Run like a river does

Men haven’t inherited the emotional damage and violence that’s etched into our very DNA, and it’s not something that can be encompassed by the limited scope of language and abstractions. No matter how much they try to understand and validate, it ultimately won’t reach to the core of the matter because we’re disconnected from the core of the matter, so our understanding is very shallow too.

Knowing the historical and political context of these wounds is helpful insofar as we’ve internalized it, and closure and clarity on the external circumstances can free up the mental space. But it won’t and can’t replace a genuine inner connection between our hearts and bodies. The memories and traumas are stored in the body and these are the emotional blockages that makes it impossible to access the heart where our unique creative powers as divine feminine lie.

Spending time and effort being on the warpath is not only ineffective but it’s a reenactment of the scenes that our trauma was born in. Going back in time to undo the damage is another way of saying, someone else did something to me that I have absolutely no ability to rectify. My release from this bondage in torture is to make this person or society undo the oppression.

The problem in this is, besides the impossibility of undoing something that has already happened, that we’re leaving our healing and emotional freedom at the mercy of a progress in the external. That’s very dangerous because it ties us to what we’re desperately trying to get away from!!

Healing not only removes the damage but it turns the scar into a portal of abundance and cosmic wisdom. It’s sorta like having your house demolished by enemies and then finding out that there’s a gold mine underneath the house that wasn’t visible before. The most valuable parts of you can never be touched or damaged or taken. Your soul is that gold mine.

Women aren’t goodwill

Obama out here saying we need more female leaders because men are starting to get on my nerves lately.

Why are women elevated through sloppy seconds? It’s like a backhanded compliment. Like when you’ve fucked up that’s when you want women to come in to clean up the mess? Wow.

It’s like those people who only contact you when they’re bored or want something from you. Getting power and position isn’t some accomplishment. It’s like being told that you can buy a house for dirt cheap because the whole neighbourhood is in foreclosure.

Women aren’t second-rate men. They are women with intrinsic value and essence. And it’s time we take time to discover and develop what comes naturally and organically to us instead of waiting on men to discover us or to discover what they have in us. Nah! That’s a form of self-hate and self-neglect. We need innovation and creativity to make sure we don’t recycle the tried and tested toxicity of the men. That entails not reaching for low hanging fruits or take shortcuts to appear a certain way. Pursue what resonates with you, regardless of how it looks like to others!

Ayeyo

Ain’t no revolution taking place until women are fed up with the status quo. It be us who keep riding the coattails and fanning the flames in the name of keeping the peace and deferring power to the masses.

I guess that’s why women are heavily brainwashed. Our power is locked in vanity and validation seeking. Men may build the skyscrapers but we’re the earth, and nothing grows in sinkholes.

Don’t live for those who won’t die with you

I read this Somali guy’s IG post where he dedicated the caption to his mum for mother’s day. He wrote about a memory in Somali that to him encapsulates motherhood. And it disturbed me so deeply that I haven’t been able to shake it off since.

He said he’d left the masjid after morning classes and was starving. In front of the masjid was an older lady who sold cup of oat, poured from a thermos she was carrying around. He had 2 cups from that and went home. There he was met by his mum who was making canjeela (somali pancakes) and had prepared for him a plate of pancakes and some tea, which he turned down because he was full. He went to his room talking to some girl when after a while his mum came in with steaming liver that she’d stir-fried and the pancakes. Apparently she had gone out to buy fresh liver to make it for him specifically. She said hooyo, here have some breakfast. I know you turned it down because it was dry so I bought and made you the liver you loved. He said he was so shocked and too embarrassed to turn her down after everything she went through so he ate it.

He concluded by saying this experience taught him that despite her not having had anything to eat she put him first and his satisfaction meant more to her than anything else. He said a mother is the one who feeds you when you’re hungry, treats you when you’re ill and the only one who will sacrifice her life for you.

The reason this disturbed me is because I saw how implicit we women are in erasing ourselves even when there’s nothing at stake, like with our kids. We’ve identified with being needed, and we’re chronically codependent as a collective. And it’s this underbelly that goes unresolved when we speak about what women go through. We’re always the victims and we never speak about ways to take back our sovereignty (not queendom) and personal power even in the face of the worst tyranny.

I was watching a short clip of Iyanla fix my life where Rick Ross’s ex fiance was on. He was engaged to her when she was just 22 and it fizzled out not long afterward. She was a stripper and he met her at the strip clubs.

She said

I’d like our black men to value us and they don’t. When I’m angry I like to drink, I like the way it makes me feel. It makes me forget my pain, my hurt, my heartbreak.

We’ve gone to such extents of projecting our shadows on men when they don’t act in a way pleasing to us as if they are innately obliged to do so, because we want to cancel out the inner pain by outer pleasure. And as long as we come from a displaced place, as long as we don’t belong in our own bodies, our own psyche, our own being, we’ll continue to seek out people who mask just as we do. No one can face another’s shadow. It’s unique to who you are and is part of your journey.

The offensive and oppressive structures and constructs are also a part of the journey. They aren’t permanent fixtures because they weren’t created by God. But they will remain for as long as we turn away from our own oppression that we mete out against ourselves every time we erase our needs, every time we minimize our will, every time we discount our intuition, every time we let others disrespect us because we don’t want to seem too sensitive or difficult, every time we distrust our discernment. All those instances then play out in the world where we continue to live in circumstances where those coping mechanisms are active and necessary.

Mata Hari

Toxic femininity is far more damaging and insidious than toxic masculinity and here’s why :

Toxic masculinity manifests in power struggles, domination, destruction of property and structures. Toxic masculinity aims to conquer the environment and subdue people overtly.

Toxic femininity isn’t confrontational nor is it overt. And that’s exactly what makes it so insidious. It’s like inhaling pure nitrogen; it has no smell or taste or colour and you will die without ever feeling like you’re about to die. You just get light-headed and pass out.

Toxic femininity uses manipulation and people pleasing to gain an inverted type of power : emotional vampirism. It’ll hypnotize you with its tactics and guilt-tripping and you won’t know what hit you. And it leaves no proof, no tangible destruction in its wake. Airtight alibi. But you’ll know its presence by how it feels. You feel suffocated, you’ll walk on eggshells, you’ll question yourself a lot, you’ll take responsibility for her feelings, you’ll feel guilty.

Because patriarchy and misogyny gets deflected on a lot, there’s the added danger to assume that women are completely innocent and don’t have their own systematic imbalances. This not only hinders awareness but it prolongs the healing and ensures that we pass on our aggregated inherited toxic to the next generation. And as long as we’re not internally liberated we can’t help liberate and heal the world. No matter what anyone says, this world needs the internal and external balance of masculine and feminine energy. There’s no two ways about it.