EDI: A Path to Open the Heart

In honour of truth and reconciliation, I want to share a reflection about Pathways—a year-long program from Arts BC that has deeply shaped my understanding of equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI). I’m taking the program with Carla as TEMPO since January 2025.

Pathways supports arts and heritage organizations to put equity and access into practice. For some, that means asking difficult questions; for others, creating new policies or building deeper relationships with the communities we serve. Their slogan resonates with me deeply: Learn. Reflect. Integrate.

At the beginning of the program, we were asked two simple yet powerful questions:

How does learning about equity and access impact your work?What could progress or success look like in a year’s time?

Those questions have stayed with me, echoing and transforming over time. To answer them, I need to travel back through memory.

From Mexico to Vancouver

I was born and raised in Mexico, where I had never heard the terms BIPOC or DEI. When I moved to Vancouver in 2019, it felt like a fairytale—fresh air, safety, beauty everywhere. But underneath the sparkle, there were small cuts: microaggressions disguised as good advice.

“Learn English, don’t speak Spanish. Don’t hang out with Mexicans here—they’ll hold you back. If you want to succeed, make friends with English speakers.”

At the time, I didn’t yet understand the language of equity or access, but I felt its absence. Looking back, I realize that context has the capacity both to open you and oppress you. And I think about all the times I may have unconsciously harmed others—through uninformed assumptions, biased comments, or limited perspectives.

Context Expands Us

I had never truly considered how context—geographical, sociopolitical, racial, gendered—shapes who we are and what we believe. I had never even questioned my own privilege.

And yet, I can also trace this awareness further back. In 2011, when I was 18, I realized I was gay. Before that, I had never met an openly queer person. Diversity wasn’t missing from my world—it was missing from my context of imagination.

What is not diverse in this world?

A Letter to My Mother

In 2024, I wrote my mother a letter:

“Mamá, have you ever felt Indigenous? Do you think in Náhuatl we would love each other more than we do in Spanish? Do you think, in the languages of Mexico’s first peoples, we could learn to forgive?”

Until recently, I had never truly looked at my own history of colonization. (I mean… in Mexico, we still celebrate Columbus Day! WTF!) There is no national movement for reconciliation. We live beside Indigenous communities not to relate, but often to ignore.

Hearing the language of land, truth, and reconciliation here in Canada expanded my understanding of my own homeland. It made me realize how much healing and remembering we still have to do, and reflect on my own possibilities of decolonizing my worldviews…

From Fairytales to Humanity

In 2019, I saw Vancouver as a fairytale.  Today, I see that fairytales are flat—but humans are not.

The experience of immigration has given me the privilege of perspective. And with that comes responsibility: to use my voice, to keep asking,

What does equity, access, and inclusion mean to you?

Growing in Relationship

Through Pathways, I’ve learned that this work is not about perfection. It’s about growing in relationship—to self, to others, and to our systems.

Because only together can we face the complex realities of conflict management, cancel culture, and trauma in the arts.

It makes me wonder: How do we make space for connection when our systems push us toward constant productivity? Am I acting from a place of transaction, or relation? Why would I do arts administration without embedding creativity, poetry, and spirit into my emails—aren’t these my values?

These are the questions I’m carrying. And perhaps, as artists and as humans, we can all ask ourselves:

What parts of your life could you explore through the lens of equity, diversity, and inclusion? What new worlds could we build through the voices we practice in our communities?

Thank you for reading. Marco Esccer