TAM FEATURE: SARA RODRIGUEZ

My name is Sara Rodriguez and I live in Queens, New York. I’ve always identified very strongly with what I do, and up until about half a year ago, I was a professional dancer working in the city. I made a career out of performing, teaching, and choreographing. As a teacher, I was lucky enough to travel throughout the country to work with competitive young dancers. Truly, there’s nothing I love more than being with kids. The chance to work so closely with them is something I’ll always cherish.

Taking the Lead in Policy Reform

Fast forward to today, I now work in public service for a New York State Senator. This didn’t come entirely out of left field. I studied political science in college while dancing, and I’ve always been politically active and passionate. I took the leap to change careers after about a year of giving it serious thought. Ultimately, this decision was in direct response to the surge of women finally taking their space in this sphere. I wanted to be a part of it—to add my perspective, my ideas, and my experiences to a space where people like me aren’t always included.

I’m a firm believer that leadership is the translation of personal experience into political voice,…

…and that voice should speak for, and include, Me.

Understanding Identity

All of this, of course, is wrapped up in identity, of which our experiences are a direct result. I’ve always felt that identity as a concept is so much more complicated than what meets the eye.

For me, I was made aware at a young age that the way people saw me wouldn’t necessarily reflect the whole me. My last name is Rodriguez, and I proudly identify as the Latina people assume I am, but what they don’t necessarily see in my name or my looks is that I’m also Russian, Italian, and Finnish.

While I was raised in the Catholic church, my mother is also Jewish, which, by Jewish law, makes me a Jew as well (though I don’t adhere to any religion these days), and I proudly identify as such just the same.

Growing up, some of my peers found me to be a conundrum.

I remember one boy telling me I couldn’t possibly be Jewish and have a Spanish last name unless I was Sephardic—which I am not. My identity was confusing for him, so much so that he couldn’t fathom that the Puerto Rican part and the Jewish part came from two different bloodlines, a man and a woman who got married and started a family despite different backgrounds.

This informed so much of my experience.

When it came to kids like that boy, I often felt like my multifaceted identity was some kind of burden, something that would make people uncomfortable or confused.

My parents, on the other hand, never called it anything but a positive. “Think of how much you know, how much more exposed you are to different things,” my mom would tell my brothers and me.

I began to see it all as a plus, being able to feel comfortable in different kinds of settings with different kinds of people. This isn’t surprising, of course.

Mothers know a thing or two about turning moments like these into learning experiences, instilling in their children that the lesson itself is a strength that will inevitably come in handy.

Claiming My Space

As I grow older, I realize just how crucial my parents’ lessons of perspective and attitude prove to be, both in life and my work. In fact, it is largely what drove me to pursue public service. My parents taught me to appreciate and value the experiences that equipped me with the skills to genuinely connect with and advocate for as many people as possible. I know how to feel right at home in pretty much any space—in any house of worship, at any kind of community gathering, seated at any family’s dinner table.

My upbringing stressed the inherent understanding that we all come from different places with different cultures, and yet there’s room for all of it, even under the same roof. And if you ask me, that’s what America is, at its best– the convergence of diversity, not as something to be tolerated, but something celebrated as perfectly, and wonderfully normal.

Raising Kids is Radical

I never thought of it this way as a kid, but my mom is pretty radical. In the process of marrying my dad and raising my brothers and I, she never gave up any piece of her identity. Despite the social norms she lived in, ones that traditionally displaced women with social expectation to change themselves for their partners, my mother did not conform. Her life choices had a huge impact on me.

I shouldn’t have to change how I express my identity for the convenience or comfort of others, whether in a relationship or in simply showing people who I am and what I’m all about.

My parents are celebrating thirty years of marriage this April, so I’d say it’s going pretty well for them. Their marriage, turns out, is radical, too.

Creating Progress

When it comes to social progress, the bigger message as I now understand it is that I shouldn’t squeeze myself into any definition that doesn’t encompass the whole me, because the whole me has a lot to offer, not in spite of, but because of everything that makes me who I am.

Progress happens when we bring our full selves to the table; when we use our voices backed by everything that informs us.

My desire for progress and my desire to use my voice to advance the experiences of a representative American voice is why I’m doing the work I am now.

I believe in what I have to offer based on my experiences. I believe that I can have an impact. I can continue fighting for issues that matter to me, like gender equity and racial justice and combating discrimination. Each of us lives these issues through a different lens and that’s what makes our individual perspectives essential in arriving to a common ground. They all contribute toward finding heartfelt solutions for our shared problems.

Ultimately, that’s what I hope to accomplish. Giving a political voice to personal experiences in an effort to make our world better and more inclusive. Moving ALL of us forward, not just for a privileged few. That’s progress—for the long haul.

Follow Sara on Instagram @sararodriguezny