# My Grandmother's Hands by Resmaa Menakem - Blinkist What’s in it for me? Learn how we can heal the trauma of racism. Anti-Black racism is part of America’s DNA. Whether it’s the country’s history of slavery, its widespread police violence, or the small, day-to-day injustices Black people experience, the burden of racism weighs down on every single American today. This is not just true for Black Americans, but for white Americans too.  The burden of racism is best described as a cumulative trauma caused by historical, social, and personal events. And such deep trauma always affects the body. It changes our nervous system and brain chemistry. That’s why, as these blinks will argue, racism won’t just end through social and political change. For it to fully disappear, we also need to heal our bodies from the trauma it has induced.  These blinks will guide you in how to do just that – as an individual and as part of your community. But first, they will help you understand how we got here in the first place, tracing the trauma of racism from the brutal European Middle Ages to its modern incarnation of police killings. In these blinks, you’ll learn which simple body exercises can help you begin to heal your personal trauma; why police encounters often end so violently for Black Americans; and how America can overcome white body supremacy. Racism lives in our bodies. When the author was a child, he spent a lot of time with his grandmother. She would often ask him to massage her aching hands while they were watching TV. One day, he asked her why her fingers were so swollen and thick. She explained that it was from picking cotton. She had started working on a plantation when she was only four years old, and the sharp burrs of the plant had torn up her hands.  This is just one powerful example of the marks that racism leaves on the body. But not all of the bodily trauma that racism causes is visible. One of the most pernicious things about racism is that its roots and consequences are often hidden. In fact, with the exception of white supremacists, most people don't consciously engage in racism – but they often perpetuate it nonetheless. The key message here is: Racism lives in our bodies.  The author’s wife once observed a Walmart employee whose job entailed randomly selecting customers after check-out to see if their receipts matched the items in their shopping carts. Except her selection was not at all random – she seemed to exclusively target Black customers. The author’s wife alerted a supervisor to this racial profiling. When the supervisor talked to the employee, she seemed genuinely sorry and surprised. It hadn’t even occurred to her that she was only checking Black people.  For many white Americans, racism is so deeply ingrained into their nervous systems that they don’t even register how they contribute to it. For Black Americans, on the other hand, racial injustice is so quotidian that they can’t even afford to pay much attention to how it affects their bodies.  But it does. In a country in which white bodies are routinely valued higher than Black bodies, Black people suffer disproportionately from physical and mental distress. They are more often subject to direct violence, such as police brutality, and they experience higher rates of stress, depression, and anxiety. As a result, they more often suffer from stress-related diseases such as high blood pressure, diabetes, and alcoholism.  Racism in the US is always a bodily experience – both for its victims and its perpetrators. It’s a trauma caused by the cumulative effect of American history, the country’s social systems, and daily injustices. And it’s buried deep in the body of every American. Trauma compounds over time, between individuals, and across generations. Our body’s main goal is to feel safe, or settled. When our body is settled, we are calm and collected. But when our body perceives a threat, it enters a state of high alert to help us quickly respond to the situation – for example, by fighting our attacker or fleeing the scene. Sometimes a threat is so overwhelming that our body gets stuck in this state of high alert. This is what therapists refer to as a trauma. Everyone experiences trauma differently. But that doesn’t mean that trauma is always an individual, isolated experience. Like a virus, trauma can spread from person to person – sometimes affecting entire populations over the course of centuries. The key message here is: Trauma compounds over time, between individuals, and across generations.  Trauma can be a result of a single distressing event. But it can also come from many ongoing threats. This is what therapist Nancy van Dyke calls “hazy trauma.” In one way or another, all Black bodies in America suffer from this cumulative trauma.  Trauma wreaks havoc on our bodies, damaging our mental and physical health. And the way we react to trauma can make things worse. The fact is, many trauma responses are not under our direct control. They bypass our thinking brain – the brain structures that let us consciously analyze a situation – and they activate our lizard brains, which are the more primitive parts of our brain responsible for unconscious and instinctive bodily reactions.  The lizard brain steers the body toward various coping mechanisms to try to regain the body’s sense of safety. What it often ends up doing, though, is perpetuating the trauma – or even passing it on to other people. Just think of how many traumatized parents, despite their best efforts, end up traumatizing their children because they struggle with controlling their emotions or use drugs to cope. What’s more, there’s astounding scientific evidence that trauma can be transmitted genetically. Excessive stress, for example, can cause mutations in sperm cells that affect how genes are expressed in a child.  If trauma can be passed down in genes, then it can be passed on endlessly. That’s why it’s no exaggeration to say that Black, Jewish, and Native American people still suffer from the trauma that was inflicted on their ancestors centuries ago. The author calls such intergenerational trauma a soul wound. The only way to heal a soul wound is to heal the body. Race is an invention. When talking about the very real consequences of racism, it’s easy to forget that race is a wholly fictional construct. For a long time in American history, people weren’t considered “white” – they were Dutch, or French, or English, or wherever else they had emigrated from. The social category of “white people” only appeared in the late seventeenth century. Immigrants from Ireland and Italy, as well as many Jewish people, weren’t even a part of it until much later. It might surprise you to know that in some early revolts on plantations, Black enslaved people fought alongside white laborers from Scotland, Ireland, and England. Dividing working class people into Black and white, and giving the latter group marginal benefits, was actually a deliberate strategy implemented by those in power.  The key message here is: Race is an invention.  With the invention of race came the invention of white supremacy and white body supremacy. These beliefs claim that white people are intrinsically better and more valuable than anybody who isn’t. White supremacy is the reason why police routinely kill innocent Black people, while peacefully arresting white mass shooters. It’s also the reason job applications from people with“Black”-sounding names get rejected more often than applications from “white”-sounding names, regardless of qualification.  The central tenet of white supremacy, as author and academic Robin DiAngelo explains, is the myth of white fragility. White fragility is Americans’ deep but often unconscious belief that white bodies are fragile and vulnerable – and need to be protected from dangerous Black bodies. The Black body, on the other hand, is considered aggressive, hypersexual, and impervious to pain. In order for the fragile white body to be safe, the Black body needs to be controlled in any way possible.  Whether they recognize it or not, all white Americans have internalized the myth of their own fragility and the danger of the Black body. Black people have also internalized some of these toxic ideas. And they have learned to accommodate white people’s supposed fragility for their own safety. Author Brent Staples once wrote about his habit of whistling Vivaldi’s “Four Seasons” when he passed a white person on the street, so that they wouldn’t be scared of his Black body.  Centuries of compounding racial trauma have made sure that, as the author puts it, “our bodies scare the hell out of each other.” But it doesn’t have to be that way. Overcoming racism begins with healing our bodily trauma. Racism is a vicious cycle. We transmit it through our bodies onto others – often without even being aware of it. Just think back to the story about the white supermarket employee who only targeted Black people. Or consider how often Black people denigrate each for being either “too Black” or “not Black enough.” Considering how deep the trauma of racism really goes, we can begin to comprehend the horrible instances of police violence against Black people. When a white police officer encounters an unfamiliar Black body, their own body often responds in a way centuries of white supremacy have inscribed: it reacts with instinctive fear, triggers a trauma reaction, and opens fire before the police officer can engage their thinking brain. This is something white officers have to change. The key message here is: Overcoming racism begins with healing our bodily trauma. In order to heal the bodily trauma that sits so deep within us, we have to learn how to settle our bodies. This begins with your own body, whether Black or white.  Over the past decades, trauma therapists have developed a variety of exercises that can help the body regain its sense of safety. Many of them are rooted in mindfulness, meditation, and breathing practices. Others go back to ancient communal rituals involving humming, singing, and dancing.  The Body Scan is a simple mindfulness exercise you can try on your own. Find a quiet spot to sit or lie down. Close your eyes, and focus on your breath for a while. Then turn your attention to the sensations at the top of your head, observing whatever may arise in that spot without judgment. After a few breaths, continue downwards to concentrate on your forehead, then your nose, then your chin, and so on. In this way, scan your entire body. In the end, return to your breath.  Regularly practicing exercises like the Body Scan will help you acknowledge and relieve the pain and tension your body is holding onto. This will allow you to become more calm, clear-headed, and focused. And in such a state you will be less likely to pass your trauma onto others, even in high-stress situations. You might even be able to reach out to other bodies to work through collective trauma together. Your practice may differ depending on whether you’re Black, white, or a police officer. In the next blinks, you will learn how. Body-based exercises can help Black people metabolize trauma. Unresolved trauma wreaks havoc on your body and soul – and the bodies and souls of the people close to you. Not only does it cause mental disorders such as anxiety and depression, it burdens the entire nervous system and can lead to a variety of physical diseases. That’s why it’s so important for Black people to begin to heal the trauma stored in their bodies.  The key message here is: Body-based exercises can help Black people metabolize trauma. Working through your trauma means confronting it – and that can be painful. But the pain of healing your trauma steadily and patiently is a clean pain that will ultimately result in a feeling of relief. This will be far easier to endure than the lingering dirty pain of suppressing, compensating for, or fighting your trauma.  Generally speaking, trauma-processing exercises involve settling the body, paying attention to the sensations that arise, accepting any pain and discomfort, and then safely discharging that tension. We’ve already learned one exercise that can help the body move through these steps – the Body Scan. And there are countless more. Short meditations, mindfulness, and breathing exercises are great practices to incorporate into your daily life. Engaging with them just a few minutes a day will help you sense and appreciate your body in new ways.  There are also countless body-based exercises you can do along with other people. Most of these aren’t new inventions. Over the course of America’s violent history, Black people have developed a variety of practices to soothe their bodies – both individually and as a community. Black enslaved people, laborers, and prisoners often sang, hummed, and wailed together. The author’s grandmother often rocked her body back and forth when she was alone with her thoughts.  You can also try some of these tested body practices with your friends, family, and coworkers. Huddle together in a circle, and then hum and sway from side to side with one another. It might seem silly at first, but you’ll be astounded by the powerful soothing effect of synchronizing your bodies.  Apart from these exercises, general self-care will also go a long way in helping your body heal. This means getting enough rest, eating healthily, exercising regularly, and incorporating fun and relaxing activities into your day-to-day. If you’re an activist, this type of self-care is especially important. Remember that if you want to change the world, your own body is the place to start. To unravel white body supremacy, white people should start with their own bodies. Undeniably, Black bodies carry the greater burden when it comes to the trauma of racism. But that doesn’t mean that white bodies aren’t affected by trauma. Let’s not forget that a lot of white Americans – no matter where they originally came from – have their own cultural history of violence. Many of them fled to America to escape persecution in Europe. Practices like lynching weren’t invented in America; they were imports from Europe, where they’d been carried out on white people.  White Americans are also routinely subject to secondary trauma. Whether they participated in, condoned, or even fought against it, many white Americans have witnessed incredible violence inflicted upon Black and Native American bodies over the course of American history.  The key message here is: To unravel white body supremacy, white people should start with their own bodies. If you’re white, it’s not your fault that your body has internalized white body supremacy. But that’s not an excuse to perpetuate the trauma of racism by being passive about your role in its upkeep. Learning to settle your body is a crucial skill if you want to become a good ally. It will allow you to overcome some of the hypersensitivity your body has developed as a result of internalizing white fragility, and allow you to become a competent, resilient adult. A great first step toward learning how to settle your body is to adopt a simple mindfulness practice. Next time you’re around an unfamiliar Black person, pay attention to how your body feels. Are you nervous for no good reason? This could be a sign that your body has internalized the idea that Black bodies are dangerous. Try to soothe your body and help it unlearn this racist association by practicing calming body exercises. You can also train your body to become comfortable around Black bodies by regularly seeking out majority-Black restaurants, cafés, or barber shops. Once you’ve taken charge of your own body, you’ll be better able to put your anti-racist beliefs into practice. This starts with small, courageous actions in your everyday life. When shopping, for example, ask the Black salesperson for help instead of the white one. And call out white privilege when you encounter it in your family, friends, or workplace.  While you do all this, keep paying attention to your body so you notice when reflexive feelings of white body supremacy arise in yourself. Don’t berate yourself for them. Simply observe the discomfort, and then let it go. Police must learn to care for both themselves and their communities. Police violence against Black people is a terrible, all-too-frequent occurrence in America today. But police officers aren’t aliens sent from another planet to terrorize Black people. They’re human like the rest of us, and many of them aren’t white.  The problem is that their job serves white body supremacy by design. Perhaps this isn’t surprising considering that policing has its roots in “slave patrols” established in South Carolina in 1704. On top of this, police work is extremely stressful. Police departments offer no guidance in how to discharge the stress; instead, they incentivize the wrong things, like arrest rates. As a result, police in America often behave as if their purpose weren’t to serve their communities, but to subjugate them. The key message is: Police must learn to care for both themselves and their communities. If you’re a police officer, change begins – just as for anyone else – with your own body. Your job constantly exposes you to high-stress situations, and in all likelihood, you need to learn how to release that bodily tension safely.  The body-based trauma exercises outlined in the previous blinks can help you discharge some of the stress your body is subject to on duty. If you’re white, they can also help you unlearn your unconscious bias toward unfamiliar Black bodies.  You should also try to add a little softness to your life when you’re off duty. Former NBA superstar Shaquille O’Neal is a vocal fan of getting manicures as a way of calming his nerves. Settling your body in this way will help you remain calmer and more clear-headed in future high-stress situations – and potentially prevent you from reacting fatally from fear. If you’re in a leadership position with the police, you should make sure that your team is taking care of themselves in the ways already mentioned. This could mean offering meditation sessions, exercise classes, and regular therapist consultations.  Your goal as a police leader should be to train your team in true community policing. This is a form of policing that emphasizes the police’s role as a friend and helper, rather than an antagonist. You could train your team in psychological first aid, so that they can approach people in distress more safely. You could also encourage them to engage with the community they serve by volunteering or simply talking to people in the neighborhood. Doing so will not only improve the mental health of your officers, but also the health of the community. We can create a culture of anti-racism by coming together in our own communities and then expanding outward. Social change starts in our bodies, spreads to our communities, and finally transforms our culture. Our culture then creates the possibilities for future bodies to grow up with fewer burdens – and more possibilities.  America is still a long way from overcoming its deep-rooted culture of white supremacy. But the seeds for change have already been planted.  The key message here is: We can create a culture of anti-racism by coming together in our own communities and then expanding outward. Fostering a new, anti-racist culture will come from many places. It will come from creating rituals from the body-based practices in these blinks. It will come from celebrating Black American artists, activists, and intellectuals, such as the novelist Toni Morrison and poet and activist Maya Angelou. It will also come from developing new narratives about our communities and their history, and passing these on to future generations.  As we start to nurture this new culture, we should first focus on our own individual communities. This means that Black people should work on healing their bodies from racial trauma, while white people should work on acknowledging white body supremacy and actively rejecting their part in it.  That doesn’t mean that Black and white people shouldn’t engage with one another, though. The processes of healing from racism shouldn’t be isolated, but run parallel – with lots of collaboration and coordination between them.  As the majority group, white Americans have a responsibility to lead the way out of white body supremacy. But this won’t be easy. While Black Americans spend countless hours of their lives thinking about racism by necessity, many white Americans have never seriously engaged with the issue. That’s why it will be crucial for white people to engage in self-learning. This could be done in the form of reading groups, public talks, lectures, and discussion rounds.  The first thing white people will have to do is dismantle the idea of white fragility. Instead of getting defensive whenever racial issues are discussed or constantly looking to Black people to solve racism for them, white people must realize that they are strong enough to take on white supremacy themselves. Many white, anti-racist thought leaders such as Robin DiAngelo and Tim Wise have already begun the effort.  Everyone must play their part as an individual, and as an active member of their community. When this happens, we will be able to create a healthy culture that values all bodies equally, no matter their race. Final summary The key message in these blinks: Today, the trauma of racism lives deep in the bodies of Black and white Americans. It has accumulated and been passed between families and communities over the course of America’s violent history. To overcome racism, then, we must begin with healing our bodies. Individual and collective practices of meditation, mindfulness, and self-care can help us discharge the visceral stress of racism and create a counterculture to white body supremacy.  Actionable advice: Call out racist dog whistles when you encounter them.  “Dog whistles” are phrases that people use to obscure the real, racist meaning behind their message. For example, when white people speak of “urban youth,” they often simply mean Black teenagers. When you encounter dog whistles, you should always politely and directly ask the speaker about the actual intended meaning: “Urban youth? Do you mean Black teens or poor Black teens?” Got feedback? We’d love to hear what you think about our content! Just drop an email to remember@blinkist.com with My Grandmother's Hands as the subject line and share your thoughts! What to read next: Hunger, by Roxane Gay You just learned how Black and white bodies in America hold on to the trauma of racism – and what each of us can do to break the cycle. If you’re looking for a great example of someone who succeeded in breaking the cycle, you might be interested in the life story of scholar, Roxane Gay. In Hunger, Gay candidly recounts the trauma of growing up Black, lesbian, and obese. For a firsthand account of bodily trauma and how to overcome it, check out our blinks to Hunger.