Dr. Jameca Cooper explains how women and girls of color can define their own stories as the foundation for healing. She shares her full identity narrative, from her education at Tougaloo College to her work as a counseling psychologist, showing how to consciously own your story rather than let external labels define you.
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Hi, this is Dr. Jameca Cooper, and I promised I would make sure to provide more information on radical healing on this channel. So today I'm going to talk about a part of my book which is titled I Am My Sister's Keeper. I know you can't see it because it's backwards, upside down, inside out. I Am My Sister's Keeper: The Brown Girl's Guide to Radical Healing. Healing. And I want to talk about a specific part of the book, the workbook. I've mentioned some of the other aspects of the book before in other videos, so make sure you check those out. But today I want to focus on the part that is the testimony. What is your testimony? I included that in this workbook because I think for women of color or girls of color, it is important for you to know your own story. One of the questions I ask people to think about reflect on in their own lives is how do you define yourself? What is your story? So what is your story? I'll start, I'll tell you my story is I'm of course an African American female middle-aged woman. I grew up in Arkansas, southeastern Arkansas, went to college in Mississippi at, um, Tougaloo College, a historically Black college and university, went to graduate school in the Midwest, and I am a counseling psychologist. I define myself as being a heterosexual woman. I define myself as African American. I also have different ethnicities that are part of my genealogy according to Ancestry, and I define myself as a married woman, as a, a mom, a parent. I define myself as a person who has been racially oppressed and discriminated against in this country. I define myself as a person that doesn't have any observable disabilities. I define myself as a person that is somewhat religious in, in nature. I definitely grew up in a Southern Baptist church, so I know all of the different aspects and components of that. However, I'm quite open to other religions as well. So those are the ways that I define myself. Um, that's what I go by every day. That's what I wake up in the morning and think. I would also describe myself as a confident individual. A person with a high amount of self-esteem. I really kind of always had that. I think it's hard to work with individuals in therapy when they have lower self-esteem because it's one of those things that you can work on piece by piece, but it's always best if you just kind of have it innately. So those are the ways that I define myself. It's best to define yourself as to letting the community or society or the people around you define who you are. You get to define who you are. You get to say what you are and what you are not. But as a part of the book, the part that focuses on what is your testimony, what is your past, what is your history, what are the things that have happened in your life that make you who you are? Those are very important, whether they're good or whether they're bad. Those, all those things have rolled together to make you the individual that you are today. So I think it's very important for women of color to focus on those. Because it helps us to really identify and acknowledge the pieces of us that make us who we are. So stay tuned for more videos on radical healing, and again, don't forget to purchase the book I Am My Sister's Keeper: The Brown Girl's Guide to Radical Healing. You can find it on Amazon. I am Dr. Jameca, also known as Dr. Jameca Whitty Cooper. Tune in for more videos and don't forget to subscribe.
