155. Love and Light: Transforming Bias with Amber Ontiveros

[00:00:00] Welcome to Episode 155 of Girl, Take the Lead for each week we explore womanhood and

[00:00:19] leadership. And I'm your host, Yol Canny. Amber Antiveros-Genex joins us to discuss her book,

[00:00:29] Heal the Four Woundings, a guide to end discord and discrimination. After a life altering near

[00:00:37] death experience, Amber recognized the limitations of traditional racial equity conversations

[00:00:45] and was inspired to innovate. She is an unconscious bias coach and has crafted tools

[00:00:52] grounded in the neuroscience of unconscious bias to heal herself from beliefs that result

[00:00:59] in discord, discrimination and oppression. Amber is also a long time civil rights activist

[00:01:09] and served in advisory roles in the U.S. Department of Transportation for both the Bush

[00:01:14] and Obama administrations and now runs Antiveros Associates, specializing in change management,

[00:01:23] policy development, executive and spiritual coaching. She has an amazing story to tell,

[00:01:31] especially about the light and love she lives in today and helps her clients listen mindfully

[00:01:38] and awaken grace. Part of her story though includes being raped so around 9 minutes 30

[00:01:46] seconds. You might want to skip those few seconds if that topic is a trigger for you.

[00:01:52] Enjoy the listen. Here you go. Amber, oh my friend, I really feel like a closeness to you.

[00:02:03] Feel like we're sisters. Me too. And I'm so glad you're here and going to share your story

[00:02:10] with everybody. And maybe let's start by just you introducing yourself to the listeners

[00:02:20] and telling them a little bit about your background because it is friggin amazing.

[00:02:27] Yeah, so let's see where to start. Obviously I'm Amber. I'm Latina. I was born in

[00:02:38] Arizona in Phoenix. I grew up poor on a farm in Arizona. I was very blessed,

[00:02:50] very blessed and I grew up poor and I was lucky in that I worked really hard and I kind of

[00:02:59] followed my passion and I accidentally ended up here in Portland, Oregon. And I met a Black woman

[00:03:10] who was a senator and you know everything is not accidental. And she saw something in me that I

[00:03:23] didn't see in me. And I know that it was my mother who had passed, who had put her in my life.

[00:03:31] And so I ended up working for a Black senator for many years. I became a lobbyist and then

[00:03:38] I ended up working for the head of TriMet which is a transit agency here in Portland.

[00:03:43] And ultimately I was recruited to work for the Bush administration and the Obama administration

[00:03:48] and I'm an expert in several federal civil rights laws that I wrote and I've investigated

[00:03:56] agencies for discrimination and compliance with the federal law that I wrote all across the

[00:04:01] country for many years. And so the thing that we're going to talk about which is the

[00:04:09] discrimination and oppression that lives within me

[00:04:13] is not, does not go unnoticed about the irony and the hilarity for which the infinite creator has.

[00:04:30] Yeah I get that. I think our listeners will get that too. What about the book?

[00:04:36] Could you tell them a little bit about the book? Yeah so I left the Obama administration in 2014.

[00:04:45] They kicked my butt because we did everything. And then I started my business and

[00:04:51] was helping agencies implement some of the things that I had learned all over the country.

[00:04:58] I learned about what not to do and through learning what not to do I could help agencies

[00:05:03] figure out what to do. But you know I have a rare disease and I talk about this in the book that

[00:05:12] one day I was in my bed and the next minute Yolanda I was floating through the ceiling.

[00:05:22] And I was floating through this ceiling and I was in pure blackness and I can feel it.

[00:05:32] I can feel it right now. And that pure blackness felt so good. And one minute I was there and the

[00:05:44] next minute there was like a tiny pinprick of light on the other side of what was like infinity.

[00:05:52] And it called me. It called me. And it sucked me into it like

[00:05:59] like a vacuum. And the next minute I was in an expansion of light.

[00:06:08] And the reason why I call the being of light that was there the infinite creator

[00:06:15] is because it was infinite expansion of light and I knew there was nothing beyond its creation.

[00:06:25] And it's very hard to explain and try and process and describe but it felt like

[00:06:34] one it was a being of light. And I remembered everything because when you're not in the body

[00:06:45] you are everything because you're a spark of that which is you're a spark of the consciousness

[00:06:53] of God. That's who we really are. That is what lives within us is a spark of the consciousness

[00:07:00] of God. And so in that moment I remembered everything because I am everything and so are

[00:07:08] you. And so you both remember everything and you feel what you really are which is you are the

[00:07:17] you are the harmonic of love. It had a harmonic. I could talk for hours about that even though it

[00:07:26] only was minutes it felt like an eternity and I went through essentially a life review of every

[00:07:35] experience I had ever had. It came back into my essence and I felt all of the good things

[00:07:43] that I had done in my lifetime and all of the ways that I had hurt people.

[00:07:51] And I experienced it from a higher perspective from that perspective of the infinite creator.

[00:07:59] And so when I came back it shocked me. It cracked my consciousness. It woke me up.

[00:08:06] I realized I had to die so that I could live.

[00:08:11] And that I was not seeing what was real. I was not seeing what was real and so I studied

[00:08:20] I became completely overnight obsessed with consciousness and quantum mechanics and the

[00:08:25] neuroscience of unconscious bias and these really bizarre things and somehow I knew all

[00:08:31] of these things about quantum mechanics and consciousness and unconscious bias because

[00:08:37] when you go over there you are a part of it and it somehow encodes into you.

[00:08:43] And why did I write this book? I wrote this book because the infinite creator helped me see

[00:08:55] Oh no baby you are angry with the white man who is angry over black lives matter

[00:09:06] but those very oppressive thoughts live within you.

[00:09:11] Right clarity on these things right? I mean this it just sounds like you got

[00:09:17] completely clear to see your sight of things too.

[00:09:22] It lives within me yes. And so as a result of that and studying these things I realized that

[00:09:33] that darkness lived within me and if I'm really going to be a change management expert and

[00:09:38] going to be a leader in discrimination and going to be a woman a person of color and

[00:09:44] a bi woman and if I'm really going to be a leader in these things I have to stand up

[00:09:50] and announce to the world how do you actually change it? And the infinite creator gave me the

[00:09:58] tools to change myself. And the book both identifies the problem and the solution that

[00:10:09] lives within me and that lives within you because like I said I am a policy advisor.

[00:10:15] We identify the problem and the potential solutions regardless of where it takes us.

[00:10:26] And in this case the reason why we act the way that we do

[00:10:34] and we are oppressive or we're triggered or we're jealous or whatever it's all the same thing.

[00:10:42] So I ended up calling the book The Four Woundings because what's really happening

[00:10:49] is the brain is holding you hostage

[00:10:58] to only allowing you to experience through your sense perceptions

[00:11:06] what you believe about yourself. Right, right. And so there's this part of the brain called

[00:11:15] the reticular activation system and whatever you believe about yourself if you think you're

[00:11:22] awesome in my case I suck because I had been raped. I had gone through a lot of trauma. I

[00:11:28] had been discriminated against a lot. All of those things color yourself and create

[00:11:37] traumas and woundings that unless you have healed from them your brain automatically applies

[00:11:48] those filters to new experiences because it's quickly categorizing experiences

[00:11:55] because it's like it's thinking oh that's a lion. I need to quickly analyze that experience

[00:12:01] so that I don't get eaten by the lion. So it's doing that constantly and applying your filters

[00:12:08] which are your expectations namely experiences that affirm my bias.

[00:12:16] And so the four woundings are I am not enough. I am not enough is the belief that I have to

[00:12:28] compare myself to you my beautiful white sisters that are listening and because I believe that

[00:12:39] and I believe the white aesthetic that I no longer do now I believe that I'm not worthy

[00:12:44] because you are the standard of beauty. And because we've been told what we've been told

[00:12:55] I then think I have to compete with you the beautiful white woman and that in order for me

[00:13:02] to compete with you I have to win which means I'm going to deny you a resource or I'm going

[00:13:10] to do something ugly to oppress you because in the past I had somehow been denied a resource

[00:13:19] so that's how it's playing out. Those are the four woundings.

[00:13:23] I am not worthy. I am not enough. I have to win and I don't have enough. Those are

[00:13:29] the four woundings and they play out in work, in oppression, they play out in

[00:13:36] discrimination, they play out with girlfriends, they play out with partners.

[00:13:43] Yeah definitely I can see that when we've been when there's a trauma

[00:13:50] that's happened how we can go to that neural pathway that's so you know just trying to

[00:13:59] protect us and how these things can and it's I had a beautiful weekend with some

[00:14:07] friends some college friends and when there's no comparison and when there's no competition

[00:14:13] and there's only love for each other oh my god is that just not the deepest connection

[00:14:19] you could have with somebody this just fills you up and but I think your the book lays out

[00:14:29] so many wonderful things from the neuroscience point of view and then showing us how we see

[00:14:37] the world differently each of us so that discrimination and the discord comes from

[00:14:46] us seeing the world differently that's right and then maybe talk a little bit too about

[00:14:54] the different biases because you spend some time talking about the ones that are self-serving

[00:15:03] and also those that are unconscious and I think you know it's all because that's happening in

[00:15:10] our brain right like you were saying before so how are they different well okay so

[00:15:17] there are so many there you know the neuroscience has studied all these different types of biases

[00:15:26] right there's you know bias against women etc but when I read when I read all all these

[00:15:34] different biases the reason why I included I included two but I'll really talk about the

[00:15:41] two in the book and then the third so the two in the book that I talk about is one is called

[00:15:48] the self-serving bias and I'm going to talk about these three because all of the rest of

[00:15:55] them really boil down to these three so the self-serving bias is it's a self-protected

[00:16:04] self-esteem protective mechanism it's an evolutionary mechanism so

[00:16:12] the way it works is if good things happen to me I attribute it to myself of course if bad

[00:16:19] things happen to me I attribute it to things outside of myself so I apply for a job I try

[00:16:26] and get the job I don't get the job I don't get the job because I blame it on all these

[00:16:31] other factors and it helps me with the challenge to get the job so that I can eat

[00:16:41] that's why it's that's why it's important the mini me bias which is also a bias it's you

[00:16:51] basically pick people that are like you in hiring now why is that also evolutionary

[00:16:59] because back in the caveman days if if the other tribes weren't like us they would likely steal

[00:17:07] our food in our women and our and our children so we would pick tribe we wouldn't let other

[00:17:14] tribes be in our tribe unless they looked like us or were like us so again it's evolutionary

[00:17:21] now this third bias your brain has a negative bias so in the book and everyone that knows me

[00:17:32] knows I only talk about positive things and there are two reasons why well actually three

[00:17:42] one is because your brain has a negative bias if you if you see five things it will look at

[00:17:48] all those five things negatively it's biased to the negative always okay now but if you know that

[00:17:57] and you understand what the reticular activation system is doing you have to when you have a

[00:18:02] negative experience you have to reframe that experience always in the positive even if it

[00:18:08] was negative because you're retraining your r.i.s filter to then only see positive things

[00:18:16] because then it will change the way the brain see you see and experience things to only

[00:18:23] experience positive things and I want to see I want to have my life awesome right right the

[00:18:30] other reason why I do that and this is this is probably for me the most important which is

[00:18:38] from that near-death experience I was shown that

[00:18:46] the kingdom of heaven that is within you is the consciousness of the infinite creator in which case

[00:18:54] all that power that you have is within you in which case you want to create have

[00:19:04] positive power come back to you not negative one love that in the book you talk oh you have

[00:19:15] some wonderful passages and one of my favorite was dr kings and I'm just gonna say it I'm

[00:19:22] just gonna read it real quick darkness cannot drive out darkness only light can do that

[00:19:29] hate cannot drive out heat only love can do that I think that was just like what you

[00:19:39] were talking about right there yeah it is it is the key because um when when you really

[00:19:50] start practicing this Yolanda the darkness that is within me is the same darkness that

[00:20:00] is within the white man that is angry over black lives matter and and then once you

[00:20:09] fill that darkness up with love you only have compassion for the man that is angry

[00:20:18] and jealous over me and then you realize you can't combat darkness with darkness because

[00:20:29] then you're only feeding it the only way that we can combat darkness is with light

[00:20:40] if you think of it this way if this pen was a flashlight and this is the ground

[00:20:50] it's not like darkness can shine on a light and it it it removes the light it doesn't work

[00:20:58] that way that is the power of love love and and light are a metaphor for the same thing

[00:21:11] let's set that sink in for a second because I think that's so powerful and I mean and I

[00:21:17] guess I'll say one other thing Yolanda and this this will be deep the beings of light

[00:21:28] to me this darkness is simply the absence of light is simply the absence of love

[00:21:40] when in the face of the absence of love you give it more love because it doesn't have any

[00:22:07] and so I know people I need people are are confused by me when they're when they

[00:22:14] when I say I only have compassion for the racist and they're shocked by me and and I'm not saying

[00:22:23] I accept it I'm not saying that I completely that I accept the racist that is not what I'm

[00:22:30] saying what I'm saying is how am I going to show up when it is in front of me

[00:22:39] and it shows up I am going to love the racist because that's what they need

[00:22:51] and that's what's going to heal us exactly maybe we can talk a little bit more about the wounds

[00:23:06] because I think we almost have them I know that I'll have them no one gets through

[00:23:14] life without trauma yes so I know for me belonging and fitting in and assimilating and

[00:23:29] all came with the feeling of not being worthy

[00:23:33] yep and you know knowing that I was different and that

[00:23:42] the last name was Chavez and it wasn't like everybody else's and my family didn't look

[00:23:48] like anybody else's right it's just so how how can others maybe find those wounds like how

[00:24:00] how did you come to that how did you come to those four and for yourself and say this is

[00:24:08] what I think this is about so the way that I came to them is the beings of light had given

[00:24:18] me a tool called mindful listening and mindful listening is a tool that I use I use with

[00:24:25] myself and I teach my clients how to use it and so let's imagine you're in a situation where

[00:24:33] your is very traumatizing you're really triggered so what you do is you focus on the tip of your

[00:24:40] nose and as you breathe breathe in think in and as you breathe out think out and this

[00:24:47] helps you regulate your emotions it helps you

[00:24:53] compose yourself so that you can assess the situation because if you're triggered likely

[00:24:59] you're not you're not going to be able to analyze the situation accurately so you compose

[00:25:05] yourself in the and then the other thing you're doing is you're asking yourself these

[00:25:09] questions you ask yourself why am I getting angry why am I feeling the way that I'm feeling

[00:25:16] and then why what kind of beliefs would I have if I was angry and then the other two questions

[00:25:25] are you ask questions about the person that's behaving in whatever way that they're behaving

[00:25:32] why would they behave that way and what kind of beliefs would a person like that have to

[00:25:39] behave that way now why you're asking yourself these questions is because you're trying to

[00:25:47] understand you and in other words what is what are the core beliefs that are resulting

[00:25:54] you having an emotional response right and you're also trying to understand the other person

[00:26:01] about why are they behaving in the way that they are behaving and and that will help you

[00:26:06] understand their core beliefs that are resulting in their behavior because again for the listener

[00:26:14] your beliefs in your unconscious mind that you don't know exist create your thoughts

[00:26:19] that create your emotions that create your behavior and if you've ever had a behavior

[00:26:23] you have no idea where it came from it's in your brain somewhere with some kind of belief

[00:26:28] I love that I love well the whole work around beliefs it's work you know it's like you're

[00:26:35] saying you've got to work through and see what's at that core yes and I love that you bring that

[00:26:42] up because that to me is also the heart of things those beliefs and you can shake those

[00:26:50] up though because you can question them and you can say well is that really true or do I still

[00:26:58] need that anymore like that's right right maybe I had that as you know a five-year-old and that

[00:27:05] was really important for survival but I don't need it now and I can let it go yes but it's

[00:27:13] it's it just doesn't happen I think what you're showing us is that

[00:27:20] you have tools you can work with them you can find people who can help you identify these

[00:27:27] things and you can get to the core so that you can heal yes those wounds because if we're all

[00:27:34] walking around being wounded like we are right now yeah yes you know we need leaders like you

[00:27:44] to help us say hey this isn't the way this the way to we've got to look at this has come

[00:27:51] from love that's right passion for ourselves first I think we have to do that work on

[00:27:58] ourselves first yes so we can give it to other people yes I think another tool that you talked

[00:28:08] about in your book was awakening grace yes can you talk a little bit about that because

[00:28:16] that was very cool so in the near-death experience the beings of light gave me a

[00:28:23] tool that I didn't know what it was it was they called it awakening grace and awakening grace

[00:28:32] awakening stands for to to turn to go within to witness and see false dark self-loathing

[00:28:47] oppressive beliefs it's basically turning within to see yourself that's the awakened part

[00:28:57] grace is then extending kindness love and compassion and grace so in other words awakening

[00:29:07] turning within to see yourself and grace to extend compassion loving kindness

[00:29:14] and through awakening your grace you then do what Yolanda just said which is you can then

[00:29:22] extend the hand of love to another once you awaken your grace you can then extend the

[00:29:28] hand of love to another so the awakening grace tools that I now use with other executives are

[00:29:39] so many like mindful listening I do an exercise called breaking the habit of being small

[00:29:48] and that ties with the visualization exercise because this is all based on neuroplasticity

[00:29:57] so your brain doesn't understand the difference between an imaginary versus a real experience

[00:30:04] so when you do these visualization experiences and techniques that I use

[00:30:11] right before you go to bed it locks that in and it builds your confidence because

[00:30:18] your brain doesn't understand the difference between a fake and a real one so awakening

[00:30:24] grace is all about turning within to see the quote darkness that is simply the absence

[00:30:35] of light and love and so you find those things and you compassionately love those parts of

[00:30:42] yourself and then you can become the best version of whoever you want to be yeah

[00:30:48] yeah we did an episode about a book called no bad parts

[00:31:01] and it I just really loved the idea that we can be all of these things we can be our experiences

[00:31:12] and we can embrace all of them and I used to think well I need to get rid of that one so

[00:31:18] that I could be this better person but maybe it's more about the awakening part of accepting

[00:31:27] yes that that's me and that was there for a reason yeah yeah and and the way I would say

[00:31:37] and I'm going to say this because this is this is the way the creator talks to me

[00:31:44] I would say this to you my sister Yolanda you were always perfect you just were programmed

[00:31:52] to believe that you weren't and those things that were quote your imperfections or your

[00:32:01] darkness you had to experience to be the Yolanda that you are today okay another episode where I am

[00:32:12] the tears are coming because you touched my heart so deeply that's that's that's how he speaks

[00:32:19] that's the real that is the real thing he's talking to me right now so cool okay another

[00:32:31] episode this little girl is like oh my god we're crying again oh but I think

[00:32:40] how can that not be so beautiful I mean that is just so beautiful and it's so touching and

[00:32:46] you know to have that light and that love come in you know it's almost like a beam that just

[00:32:53] goes right to the hurt yes you know and just goes boom it's like we're gonna we're gonna

[00:33:01] flip that well you know we've covered our questions that we had outlined when we talked

[00:33:10] before and is there anything else that you would like to pass along I mean you've given us love

[00:33:18] and understanding and compassion is there anything left I mean you did such a great job

[00:33:30] let's see what I don't know what else do you think I should talk about Yolanda

[00:33:34] I think my takeaway because you talk a lot about this in the book is self-love yeah

[00:33:47] okay I'll I will I'll talk about that so um we have it wrong

[00:34:00] we have it wrong Yolanda we first must love ourself

[00:34:08] we must love ourself first because when you go back to what I said at the beginning

[00:34:19] for those of you that can see I have my hand up and in the middle think of your heart

[00:34:26] think of your heart as the spark of consciousness within you you have to love yourself

[00:34:35] love yourself unconditionally love yourself and when you then love yourself in the way that you

[00:34:45] are loved that comes to you because that is what's within you that you are calling

[00:34:54] forth do you get it it's manifestation so if you are if you are consciousness if there is a

[00:35:01] consciousness within you that is that powerful and you do not love you that is what you are

[00:35:08] calling forth so you have to love you including when you make a mistake when you make a mistake

[00:35:17] it is here's why this is also a love story it's a love story because when you made a

[00:35:25] mistake you were unconscious you were unconscious you made the mistake from your past it wasn't

[00:35:36] real you were innocent that's what I learned in my NDE and I realized that I was like oh

[00:35:44] my gosh but I'd hurt all these people and so therefore I wanted I had to come back

[00:35:50] so that I could learn all these things so that I could teach people you don't have to live this

[00:35:56] way and also you can't live this way because you're a spark of God it's not who you really are

[00:36:13] you are amazing you are so amazing and your book is so amazing I hope it helps people

[00:36:24] I want everyone to listen to this episode

[00:36:30] everyone needs to listen to it but oh my gosh thank you thank you Yolanda and I just

[00:36:40] want to say one last thing to everybody that's listening you don't understand the true nature

[00:36:48] and true power that's within you but when you're ready and you're ready to tap into it

[00:36:52] and you then harness it you can literally be anything that you want that's real thank you

[00:37:07] again I love you take care of yourself you're so special thank you for listening today and

[00:37:18] we sure hope you enjoyed this episode and if you did please leave us a comment wherever

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[00:37:44] we've recently expanded to YouTube music where you can find a video of this episode

[00:37:51] here are the three takeaways from this episode one everything is not

[00:38:00] accidental two the only way to combat darkness is with light and three the secret is self-love

[00:38:15] you can't give what you don't have our next episode we'll explore a bit more about the

[00:38:25] spiritual awakenings after a dear nath experience I have questions after listening to Amber's

[00:38:31] story that got me going then maybe you tip like how common are near-death experiences

[00:38:39] and are other experiences like Amber's so I found a study that Dr. Bruce Grayson who has

[00:38:48] been studying the field since the mid-1970s as professor of psychiatry and director of the

[00:38:55] Division of Perceptual Studies at the University of Virginia Health System

[00:39:01] and he's credited with the term near-death experience and then I found this book titled

[00:39:08] after a doctor explores what near-death experiences reveal about life and beyond

[00:39:14] I was in and hope you will be too so join us again thanks for being here and I'll talk to you soon bye