How to Human

When was the last time you felt truly human—seen, known, and connected beyond screens or labels? In How to Human, Carlos Whittaker invites you to remember what you were designed for: to love deeply, live simply, and show up for others with compassion rather than contempt. He argues that while 2020 exposed how fractured we’ve become, it also revealed our capacity to rebuild humanity by recalibrating how we be, see, and free each other.

The Crisis of Being Human

Whittaker begins with his own story—watching a barbershop full of strangers chase down a child’s kidnapper in 1985. That moment stamped a conviction in him: people instinctively run toward good. But as he shows through the pandemic and political tension of 2020, that reflex has been buried beneath fear, hate, and endless scrolling. We’ve traded presence for opinions, and compassion for comparison. Yet beneath the noise, he insists, remains the spark of divine design—what he calls a “human reflex to unite.”

His central message is clear: humanity doesn’t need to be rebuilt—it needs a reset. Like pressing Control–Alt–Delete on an overloaded computer, we must recalibrate back to our operating system: we were made in the image of God, wired to love, serve, and help others flourish. Whether you’re religious or not, he says, those traits aren’t moral extras—they’re our default mode.

The Three-Part Path: Be, See, Free

The book unfolds across three sections that mirror both a personal and social transformation. To Be human is to rediscover your identity and capacity for love—by being yourself, loving others simply, and recovering awe in a world that runs too fast. To See human means re-learning to notice, listen, and understand others, even—or especially—those you disagree with. And to Free human is to act: releasing others (and yourself) from isolation, shame, judgment, or oppression through intentional, tangible compassion.

These aren’t abstract pillars; they’re sequential steps. You can’t free others if you haven’t seen them, and you can’t see clearly unless you’ve first remembered who you are. As Whittaker puts it: “Be. See. Free. That’s how we human.” Each section blends personal storytelling—funny, messy, spiritual—with lessons from the life of Jesus, who the author portrays not as a distant deity but as “the human who did humanity best.”

Why It Matters Now

Whittaker frames the urgency through real crises. In 2019, thousands prayed online for his daughter’s healing. Months later, some of those same people retracted their compassion when he spoke against racial injustice. What happened? The same humans who had poured out empathy suddenly weaponized belief. For him, these contradictions mark the “Covid coma” that dulled empathy worldwide. Healing begins not with policy but practice: ordinary acts of seeing, touching, and freeing others—what he calls “the small stuff that saves us.”

The book's structure echoes what psychologists and theologians describe as integral transformation—moving from awareness to action (similar to Brené Brown’s progression from vulnerability to courage). Whittaker reminds readers that emotional growth must be embodied. You “love God and love people,” he says, in tiny, visible ways—a blow-up Santa in March, a kind word to a janitor, paying for someone’s coffee.

The Human Revolution Awaits

Ultimately, Whittaker’s invitation is revolutionary in its simplicity. He doesn’t call for cultural war or political dominance. He calls for a recalibration of the soul. The path forward isn’t to out-argue others but to out-love them. Drawing parallels to Jesus’s command in John 15:12—“Love each other as I have loved you”—he shows that being human requires humility, curiosity, and reckless generosity. When we rediscover that, we not only heal relationships but find freedom ourselves.

“You can’t change the world by standing on issues,” Whittaker writes. “You change it by walking with people.”

By the end, How to Human becomes less a book and more a blueprint—a reminder that you already possess what the world needs. It’s about slowing down, seeing people as people again, and daring to be love in a world consumed by fear. If you’ve ever mourned what humanity has lost, Whittaker assures you: it’s not gone. It’s just buried. And it’s time to dig it out together.

Whittaker begins the first section—Be—with the question: who are you, really, when no one’s watching? In the chapter “Be You,” he traces his own journey through racial identity, family history, and self-acceptance. His story starts with a father who told him, “You are Mexican, not Black,” an attempt to protect his son from the racism of 1980s Atlanta. That message buried part of his identity for decades until a DNA test decades later revealed he was 72 percent Nigerian. That discovery, he says, forced him to “wake up the Black part of my soul.”

Identity and Fear

By sharing his childhood conflict—being both Panamanian and Mexican, Black and White—Whittaker normalizes identity confusion. His father’s denial wasn’t hatred, it was protection: being marked as Black in the South was riskier than being seen as Latino. But suppression always costs something. As an adult, he realized that the parts of himself he had hidden were the very parts God wanted to heal and use. “If you can’t embrace your whole story,” he writes, “you can’t help others find theirs.”

He challenges readers to ask: what part of your story have you buried to fit in? The key to “being human,” he insists, begins by reclaiming what you’ve silenced. This aligns with the psychological truth that self-compassion precedes empathy (Kristin Neff, Self-Compassion). Whittaker reminds us: Jesus Himself was unapologetically Jewish, grounded in His lineage even as He loved universally. Your particularity, not your perfection, is what makes you human.

The Joy Reflex

He invites readers to rediscover the “jump for joy” feeling of childhood—the surge of awe when you opened a gift you didn’t expect. Somewhere along the way, adulthood choked that reflex with shame and cynicism. To be yourself again, find what still makes your soul leap. Make lists of things that spark that lift. Maybe it’s painting, cooking, parenting, hiking; those are clues to who you are without fear. “You still have excavating to do,” he writes. Each joy uncovers another buried piece of your God-breathed identity.

Owning Complexity

Authenticity isn’t about flaunting flaws; it’s about embracing complexity. Like Brene Brown’s antidote to shame, Whittaker’s approach values wholeness over image. His mix of humor and vulnerability makes the point clear: when you accept your contradictions, you become a safer place for others to do the same. He reminds readers that you don’t have to advertise every secret pain, but you do need to know your own story inside and out. Owning your darkness lets you lead with light.

“Jesus was a Jew. I am a Black Panamexican. What about you?”

The courage to be yourself isn’t self-centered—it’s essential. You can’t love others fully until you stop fragmenting yourself. Whittaker’s takeaway: celebrate everything that shaped you—the good, the awkward, and the inherited. Then live unhidden, because when you do, your authenticity becomes contagious.

After identity comes action. Whittaker’s message in “Be Love” is disarmingly simple: love God, love people—it really is that straightforward. He argues that modern faith and politics have overcomplicated what Jesus made clear. When the world feels broken, we don’t need more analysis; we need more love transformed into motion. He illustrates this principle with two moments: his fourteen-foot inflatable “Covid Santa” and a singing hotel housekeeper who reminded him that small gestures birth hope.

Restoring a Human Reflex

During lockdown, Whittaker’s “Ho Ho Hope” Santa became a beacon on a scared street. The sign—“We got this!”—wasn’t theology; it was therapy. Neighbors honked, kids took photos, adults smiled. His reflection: no one asked about politics or vaccines before they waved. Compassion cut through division because it met a universal need—to feel seen. It’s a scene that mirrors how Jesus loved: concretely, without qualifiers.

Simple Doesn’t Mean Easy

Whittaker warns that we often complicate love to excuse withholding it. Adding conditions—“tough love,” “realistic love”—makes it manageable but less miraculous. His advice: stop overthinking. Take cookies to your neighbor. Pay for someone’s coffee. Compliment a stranger’s shoes. Each act is a protest against cynicism. Like Mother Teresa’s maxim—“Do small things with great love”—his approach insists that the simplest love amplifies humanity’s healing.

He integrates this with his Christian lens: you don’t need a seminary degree to understand Jesus; His life distilled to two commands—love God and love people. Loving God amplifies your capacity to love people in “impossible” ways. But even non-believers, he says, embody divine love when they choose compassion over apathy. Love is the great equalizer, the universal human language.

Ordinary Miracles

In Seattle, his applause for a hotel housekeeper’s singing became a viral example. He didn’t give money or publicity; he gave attention. “She felt so loved,” he recalls. That’s the secret: love multiplies when people feel seen. (In psychology, this echoes Carl Rogers’s concept of “unconditional positive regard.”) Whittaker’s reminder is that you don’t need to save the world. You just need to human within ten feet of you.

“Go make someone feel loved today,” he writes. “Because if you think humanity is broken, someone else does too.”

Loving simply is revolutionary in an age of outrage. It reclaims what headlines forget: being human isn’t complicated. It’s just rare. Whittaker’s rule of thumb: if it feels too hard or politicized, scale it down. Choose kindness that fits in your hand—and watch it alter the heart of someone else, including your own.

In the book’s second part, Whittaker shifts focus from being to perceiving. In “See Humans,” he argues that every person is desperate to be seen—not for achievements but for belonging. Drawing on a moving story about his adopted Korean son, Losiah, he explores how visibility shapes identity and connection. When Losiah visited Beijing and was surrounded by faces like his own, Whittaker saw him “walk with a new swagger.” For the first time, his son’s reflection matched the world around him.

Belonging Over Appearances

Whittaker notes that being seen isn’t about being noticed—it’s about belonging somewhere our differences fit. His son’s experience, after years of being the only Korean person in a mixed-race Southern family, illustrated how visibility feeds dignity. He contrasts this with insults Losiah endured (“flat face”) and commends his son’s grace-filled empathy: “They’re probably hurting at home, Daddy.” Real seeing always begins with compassion for what others carry, not pity for how they differ.

Our Desperate Need to Be Seen

Zooming out, Whittaker connects this human hunger to the chaos of modern discourse—why people shout online, protest, or post aggressively: they’re all saying, “see me.” From Capitol rioters to neighborhood activists, the cry is the same. Social media has multiplied voices but diluted attention; seeing has become transactional rather than transformational. His challenge: to recognize people without demanding agreement. Seeing isn’t endorsing; it’s dignifying.

“Once you see someone,” he writes, “you can’t unsee them.”

To see humans well, you must risk proximity—sharing space, asking questions, and holding tension. Seeing transforms both seer and seen. As he tells it, that’s how his son helped him understand what love looks like: simply taking your father’s hand in a foreign street so “everyone knows you belong.”

Whittaker next dives into one of the hardest skills of modern life: seeing clearly through disagreement. His story with Eric, a police officer friend, epitomizes this. After publicly opposing no-knock warrants (inspired by Breonna Taylor’s death), Whittaker realized he had never actually asked his law-enforcement friend why such policies exist. When he finally did, Eric replied with love—and honesty: “When I go to serve a no-knock warrant, I kiss my kids goodbye. Do you want me to knock first?”

Nearness Brings Clarity

That exchange shattered Whittaker’s certainty. He didn’t flip sides; he gained depth. “Maybe not all no-knock warrants should be abolished,” he admits. The insight is profound: closeness clarifies. We can’t see truth from afar. Jesus modeled this after his resurrection when “some doubted.” Instead of arguing, he “came near” so they could see who he was. Whittaker’s conclusion: you can’t be clear about people you keep at a distance.

Proximity Over Proof

In a world obsessed with winning debates, Whittaker reframes clarity as emotional nearness, not intellectual dominance. Healing starts by walking toward—not away from—the people who make you uncomfortable. His practical advice: text the friend who disagrees with you, invite them to a movie, or cheer together at a game. Shared experience rekindles shared humanity. (Comparable to Adam Grant’s research on “motivated reasoning,” Whittaker shows how connection lowers defensiveness better than facts do.)

“There can be no healing if there is no feeling,” he writes. “And you can’t feel from far away.”

Seeing clearly doesn’t mean compromise; it means comprehension. When you come near, eyes and heart cooperate. Whittaker’s challenge is deceptively simple: reach out to someone you’ve avoided, not to debate but to discern. Clarity requires courage—and a shorter distance.

The third section, Free, begins with a paradox: when you help free others, you discover your own freedom. Whittaker illustrates this through his involvement in the case of Brandon Bernard, a young man on death row. Initially hesitant to speak out—fearing backlash—he used his platform after trusting a friend’s request. He invited his followers to petition for clemency. Despite massive attention (even Kim Kardashian reposted his video), Bernard was executed. Yet something inside Whittaker shifted: “Fighting for freedom freed me.”

Freedom Through Proximity

He realized that true liberation begins with closeness. By getting “near enough to someone’s story to touch them,” you release their dignity—and your own. That mirror effect reflects both neuroscience (mirror neurons) and theology (Jesus’ mandate in Luke 4:18 to set captives free). Tangible compassion, not theoretical support, changes both giver and receiver. “The more you free, the more you are free,” he writes.

Generosity as Freedom

Whittaker connects this to science: studies show people are happier when spending money on others. Generosity, even imagined generosity, rewires joy. So freedom isn’t about autonomy; it’s about interdependence. He recounts countless small acts—paying for coffee, leaving twenty dollars on a stranger’s windshield—that replicate Bernard’s greater truth: giving away control restores humanity’s soul.

“Freed people free people,” Whittaker concludes. “We are meant to set each other loose.”

In the end, Bernard’s death became Whittaker’s awakening. Freedom isn’t about avoiding pain; it’s about proximity strong enough to heal it. Every act of freeing—whether lifting debt, forgiving debtors, or showing up for prisoners—is a rehearsal for heaven on earth.

“Extravagance is risky business,” Whittaker declares, retelling the almost unbelievable story of how his followers—after a week from hell—gave so much that his family became debt-free overnight. That generosity, triggered by empathy rather than request, mirrored the miracle at Cana where Jesus produced 908 bottles of fine wine for guests who had already drunk plenty. Extravagance, Whittaker insists, is God’s economy: abundant, irrational, freeing.

When You Receive, You Learn to Give

Initially ashamed to share his Venmo, Whittaker wrestled with pride. Accepting help felt weak until he realized the deeper lesson—snapping the chain of comparison. Receiving humbly made him part of the miracle. As donations erased debts, he saw compassion not as charity but circulation: “They gave, I received, and now I can give again.” This cycle of grace turns recipients into givers, maintaining what Jesus called the “rhythm of generosity.”

The Logic of Abundance

Using Jesus’s water-into-wine story, Whittaker redefines divine extravagance: not waste, but witness. Jesus created too much of the good stuff on purpose to show that grace never rations. Likewise, giving extravagantly defies the scarcity mindset that fuels cynicism. The test isn’t how much you give—it’s how much costs you to give. Faithful extravagance might mean time, forgiveness, or attention, not just money. You’ll know it’s extravagant, he says, when it stretches you but still sets someone free.

“When we give extravagantly, we free more rapidly,” he writes. “What if your risk is the key to someone else’s rescue?”

Generosity, when practiced at this scale, becomes contagious. Whittaker closes by urging readers to find their own version of Cana—where giving goes from rational to radical. Extravagant love rebuilds humanity not by force but by overflow.

Whittaker ends where humanity begins—with empathy. He defines it not as weakness but power: the bridge between conviction and action. Sympathy feels for someone; empathy feels with them. That difference made his followers raise tens of thousands in hours for strangers like Shannell, a young epileptic mom seeking a service dog. “They didn’t just care,” he writes, “they carried.” For Whittaker, empathy is the antidote to apathy and the soil of every freedom found in this book.

Jesus Wept: The Model of Empathy

Whittaker turns to the shortest verse in Scripture—“Jesus wept.” Jesus knew He would raise Lazarus moments later, yet He cried. Why? Because empathy isn’t about outcomes; it’s about presence. Jesus didn’t offer theological proof; He offered tears. That moment, echoed in every story Whittaker tells, models how true humanity responds: not with advice or avoidance but shared emotion. It’s divine proximity in motion.

Modern Empathy in Action

Whether tipping a dialysis-stricken pianist $60,000 via Instagram or uniting liberals and conservatives under the banner “Instafamilia,” Whittaker demonstrates that empathy scales. Collective compassion—felt together—produces revival. He outlines empathy’s enemies: the Dodger (who escapes discomfort), the Positive Picker-Upper (who dismisses pain with optimism), and the Advisor (who replaces feeling with fixing). Overcoming them requires stillness and courage to stay in someone’s suffering without steering it.

“Empathy builds trust,” he writes. “It starts the domino of freeing hearts.”

The book closes with a call to empathy-driven revival. When people feel with one another—across race, class, and politics—they practice “how to human.” Empathy, Whittaker insists, is the last great unifier: the act that makes heaven’s love visible on earth. His challenge is simple: don’t scroll past pain. Stop. Feel. That’s where the healing of humanity begins.