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As you read through my final reflection. I want you to remember this, always: Women? We are sooo cool!
Women preserve; Art and historic spaces in DC like the George Washington Home that have helped to continue the art of storytelling in History. Women Take Risks: Anna Murray Douglass not only helped her husband escape slavery but also played a pivotal role in keeping their family running and helping other fugitives. Women lift other women: Ms Sarah Holt, Dean Schwietz, Dr Al Sada and Dean Fisher played such a pivotal role in ensuring this class and trip was as successful and as enriching and that is soo cool!
Even though it was not my first time in the US, it was my second visit after a long time. One thing I have always said was that people in the US always seem so busy! They always look like they are running late for something, but in my country (which is also something I can easily relate with Doha) we live life at a physically “slower” pace. We will stop to say hi, we smile at people, and we even just generally walk slower (Americans walk so quickly!)
I am a firm believer in experiential learning because I can imagine that if we had been learning all this information in a classroom, reading 100 pages every day, it would not have had the same effect on us as it does now. Taking us all away from what we consider our usual settings and into what, to most of us, was a new space allowed us to bond in a whole different way.
We laughed, sang, cried, ate, shopped, and explored together. It was a level of vulnerability that I had not experienced with people that I knew in such a short period of time. It made me solidify my thoughts on the complete power of passion. Regardless of the differences in our change-making stories, our vision aligned so much that it transformed us. I do not think that the Nelly I was before and after this trip are the same.
I feel more empowered now. I believe in the power of my empathy and sensitivity. A trait I always considered a weakness. I do not need to suppress parts of me to prove leadership, each part of my personality makes me who I am. Women are leaders and changemakers just as they are, women. Not as women who try to be performative leaders who suppress their feminine traits to appear more likeable. That feels so inspiring to say out loud.
Having an all-female group felt like the biggest paradox of the 21st century because I felt very safe because it was just women, but I also felt the need to feel unsafe because it was just women. However, I appreciated having a group of amazing women around all the time. I believe that it is important to have your communities in spaces like the US that feel like it could be easy to self-isolate.
I am always inspired by women who work hard to create such amazing spaces for young women like me. This course is one of those experiences that will always be a reference in our stories as leaders, all the parts of it felt so carefully curated to help us learn and unlearn and re-learn ourselves, others, our communities and all the social justice issues that we wish to solve.
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