This Is Us
I don’t think this is the official graduation photo — although who knows, this is a very unorthodox program! — but it’s one of the photos that were taken as we were getting ready to graduate…that is, about to be let loose into the world as brand new Community Dharma Leaders!
You can’t tell by looking at the photo (even after clicking to enlarge), but this is absolutely, positively the most diverse group of people I have ever been a part of. Not just in terms of race — although there certainly was that — but also in terms of gender identity, body size, sexual orientation, age, nationality, language, economic status, cultural background, religious tradition (we’re not all Buddhists!), level of formal education, health, other-able-bodied, marital status, family configuration, etc etc etc. (In case you can’t tell, I’m the late-middle-aged, upper-middle-class white woman, with glasses and pink-and-silver hair, wearing a striped sweater, near the middle of the pack, on the right.)
It wasn’t easy to navigate all these differences. But it was possible.
And it was liberating.
Look out world. Here we come!!!