Leading Beyond Normal

Dr. Alvin F. Poussaint, MD – Harvard psychiatrist and civil rights advocate who, with colleagues in the 1960s, petitioned the American Psychiatric Association to classify extreme racism as a mental disorder. Their effort highlighted how deeply racism was woven into the definition of “normal.

In the 1960s, a group of Black psychiatrists petitioned the American Psychiatric Association to classify extreme racism as a mental disorder.

The APA refused. Not because racism was harmless, but because it was so common that it counted as normal.

That decision reveals something we do not often talk about: “normal” is not neutral. It is not a universal truth. It is a cultural choice.

At the time, psychiatry defined mental illness as a deviation from the majority. If most people held racist beliefs, then racism was not considered “sick.” It was the baseline. That realization still shakes me. Because it means the definition of “normal” can hide harm rather than heal it.

The Moving Target of Normal

And that is not just history. It is a caution for us right now.

We still define ADHD, autism, depression, and many other conditions against that same moving target of “normal.” What counts as a disorder depends on what a culture is willing to tolerate or celebrate at the time.

• Homosexuality was in the DSM until 1973.

• Autism was not widely recognized until the late 20th century.

• ADHD criteria keep evolving, partly because our idea of acceptable attention and productivity keeps shifting.

  
  

If “normal” can expand or contract with cultural pressure, then normality is not a scientific constant. It is a reflection of what society values most in a given moment.

The Leadership Lens

Looking Through the Leadership Lens – Leadership invites us to examine the “normal” we carry into our decisions, policies, and relationships. What we focus on shapes the culture we create.

This is where the reflection becomes personal.

The question we have to ask ourselves, at the most foundational level of how we see ourselves and each other, is:

What definition of “normal” am I carrying, and how does it shape the way I lead, serve, and build community?

The “normal” I carry influences:

• How I respond to difference.

• How I decide who belongs and who does not.

• Whether I expect others to conform or create space for them to be fully themselves.

If my definition of normal is narrow, I risk recreating harm under the banner of “business as usual.”If I let my definition of normal expand to hold complexity, difference, and even discomfort, I can create spaces that are safer, more human, and more just.

From History to Action

This is why the APA story matters so much.

If psychiatry could declare racism “normal” simply because it was widespread, then we cannot rely on majority culture to define health or humanity for us.

As leaders, we must be intentional. We must examine the “normal” we are reproducing in our policies, in our teams, and in our expectations.

Leading beyond normal means refusing to let what is common excuse what is harmful.It means building spaces that heal the very wounds “normal” once justified, including racism, exclusion, and every system that told someone they were broken for being different.

When we lead beyond normal, we do more than create belonging.

We create a new baseline.