Sara Ting is one of the foremost diversity-and-inclusion educators who has been an ardent vocalist about equality, diversity, and inclusion, having given a groundbreaking TEDx Talk about her transformative Sun Poem. She is the founder and president of World Unity, Inc., a nonprofit organization founded in 1993 that aims to spread the universal message of equality by raising self-awareness through the Sun Poem. It helps us see we are all connected, “We are human beings first.” In 1978, she penned her famous Sun Poem in a personal journal that was never meant to be public. The impact it has been making is extraordinary, and it has taken on a life of its own. In light of this, she says, "Laws, policies, and technology cannot remove or eliminate people's conscious or unconscious biases. The individual needs to remove them." The Sun Poem can ignite the change from within.
Are you greater than the sun, that shine on everyone: Black, Brown, Yellow, Red, and White, the sun does not discriminate.
- Sara Ting
At a very young age, Sara first became rooted in my humanity. She didn't understand prejudice until she was about 17 or 18. She says, "I didn't think people would reject me because of my eyes. I didn't know that existed. My parents didn't sit down with me and say, we're living in America where there are few Asians, so you're going to be discriminated. I learned about prejudice just through life. I would have been alone all the time if I only wanted to play with Chinese children. When I interacted with children, I based it on what kind of person they were, not on their race, because 99% of the children I saw were the same color - white. So I'm thinking is this a kind child I want to play with? Is this person mean? I didn't want to be with a mean child. Or is this person honest? We need to feel comfortable mingling with all different kinds of people."
This is where it began for her that would become her life calling to promote equality for all people, not just Asian Americans. She says, "Because I think when we look here in America, these slogans, Black Lives Matter, of course, they matter, but I feel it needs to be 'All Human Beings Matter' when you say black lives matter, what you're doing is you're focusing in on the race. If we say all human beings matter, black people are human beings; that's why they matter."
Sara recalls the first time she saw her poem being the centerpiece of a citywide multimedia public service campaign in Boston in 1985. The poem was published on billboards and produced into a public service announcement. It aired on all three network TV stations. It also was displayed in the MBTA mass transit. The campaign was so successful that it was duplicated in New York City the following year. Billboards, the network, and CBS and NBC network TV aired the PSA across the country, and it was also shown and displayed on the subways. That began to open her eyes to the power of the poem.
It began at a pivotal moment when a young lady told her a dramatic story in her TEDx talk. Sara says, "So there's a graphic poster of the poem, a foot-by-eight-foot poster hanging in the lobby of the YWCA Boston. She can't ignore it; it's hanging in front of her. She said when she first saw it, she hated the poem because it opened the wounds. It brought back the memories of being discriminated against as an Asian-American woman in Boston. And she hated those feelings and memories. She wanted to bury it. She did bury it. But the poem brought it back up. And she realized then that she had to learn to let go of the past and forgive. She learned forgiveness. Boston's not the only city with biases and prejudices. Every city has its share."
This further fueled her desire to build a landmark showcasing this poem so that future generations would know the truth. That inspired her to create World Unity in 1993, which promotes equality, diversity, and inclusion by raising self-awareness through the Sun poem and empowering and inspiring individuals to pursue the arts, education, and innovative ideas. One of the innovative ideas was to build a permanent landmark showcasing the poem. That poem was also turned into a song children performed at the United Nations.
She further remarks, "So that program is to plant the seeds early in children through a song. The children love the song. One young man said when he sings it, it makes him feel like he can do anything—anything! We want all the children to feel that way. And another student says he's inspired every time he sings a song. And this is a powerful one. She said, ‘One day, the world will hear this song, and it will stop discrimination.’”
There are many stories about the transformative power of the poem that inspired and empowered others, and it had a domino effect. She reads a letter from a teacher informing her about the powerful effect the song 'We All See the Stars,' inspired by the sun poem, had on the children. The teacher shared that she felt a dark cloud in the classroom as she struggled to motivate the children. When she made the students hear the song, an unbelievable thing happened: they all went quiet and made relevant connections to life. The students were mesmerized by the music and message. They didn't want to stop singing. This created a significant shift in their attitude and behavior. Sara says, "I am hopeful that this is just the beginning of a major shift that will take place for the better as well as trickle out into the community and beyond."
Sara says the biggest challenge is people's willingness to face themselves and the truth. That's the challenge because prejudice and bias is a global problem. Every country has to learn. The challenge is creating a community, school, and healthcare system that values everyone. Then another question arises: ' Are we willing to commit ourselves?'. She feels everyone can work on their biases, and she often tells people everyone has an opportunity to overcome them, and they can grow personally and professionally. "A lot of these prejudices and biases are passed down from generations. And I think the younger generation seems to have a level of consciousness where they recognize their parents’ prejudices; some children adopt them, and some don't. The poem and what we are doing is helping humans evolve and become more rooted in their humanity first," she observes.
When she asks people the question, "What identity are you rooted in first?" people often answer regarding their gender, ethnicity, economic status, country, etc. Sara answers, "Human beings are what we all have in common. That's what ties us all together. The problem we're having right now is people are getting rooted in the identity that they are defending. This is not something you physically can do. It's your consciousness. I can't put equality into somebody. I can't make a person a human being. I can't do that. It's up to us where we put our consciousness. I'm asking you how this feeling of humanity was first instilled in you."
Throughout her life, she was guided by Einstein's powerful words: "You cannot solve a problem with the same consciousness that created it. You must stand on a higher ground." The other quote is by Madame Curie: "We cannot hope to build a better world without improving the individual. To that end, we must work on our improvement."
Sara feels that learning about equality begins at home, but if the children don't have the right values, the school must teach them. In her outlook, this concept of equality is a universal truth. Everybody is a human being. So, the bigger question is that people in power, like presidents of the nations, should be asked how their country's human beings should be treated. She mentions, "Too many people do feel inferior. They do not feel that they have a voice. They do feel like they're second-class citizens. They feel like their voice doesn't count. And so, to me, the Sun poem has so many different dimensions. For those oppressed all their life, the poem could help make the light bulb go off in their head and realize, that's right, the sun is shining on the billionaire and me. I don't have a home, but the sun is shining on me and the billionaire. Oh, and that's right. The sun is shining on me and the people with all these PhD degrees, and I'm a high school dropout. So that's why the beauty of this poem especially can empower those who feel like second-class citizens, who feel like they don't have a voice." The Sun Poem can liberate us from our fears, It can empower us to see the common humanity we all share and connect with the divine within us to fully realize our natural gifts and talents. For Sara, the Sun Poem and her deep faith in God have been a guiding force throughout her life.