International Women’s Day - Embracing Equity
Why equal chance often means different support.
The theme of this year’s International Women’s Day is #EmbraceEquity in all its forms. We are all responsible for creating an inclusive world and we have the power to do so through our everyday actions. The way we relate to one another and take part in life everyday, reflects our values and beliefs. Embracing equity means valuing and supporting all differences. Equity is not the same as equality. We cannot have equality without equity. As Naheed Dosani says:
“Equality is giving everyone a shoe; equity is giving everyone a shoe that fits.”
This is as important in the context of counselling and psychotherapy as in anywhere else. In order to learn about each person’s unique experience, we need to acknowledge that we don’t all come with the same privileges and we’ve not all had the same starting point or journey in life. While, as a counsellor, I don’t have the power to change my clients’ circumstances, I can support them in becoming better equipped for facing them.
Equity in therapy
How exactly does the topic of equity occur in the therapeutic space? Something that immediately comes to mind is what I often hear my clients say: “I should be able to…. cope, manage, do better” etc. The idea that we should be able to do something just because others seem to, comes up often. Why may one person find certain situations much more stressful than another? What makes something completely unbearable for one, while someone else barely notices it happening? If you put 2 people in the exact same situation, they will still have a different experience and each of them will process it differently. How, will depend on many factors including previous experiences, their physical and mental health, current stress levels, the way they’ve been brought up and even what generations before them went through. A traumatic event experienced by someone who comes from a supportive family with a secure socioeconomic status may be distressing at the time, but might not lead to significant trauma with long term consequences. Someone who grew up impacted by adverse experiences, on the other hand, is likely to find processing the same traumatic event significantly more challenging. These two people didn’t have the same ride in life and we cannot expect them to recover within the same timeframe or by providing them with the same amount and type of support.
Acknowledging own biases
Learning about someone else’s experiences and trying to truly understand it, involves becoming aware of our own biases and acknowledging our assumptions. One of the pillars of gestalt psychotherapy (more about gestalt therapy here) is the way we approach exploring the client’s experience, called the phenomenological method of inquiry. This involves becoming aware of my own assumptions as I’m present to my client sharing their story. As a human being I cannot avoid having certain biases and assumptions about life based on my own experiences, circumstances, beliefs and values. These may be very different to my clients’. By noticing these assumptions, I am then able to “park them” or put them in a metaphorical “pocket” where they can stay, while I’m taking in what my client is sharing. Instead of assuming I know what they mean, I put aside my interpretations of their words and I ask them to describe their meaning to me. I consider everything from the way they speak, sit, what they say, how their facial expressions change and what they seem to be choosing to leave out, as equally important. I am not an expert on my clients’ experiences, they’re the ones who know the most about their life.
Gender equity
The theme of gender equity comes up in therapy in sneaky, yet ubiquitous ways. There are many situations in life where men and women don’t have equal rights and opportunities even if they are given the same tasks within the same environment. Women who have children certainly don’t have an even playing ground with men who are fathers. Much more unpaid labour is still being done by women and this is not just physical tasks such as housework and childcare, but also a lot of mental labour of ensuring that everything and everyone is taken care of. All of the energy spent doing this is what women often lack for taking care of themselves or investing in their career. Another example of gender inequity is the context of domestic and family violence where women face much higher risks than men. Many of my female clients struggle with beliefs around their value and worth as a person being directly linked to their appearance. It’s not a big surprise considering they’ve been fed these messages since they were little girls. A huge amount of time, energy and money goes into maintaining their looks. This is energy that could, again, be invested elsewhere. Such issues are rarely the case for my male clients. As long as women are kept busy making sure they look how the world expects them to and proving that they can do their jobs as well as be good mothers, all the while trying to stay safe from male violence, we don’t have equity and cannot achieve equality.
Equity as a means to equality
Men and women are different, we have different bodies, different needs and women face challenges unique to our gender. However, equity goes beyond gender. Equity is about addressing each person’s unique challenges in a way that allows everyone to have equal opportunities. We cannot do this without learning about these challenges from those experiencing them. Let’s start with becoming aware of our biases, parking them, and listening with our whole body as if we didn’t know the meaning of anything being shared. Because we don’t. We don’t know what something means for someone else, we don’t know what it feels like for them and we don’t know what they need. One size doesn’t fit all and everyone’s needs for the best chance in life are different. Let’s set aside our assumptions, listen and learn from each other.
