Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: You. But be true to yourself.
Be true to yourself.
Do not act like you're someone else. I'm saying that to African Americans because I used to say to people, you know, you can change everything about yourself. You can change your sex, but you cannot change your ethnicity.
You.
[00:00:25] Speaker B: You are listening to exploring Satir's legacy, the Virginia Satir podcast. I'm your host, Michael Argumanis Harden, and together we will embark on the journey of self discovery, empowerment, and meaningful connection. Let's dive in.
[00:00:41] Speaker C: Today, I'm excited to introduce you to our next guest, Hilda Richards. Hilda embodies resilience, compassion, and a profound commitment to service. With a career spanning five decades, Hilda has touched countless lives through her tireless dedication to social justice, education, and community empowerment. As a lifelong advocate for marginalized communities, Hilda's journey is a testament to the power of perseverance and the transformative impact of love in action. Over the years, at numerous institutions and organizations, she has been dedicated to expanding what we refer to today as diversity, equity, and inclusion. Nursing school was a first step in a trajectory that eventually included earning two master's degrees, one in health administration and the other in psychiatric nursing and a doctorate in education from Columbia University. Among many other accomplishments, Hilda helped create the nursing program at Medigare Everest College in Brooklyn in 1972, where she became the chair of the health sciences division. This opened the door for her leadership roles in academic administration, which included becoming a dean, provost, and chancellor, often as the first black woman to hold those positions.
Join me as we embark on this journey through Hilda's life, exploring the pivotal moments, challenges overcome, lessons learned along the way, and even a friendship with Virginia Satir. Through her experiences, we gain insights into the complexities of our world and discover the profound wisdom that emerges from a.
[00:02:13] Speaker B: Life lived with purpose and passion.
[00:02:17] Speaker C: Dr. Richards, welcome. We are so glad to have you here today.
[00:02:22] Speaker A: Pleased to be with you.
It's always so good to see your face when we're on the Zoom meeting.
[00:02:29] Speaker D: I love any time that we get to spend with each other, and every time I hear parts of your story, I'm always inspired.
[00:02:35] Speaker A: Thank you.
[00:02:37] Speaker D: I would love for the listeners to hear a little bit about your story.
Would you mind sharing? I would love for them to hear parts of your story.
[00:02:45] Speaker A: Well, next week I'll be 88, so I've been around a long time. Let me tell you how I got birth.
I think it's funny, but anyway, my father had a job that took him to different places, and at the time I was to come, I was in st. Joseph missouri. I've never been back after my first few months there, but st. Joseph was very this 19 636. I'm sorry, real prejudice.
White doctors didn't.
No black doctors, whatever. So my mother tracked down a white doctor who would deliver at home. And the reason he chose to do that, because he was curious about a black child's birth. Did they have blue eyes like other children? Now, by the way, all children start off with blue eyes. They may change quickly, eastern, all that, but they all started. But he didn't know that. So thank God he was there, because I was breach.
My mother didn't want to go to the hospital because it was segregated. They put the black people in the basement on armory cops for everything if you were giving birth or if you were dying. So she didn't want to do that because she knew a friend who had given birth, and the doctor said, oh, he's going to die, and threw him on the next cop and left. So the lady got up and got a blanket, an army blanket, covered her child and held her, and that kept her son alive. So she didn't want to do that. So anyway, I got born at home with breach. So that was, I guess, my first little adventure in the world.
I moved around the country because my mother did or my father did, or somebody did. So I've been in a lot of states in the United States.
My mother was a bossy woman, and I'm a bossy woman. I took after her. But one of the problems she had that she was a black woman, and that was a problem from the get go, because actually, at some point when I was with her back and forth, she went to school and got a degree in mortuary science, could not get an internship, a residency.
The men, the black men in the program were the sons of people, but she was a woman. So a greek gentleman who had married the daughter of business has said, I'll let you come to be with me for the year, but I will not pay you.
So what she did is she did her internship, and at any time, and she worked in the shipyards at night.
We always had these little niggly things. I lived in Hawaii for a while. I came back when I was 13, and then my mother said, you will go to college, all right?
And that was years when you did what your mother know, but she said, it cannot be all black, and it has to be catholic, which was a big problem now because we were back in St. Louis, which was very racist, and they just integrated the catholic schools. And I went to an all girls school, because the bishop said, next year we're going to do it. That's how Catholics did it.
So this was a problem that the mothers went to the pope. The pope said, I got enough problems. Go home.
It got integrated. And when I was there later visiting the campus, they said they had to place some of the nuns other places because they did not want to have. So in the whole school, which got integrated, I guess in 47, before the 1954, there were 30 of us. We could sit at one table.
So when you say, why do all black people sit together? It's like, why do all white people sit together?
So it was a challenge getting through high school, because if I hadn't been, I graduated sort of almost the top of the class. If I hadn't been smart, some of the nuns would have liked me better.
There were two groups of nuns. One loved me and really helped, and the others were a little difficult.
So then I applied for nurses training, and again, it had to be catholic and it had to be integrated. And so I went to the hospital tour, asked the mother superior, could I come here? She said yes, with her irish growth. And I took the test. Little did she know I would score at the top. So my mother said, you go see the nun. So I did. And the nun said, we have a problem because we don't have any single rooms. And the mothers would get upset if you were sharing a room with one of their daughters. But if I was willing to pass for Mexico, she'd let me in dead hide my folder. I was always considered uncooperative. So uncooperative was this, I said in my little uniform.
Well, I think we were colored then, before. I have been colored for 17 years. My parents would get so upset if now they found out I was something else.
So she was angry because I wasn't cooperative. I went home. My mother was angry because I wasn't aggressive enough.
So we finally, life went on. I ended out being the first black graduate of that school of nursing, which isn't there anymore.
I went forward again. My mother said, I'm just giving you a little lens. So I went to Hunter College, which was good. I went nights and weekends and stuff, and at one point, an instructor, because I was good at group behavior, et cetera. But the white gentleman was not Zeus. He called me into his office and said, you will not succeed in a university because a university is a white male institution, and you do not have the right kind of personality.
So I did go to the bathroom and cry and went home and cried and my husband was married at that time, said, oh, you don't have to go back. I thought, now I'm going to call California to my mother and tell her that a white man said, and therefore I'm not going. I don't think so. So I didn't sort of lost the husband, but I went back and got my.
I had, you know, teachers in the school nursing class called me out of the classroom and said, oh, your paper is too advanced for the course, therefore we can't give you an a.
You give an a minus. You know what you do as I know you have Michael, you learn to breathe a lot.
Breathe a lot because you don't say anything. You just breathe. And if you can't breathe and open, you go home, or you go to the bathroom and breathe. Right?
So over the years, I helped open a college, this is in the 70s, called Medgar everest college. And I finally got my doctorate, and I was there and my boss said, you need to do some promotion. All right. So I ended out being at Ohio University, which is in Athens, Ohio, down the street from Columbus, and I helped open a new college on the university campus. It was really a nice thing, and I was there, and there were a lot of challenges. I was the first black, first woman they had as a dean. And one day, my associate dean really wanted to be just a faculty. He didn't like administration. So he's in my living room on a Saturday morning, and he said, you know, when we hired you, we thought we had the best of all possible worlds.
We got the provost to have his affirmative action candidate, and we, the chairs of their department, we knew we got a weak dean so we could be in charge. I said, how did you decide you had a weak dean? They said, because you were black and female.
Now, this was in a different time period. On the other hand, it has not changed that much. Life does not change that much.
I'm just giving you a few things.
But I kept going and kept going. And when I retired, the title was chancellor of Indiana University Northwest, which really was one of the campuses of Indiana university. The president was over the university, and the chancellors were on their campus, and they had eight campuses. They have Bloomington and iupy, but they also have Kokomo and South Bend. And my campus, which was Iu northwest, and it was in Gary. Now, Gary was a black town, but the students were white and the faculty was white. So my goal was to get more black students, et cetera. So that's among the things I did.
[00:13:52] Speaker D: It is incredible to me, because it's a hard space to grow in when you're female and then when you're black, a minority of any kind. But as a black woman, and you went from faculty to dean to provost and then chancellor, growing through the whole thing. And really, that's why I refer to you as a trailblazer. You were the first black woman to do a lot of things, and you opened the doors for many of us who are following behind you.
[00:14:23] Speaker A: Both of us are part of the Virginia satir network or whatever. They changed the name on me. I like the other name better. But anyway, Avanta. Yeah. So if I slip and say Avanta, you know what I'm talking about.
[00:14:38] Speaker D: Absolutely.
[00:14:39] Speaker A: And when I became a member of it, I was it, I represented everything that wasn't.
And Virginia Suarez, who I think was a member and is obviously a Latino, became the CEO. And so it was her and me for years. So the fact that over the years they've had a couple of african women, they have you who have been on the board, I'm thinking board members, because I was on the board for a long time is a wonderful thing. For know, I know that it's interesting that sometimes the satir model, it survives easier in other countries, surely in China, but they're looking.
And when John Brandon went over, but because of the history of the United States, we are just so know there are really more black slaves that went over to Brazil than to the United States, but they didn't have this over thing. And so now they do have the pyramid. The more white people on top than on bottom. But in relationship to being integrated and being, talking easily to one another, they're historically much better than we have been in the United States.
[00:16:19] Speaker D: You brought up Satir global. When did you get connected with Avanta?
[00:16:26] Speaker A: All right, now I connected with Virginia Satir long before there was Avanta. All right. So actually in the Harlem at a center that was opened actually by a lady who died, and I'm going to be in her.
She was 99 and a half, and I was always twelve years younger than her. So anyway, I was working in Harlem and it was Martin, let me tell you a little bit about the center. I worked in June, Jasmine Christmas had come back to Harlem, really to build psychiatric department, because there had been none in Harlem, which sounds stupid, but it doesn't look all right. So she wrote a grant and ended out writing me in. So I was in the grant, and again, the early sixty s, I got my first master's degree. And the people we were working with people who were coming out of state hospitals had no street people then, because we had state hospitals. And the first two or three ways, that was all right. The center was to really help socialize folks for the world, both home skills and jobs. We had a job fame, all right, our staff. We had professional staff, social workers. But most of our staff we called paraprofessionals. And these were african american folks who had tough backgrounds. I mentioned something else. One was on lifetime parole. Let me tell you why in the something, because this is 60. He and his father had done some hard work, et cetera, and had a lot of cash money. They used to use cash, right?
But they went into a bar and got. Because they were a little too happy with their money. And so some folks saw him, so they went and they stole their money. And the two gentlemen weren't happy. They went home and got their guns and killed them.
So he had been in prison for 20 years, and now he was left in parole. We had a woman who was trying to raise her child and lived in a building where she had to step over the trunk to get into her apartment. And there were people shooting up on the roof. And we helped her through that. So the staff was.
Most of them were what we call paraprofessionals. And we did the training as well as working with the clients.
When the riots came with Martin Luther King, the people on the street protected our building because we were so supportive of them and then of us. And that was a wonderful thing.
I remember June, my boss, saying, you got to go. I said, no, I didn't live in.
We lived other places. So that was really an inspiring experience.
He was assassinated in 68. So it was about 69.
A friend of mine who was a therapist and did training, and I was getting more training, whose name was Ruth Cohen, invited me to lunch, saying, there was a lady coming to lunch that you might like, or she might, whatever. And it was Virginia satir, tall, blonde looking woman. Now, I was, like, very young, and she was, too. And our inexperiences really showed in some of what I want to say next.
She was developing her month long and invited me to it, and I said I would go. And it was in Montana or Minnesota, one of those cold states. And I thought even in August, I thought it was going to be cold. So I had to buy a new coat. Anyway, we went through the experience, and we clicked.
She said, I'll come to Harlem and help do stuff. And, of course, many people in our secure thing know she could do magic. And therefore, so she went to Harlem, and magic didn't happen.
Now, I'm telling you, the background of some of the staff, et cetera. This big, blonde white woman. What is she doing here?
But that's how Hayek met her. I was with her many other times, and I remember saying in our meeting together about we had to go get in a cab because taking her to the airport now then, and even now, white policemen don't like to see black and white in a cab together. Then the cab driver is black. So he stopped the cab.
Virginia said, this is not right. You're not supposed to be giving her tickets, et cetera.
But I have to go to the airport. So, Hilda, you make sure he doesn't have to pay the ticket. So I ended up going to the courthouse three times, because if the police doesn't show, they have to come back and come back, and he didn't pay the ticket. But I'd never been in a courthouse before in my life because I was a little middle class child, too, anyway.
But I went to workshops with her, and we went all over the country and to learn the principles. And at one point, she decided she was going to have triads for each continent. And so she know I would be part of a triad for Africa. Now, that showed how naive she was about stuff. You can put all of the United States inside of Africa, and I'd never been to Africa. I didn't even know any.
So the idea of me, and it was only me, she didn't have any.
It just showed our naivety at that period in time. But we were doing our growing, and she was definitely doing her growing, because in the first thing I was in, maria Gamora, who was part of a triad that Virginia created, was really going through training then. So this was a long time ago, before she really got all her principles, et cetera, together.
On the other hand, during her lifetime, I never saw her doing anything with anyone other than a white person except me. I would be in some triad or whatever, because it was a time period, and she wasn't God, she's a human being, and she's dealing with people, and she was dealing with people who were paying to come to her workshops. So the.
If I can understand it. So when people want to say, well, you know, she was not a saint. I was with her when she was in difficult, saying things which do not need to be repeated.
I was on the board, and she didn't like what was going on the board. She swept into the room and upset the whole board. I mean, I saw her in many different stages.
And she was a wonderful woman. And really, I think all of you guys who are really able to taking your principles forward, it's a wonderful thing.
Now, I think I'm glad she decided I wouldn't be a triad for know, along the way, she figured, all right. But the one of the things that I've thought of, and you, too, Michael, in really spreading her model to people other than middle class white people, it's really to have someone like you, having gone through the training, now know it, and then taking it to your people, that's really the way to do it, because the principles are wonderful.
And as I said when I helped open Medigare Everest College in Brooklyn in the able to design a course that included the growth and development models that she had in people making, the students thought nobody in this book looked like me.
On the other hand, the principles were good, and even they would share it with their husbands.
But if we did that book now, of course they would do it differently, and they'd have people of color, a whole lot of colors represented in.
You know, we're dealing with phases in history and time when we're dealing with anything that relates to the Virginia satir network.
And I'm sure that most of the people in the zoom that we do on Wednesday, if they're therapists, their clients look like them, and that's all right because it's within their culture and so they can relate to one another. They're not having African Americans.
Now, Carol Provo, I think, pronounced her name, who's been on the board, wonderful woman's got another book out. Her client base is both white and able, and you don't even know that you're relating to a different culture. I mean, in your head, it just happens.
Yeah. So it's not something that you necessarily. Now, as you get more sophisticated, you are aware that you're doing this.
What you might say or do is different if you was an african american or hispanic client than if you was a white client.
And I think most of us in the satir network are not aware of it. We don't think about it just because that's not part of the background.
[00:28:04] Speaker D: So really, you got to see the satir model really develop over time, in its infancy. And as it became all that, it became in retrospect, as you think about it, and I'm hearing you say this even as you're talking about it, but it seems as though you very much believe that her model and what she teaches has something to offer to the black community. But it's really important that those of us that are minority are able to learn these things and take them into our own communities so that they hear from us. And it's not just a white person teaching minority population, because a lot of.
[00:28:47] Speaker A: Us will turn it off, just like the reverse lot of it will turn it off, right. So it's almost the same words. You don't have to even use a different dialect because we're all speaking American English and middle class American English. But how will you present? I had a friend, much younger years, shared an apartment with a friend, one of my best friends, and she would get pissed when I'd be talking on the phone to my black friends because she says, you talk to them differently than you talk to me. And it's an automatic thing. It's not something that I thought of. It's something, though, that actually, if more white people thought of it, they might be able to do more with people of color. But I'm sure they have enough clients. But it's something that now, of course, I don't practice. I'm super retired. But that's something that if I would be telling a young person, I would tell them, just think about it.
[00:29:59] Speaker D: One of the questions that I've had as I talk to different people that have been in the satir world, they seem to all gravitate to something that is different from somebody else. I mean, you gravitate to things that really appeal to you. And in just hearing your history, one of the things that I keep on hearing about is how you gravitate towards meditation.
Is that something that you gravitated towards within Satir's model also, or is there something else in the model that really attracted to you?
[00:30:30] Speaker A: No. I was very catholic. I made sure I got my mother to Church.
I veered away from that over the years. But I started really dealing with the buddhist tradition many years ago. And what I experienced, though, especially in the meditations that you guys do at the beginning, you're doing a buddhist meditation, and the principles are the same. That's the other thing.
Now, I didn't think about it until after I'd already joined sort of the buddhist philosophy thing. But the principles that the satir model uses are the same principles in the buddhist meditate in the budhist tradition.
It's really amazing.
I meditate every day, but I also meditate when I'm with the meetings, et cetera. So it wasn't something that I did directly, but it ended out indirectly.
[00:31:48] Speaker D: What other parts of the satir model attracted you.
[00:31:55] Speaker A: Some parts that it's hard for people to do the family thing, where you have several people when you're really dealing with the generations.
I think that is a super thing. And over the years, when I would be with the group, people will ask me to be part of that, and I appreciated that.
And I also had to do that with myself, with a person now long gone who was with the Satir Institute, he and his wife, because you really begin to look and appreciate your background more.
[00:32:43] Speaker D: You're talking about the family, right?
[00:32:46] Speaker A: That's right. Thank you.
And I know it's hard for therapists to do it. If there's one person in the room, it's. It's almost too bad, because I think some therapists have figured out how to use it in modification, because what you're really doing is helping people look at from where they came and maybe where they're going two generations back and a generation forward.
I think that is inspiring.
[00:33:25] Speaker D: On the topic of inspiring, I know that you have lived a full life in which you have opened the doors for others and you have fought hard. As a strong woman, it seems like you're attracted to other women who are strong, and you are inspired by them, your mom being one of them. To end this podcast episode, I would love for you to share some wisdom with our audience, to the general public. What would you like to share with them that they can take away?
[00:33:56] Speaker A: Now, that's hard. I hadn't really thought of that.
One of the things my mother taught me, pushing me all the way, is never give up. When people ask, what's my biggest?
Whatever I say, persistence. Be persistent. Hang in.
People are going to be what they are to you.
But you, number one, hang in. I always say black people know much more about white people than white because we're observing and we're figuring out when to move forward, to speak, when not to, and just be aware of that. Be aware, but be true to yourself.
Be true to yourself. Do not act like you're someone else.
I'm saying that I think that to African Americans because I used to say to people, you know, in presentation, you can change everything about yourself. You can change your sex, but you cannot change your ethnicity. You are what you are.
But that is a good thing, what you are.
And yes, you learn to smile, you keep your mask, but everybody's got masks. No big deal. You know when I know even as much as I can talk, when to keep my mouth shut, to allow the stuff to just flow by, because a lot of stuff is going to flow by, and lots of time people say things they don't even know what they're saying.
So don't take it personally. Just say, this is what that person said. It sounds stupid. Don't respond. Just let it slide by.
Yeah, I don't know what else.
[00:35:58] Speaker D: That's good wisdom. And for the general public, is there something that you'd like them to take away from this time that we spent together?
[00:36:05] Speaker A: People say, be nice to everybody.
I see people, and actually, I love the symphony, and I go to the symphony, and not a whole lot of me there, and I'm a little walker. But I say to this lady that's passing, you have a beautiful top. Your top is so good. I love your color. And they start smiling. They'll be smiling back at me.
How do you break through that stuff that we carry around? And after a while, using an example, start talking.
Well, thank you. Don't you look beautiful today? I tell men how handsome they are. I can't sue it because I'm an old lady. I'm not flirting with you.
So how to just have them soften their mass? Because we all have mass and figure out how to move forward, but always move forward. Don't move. I know the world's keeping us pushing back, but really work on moving forward.
[00:37:21] Speaker D: Hilda, thank you so very much. I have loved getting to know you. I know our listeners will love getting to know you in this way as well.
But I thank you for what you give to dear global, and I thank you for what you've given me through our Wednesday conversations.
[00:37:38] Speaker A: Thank you.
[00:37:41] Speaker C: As we conclude this episode of the.
[00:37:43] Speaker B: Virginia Satir podcast, I want to leave you with a reminder that the journey of self discovery and transformation is ongoing.
Virginia Satir's wisdom continues to inspire us to nurture healthier relationships, foster open communication, and embrace personal growth. Remember, you hold the power to create positive change in your life and the lives of those around you. Well, that's it for today's episode. See you next week. Thanks for listening to the Virginia Satir podcast. Be sure to, like, subscribe and give us a review wherever you listen to the podcast and share this with a friend. Also, for more information on Gina Satir, you can go to satirglobal.com or liveconnectedtherapy.com. Until next time, be kind to yourself and to others, and remember, you are a miracle.
