I believe in humans.
I’m rooting for all of us to make it.
I’ve come to appreciate that despite our innumerable differences, we all want to be treated with dignity and kindness. We all yearn to know that we matter. We all want to be seen, accepted, and loved simply as we are.
I’m interested in what gets in the way.
Sometimes the obstacle begins within: our ego, fear, and shame can eat at us and make it difficult for us to be kind even to ourselves let alone to others. Each of us is also implicitly biased in favor of and against groups of humans based upon our upbringing, lived experiences, and the ideas to which we have been exposed. And over the decades and centuries of our modern existence, we’ve built societal mores, rules, policies, structures, and systems that preference some while demeaning or excluding others.
There is so much work to do, at all levels, to build a human community in which we all matter. I want to do my small part.
As someone who has the privilege of writing and publishing books, I’ve decided that the twin practices endemic in American publishing of describing characteristics of race, class, sexual orientation, and other identities only when deemed “the other,” and of assuming that all readers belong to a particular demographic group are no longer tolerable. I’m using my newest book Your Turn: How to Be an Adult to demonstrate that we can, and must, write inclusive books. You can read about how I’ve attempted to do that, here.
It’s up to you and me to treat all humans with dignity and kindness and to inspire others to do the same. We can do this. It’s well past time.
Bio
Julie Lythcott-Haims believes in humans and is deeply interested in what gets in our way. Her work encompasses writing, speaking, teaching, mentoring, and activism.
She is the New York Times bestselling author of How to Raise an Adult which gave rise to a popular TED Talk. Her second book is the critically-acclaimed and award-winning prose poetry memoir Real American, which illustrates her experience as a Black and biracial person in white spaces. Her third book, Your Turn: How to Be an Adult, has been called a “groundbreakingly frank” guide to adulthood.
Julie holds degrees from Stanford, Harvard Law, and California College of the Arts. She currently serves on the boards of Black Women’s Health Imperative, Narrative Magazine, and on the Board of Trustees at California College of the Arts. She serves on the advisory boards of LeanIn.Org, Sir Ken Robinson Foundation and Baldwin For the Arts.
She lives in Palo Alto, California with her partner of over thirty years, their itinerant young adults, and her mother. She is a member of the Palo Alto City Council.