Falling In Love Again

As I tell my students, I truly believe that some lessons we can learn from others and there are lessons we must learn on our own and sometimes this means learning the hard way. In the past I’ve let myself repeat mistakes because I somehow was able to convince myself that the outcomes of my interactions with others could not be fully determined unless I was willing to take a chance. Even when all of the road sides looked the same, I traveled down similar streets thinking that perhaps the sign that said “Dead End” was placed there by accident. But not once in my mere 22 years has my intuition failed me and you’d think by now I’d no better than to question it.

My mother told me when I was a child that my naïveté would allow others to take advantage of me and while I’ve often been able to spot danger zones and deception, I’ve had some instances in which I made poor judgments. In any case, I have come to so greatly appreciate the times I’ve fallen, the times I have allowed myself to think that perhaps the people I’ve met would be an exception to the many rules I knew of, the times when I allowed myself to give attention and energy that weren’t at all properly earned, because these are the times when I have had to fall back in love with myself.

It is often said that there is a difference between loving someone and being in love with someone and I tend to believe that this rule applies to our love for ourselves. When I remember to be in love with myself, I remember to look out for my interests. I’m not talking about the kind of love that gives me license to practice selfishness, but to be in love with ourselves enables us to make the best decisions for our future; to recognize the opportunities for pain and deception and to keep our eyes open for the paths that come our way. To be in love with ourselves allows us to be free of what others want for and from us and to decide what it is that we want for and from ourselves and to act accordingly. Finally to be in love with ourselves allows us to teach others how to properly love and appreciate us as we model and reflect the very standards we set for others with the belief that being a part of our lives is a privilege others should take more seriously. I find myself not just loving me but being in love with me first and it is through this that I am able to give love and properly direct others how to give love and appreciation to me in return.

The Fear of Failure

There was a time when I thought that if I started something and didn’t finish or the end result of what I started was not what I expected, that I failed. As we get older we get wiser, or at least that’s what I hope to be true and so in a recent moment of reflection I discovered that I no longer feel that way. Just as the idea of success can be interpreted and defined in a variety of ways depending on a person’s individual ambitions, goals and perspectives, so can failure. From the time we are children we are taught, both directly and inadvertently, that failure is something to be avoided at all costs. What we are seldom taught, and perhaps what many of us have to learn on our own, is that we must learn from our so called failures and perhaps learn to not look at them as pits we must crawl out of but opportunities for us to be reminded that we are capable of better and that better is available.

What we sometimes fear most about failure is that feeling of shame, perhaps even a sense of embarrassment and discomfort, particularly when we have shared our vision(s) regarding what we’ve started with others. Perhaps we realize in our moments of “failure” that what we are chasing after is not obtainable. Perhaps in our moments of failure the thing that hurts the most is the feeling deep within us that we ignore which tells us that we must be more courageous than we think we currently are if we are going to pick ourselves up and keep searching for the right thing even if we have to start over, even if we have to stop in the midst of our journey and begin moving in the opposite direction. Perhaps what we fear most about this idea of failure is that it is somehow another loss rather than a lesson gained, a spirit strengthened, a vision revised and an understanding more narrowly tailored to fit the destiny that awaits us.

Certainly I could pull from my collection of famous quotes or perhaps popular scriptures to support the idea that sometimes we need to be broken so that we can be fixed,  but through my own experience I will simply say that failure, in more cases than we realize or are willing to accept, is the voice that calls out to us as we try to hide from our very own reflection which dwells between our need to have a taste of immediate success and our willingness to accept the end results of our experiences even if when they are contrary to what we desired, in hopes that we can move forward in our search to find joy. I suppose then at some points and in some circumstances we must ask if we are willing to accept what is, or accept the failure of what is having faith in what could be.

It takes true courage for someone to look at a failure even if you fail repeatedly and say: in spite of it all I will not give up until I succeed in finding or creating what it is that I deserve.

Mortal Beliefs About an Immortal God

Over a few drinks and greasy food, I sat with a friend and an acquaintance listening intently as the two discussed the complicated spiritual and psychological stress one must endure should he find himself a member of a congregation led by a “chosen one” who, through biblical misinterpretation, condemns his very existence. I suppose it’s an uncomfortable situation for any critical thinker to sit in a setting where asking questions  about the assumed word of God is frowned upon. And when one finds him/her self in a situation where the very fabric of one’s spirituality and self-love can no longer withstand the false claims propelled from the pit of an uninformed self-proclaimed prophet knowing deep within our hearts that there is a greater truth that is not being explained, our ears begin to burn, our brows become distorted and our feet begin to move quickly toward the exit sign. Such an individual may break free from such spiritual imprisonment with little to no interest in returning.

This was the essence of my friend’s experience. He summed up his spiritual awakening in a startling and quite fascinating statement, “my god died…” I knew very well what he meant by this phrase in that to be taught one thing and to discover the opposite is to kill any and all remnants of our indoctrination, but I couldn’t help but to identify somewhere in this phrase a detected philosophical/logical flaw that I could not yet explain in words but could certainly feel.

To say that one’s God dies is, in terms of logic, to suppose that God can be killed. And since a theist in a growing population of atheists may reasonably (and this reasoning is certainly limited to the logic of the theist) assume that God’s existence is not predicated upon the faith humans have in his existence (this in itself is a potential topic for a future post), the theist may very well argue that God cannot be killed. So one may wonder what does die, what does change in the presence of spiritual/intellectual awakening and I would assume that in such cases, only what the theist believes about God changes.

Allow me to further explain. Let’s assume for the purposes of this conversation that God is an unchanging truth. Unchanging truths include those things that always remain constant despite time and place. Examples of unchanging truths include the chemical makeup of water which always consists of two molecules of hydrogen and one molecule of oxygen. Let me preface the continuation of this argument by simply stating that I am fully aware that unlike many unchanging truths, God’s existence lacks scientific evidence but let us assume that if a higher being exists, and I have faith that it does, that this higher being remains constant as an autonomous truth. With this in mind, I believe that we as humans may differ with respect to our ideas about what this higher power is, how it came to be, what its purpose is, what function it serves, how we relate to it etc.; however in all of our infinite ideas about the truth, the truth remains constant and all that changes is what we believe and feel about that truth.

Keeping this in mind, we must recognize that when something dies it changes and if something is regarded as an unchanging truth it cannot die, it cannot be killed. All that can be altered is what we believe about that unchanging truth. This is all to say that when we say our God died in the aftermath of our spiritual awakening, this notion of the death of God for the theist is logically flawed and what we are truly saying is that the plethora of falsehoods bestowed upon us in our religious indoctrination have ceased to exist in the conscious rebirth of our knowledge of the higher power we worship.

Literate

I found freedom

Between hard and soft covers

Poems, essays, articles, biographies, novels

Filled my heart with maps

Maps that guided me

Away from ignorance

Away from poverty

Away from spiritual slavery

And toward my identity

There are few things more moving

Than the words of our enlightened fellows

Which give us glimpses into the worlds

Beyond our ghettoes

Beyond the boxes we’ve been placed in

Beyond who we thought we were

I wish we could all read…

Rules of a Race

Few things sadden me more than seeing the very clear internal results of racism in this country. What I mean by internal results are those things that can be felt but not always seen. I am not speaking about poverty, data concerning the educational achievement gap or even the many pictures and video clips of victims of police brutality that float around the world wide web. Internal results are those things that can be felt like anxiety, depression, anger and fear all of which can be easily conjured up by the slightest hint of racism which beckons one’s own personal tragic experiences with the aforementioned traumatizing social construction to rise to the surface.

I’ve seen it in the eyes of my family members when I tell them I’m going on a trip that involves me driving for long distances. There’s a tremble in my mother’s voice, a slight raise in my sister’s eyebrows, or perhaps the heavy tone of concern in an uncle’s words… “be careful”, they say. It’s a simple phrase that carries such heavy and complex fears. Be careful of the elements; be careful of thieves; be careful of possibly deceitful “friends”; be careful of the police. The very last of these cautionary instructions comes with a specific set of directions I have heard repeated like a pledge or a prayer: If you are ever stopped by the police place both of your hands on the stirring wheel, pull over calmly and do not move. Do not move. Do not reach for anything. Do not turn on your lights. Do not answer your phone. Do not move. When you are instructed to handover your license, registration and proof of insurance tell the officer where each of these things are located and ask him or her if it’s okay if you get them before you reach for them.

These are some of the rules that come along with being Black, male and paranoid in a country that has treated both your actual and fictive kin like second-class citizens and at many points not citizens at all and at other points not even human. Some may look at these elements of Black culture and perhaps think they’re ridiculous. Perhaps at some point in my life even I didn’t fully understand the need for these commonly shared do’s and don’ts, but now at the age of 22, I fully understand the intentions of my elders. I have been told how to use bread and a hook to catch fish, how to clean the home, how to wash, fold and properly iron clothes, and how to stay alive in a world filled with so many opportunities to be harmed. My elders and loved ones were not and are not unreasonably paranoid. They just can’t erase, from their psyche, names such as Emmett Till, Rodney King, James Byrd, Abnder Louima, Amadou Diallo, or Sean Bell.As sad and incredibly depressing as it may be, my loved ones believe, and for great reasons, that if they are not careful to remind me of the rules my own name could make headlines as the innocent slaying victim in yet another “misunderstanding” or “accident”…

Burned at the Stake

My professor looked baffled yet simultaneously intrigued when I asked for her permission to give a presentation on the connections between the history of witch craft and racism in America. Her inquisitive eyes and shut mouth begged for further explanation and as I began to provide some more detail on what I had in mind, I could see that she was indubitably interested and excited for the rare comparison I may have stumbled upon. She was and still is a professor of history who focuses on witch craft and magic and I was a Senior at Rutgers growing increasingly eager to graduate yet still focused on my courses and dedicated to discovering new ideas and she and I were, in this instance, on the same page.

The presentation, “Burned at the Stake: Race, Sex and Evil in America” focused on the history of evil and fear in this country and drew upon the history of ideologies regarding the place of women, particularly the elements of the Cult of True Womanhood: piety, purity, submissiveness and domesticity, to show that a growing mythological fear of women as evil beings resulted in the slaying of many thought to be witches. Similarly, I drew upon the history of racism as a social construct to show that this social institution, heavily linked to fear, was the catalyst for myths concerning black sexuality and the black male as an oversexed beast. Both of these events, which were deeply connected to fear, resulted in violent acts against women and blacks.

For the many women charged with being witches during the witch craze, their bodies were tied to wooden posts and set afire, while the Black men charged with potentially disturbing the purity of white women were hanged from trees and sometimes set aflame in public displays drawing the attention of nearby citizens who smiled upon such tragedies as entertainment.

The fear of potential or perceived Black dominance, strength or contamination of “pure” white blood and the fear of evil spirits not able to be seen but conceivably present in the bodies of white women threatening the stability of a Christian community, have left their fingerprints on American history forever along with other calamities on North American soil seldom spoken of. Many white female bodies and black male bodies have absorbed their last breaths at the hands of fire and rope. Whether it’s the result of mythological spirits or social constructs imbedded in the psyche of a people, fear is a powerful thing. One only need to look so far as recent news and debates concerning political/religious matters to see that there are still many people who are persecuted as a result of fear.

The Inqusitive Believer

With an inquisitive eye my colleague lifted the book I was holding in my hand “The God Delusion.” He read the title in a questioning tone and I began to explain the book’s purpose as stated by the author, Richard Dawkins, which is to prove that God does not exist. “You’re going to hell” he replied in joking manner. Though I knew it was a joke, I couldn’t help but to remind myself that there are many people in this world who would condemn the reading of such a book as a sign of their commitment to god. To me there is no breach of such loyalty created by my journey to further understand the existence of a supreme being from multiple points of view, nor is there the slightest morsel of abomination in questioning the validity, accuracy and intentions of religion.

Perhaps the act in the immediately previous complete sentence was too subtle so let me make it clear that I am drawing a distinction between god and religion. As it currently stands, and I can’t imagine what would cause a change in this status quo, I believe in god. What I don’t feel comfortable accepting whole-heartedly without question, is religion. It’s not my concern with the existence of religion, it exists and it’s not going away, but what does concern me is the purpose and intention behind religion. More specifically is the notion, promoted by many religions, that we should believe what we are told and never raise questions which doesn’t sit well with me.

It’s not simply intellectual curiosity that drives my inquisitiveness, but if anyone anywhere believes in a higher power/supreme-being, I feel that it is inherently the duty of such people to seek a comprehensive understanding of that higher power which requires us to ask questions and to expose the doubts we have about the words of our fallible fellows. There are not answers to everything and there are many things in this world we may never fully understand. When we accept the answers we are given by those who claim to have a better understanding of the ambiguities of life, love and faith, we may actually be stopping short of finding a truth that continues to exist but will never be accessed if we stop raising questions.

It’s Personal: Church Attendance and Relationship With God

The assistant pastor of my church mentioned something this morning that underscored my own personal beliefs about my relationship with God while simultaneously leading me to a revelation concerning my frustrations with many congregants I’ve met in my church experiences. His words were simple yet profound. I need not recall his remark verbatim but the gist of it was that we should each seek as individuals to establish and maintain a personal relationship with God and our attendance at church is simply a bi-product of that relationship.

Whenever I’ve gone “long” periods of time not attending church, someone, a stranger or familiar acquaintance, has felt compelled to ask me, when was the last time I’ve been to church or why don’t I go every Sunday. As long as these questions have been posed to me my answer has been the same: I don’t feel the need to attend church every Sunday, I have a very strong relationship with God.  The interrogator has usually responded by asking additional questions or reciting some scripture they memorized in preparation for whenever they run into what they call a “backslider”. They’re all so very excited to share their very calculated words of wisdom with me as a sign of their knowledge of the holy word, meanwhile as soon as I realize that they are on a mission to either persecute me for my lack of attendance or sell habitual church attendance to me as the only way for me to honor my God, I check out because it is immediately apparent to me that they did not hear me when I said, I have a strong relationship with God.

I find that many people  are eager to attend church either habitually or occasionally yet this urge is not motivated by an internal calling stimulated by their relationship with God, rather they attend out of loyalty to custom or tradition or because they are seeking social recognition from the other congregants they see when they do attend. No one wants to be judged as a sinner or backslider for being absent, yet our own selfish and egocentric minds may never even consider that those who decide  to attend church habitually are not in the least bit concerned about those of us who have not.

I cannot and perhaps am not required to fully explain what happens when I do attend church. What I do know is that I am in consistent and persistent communication with the higher power I call God and on occasion I feel compelled to attend a weekly meeting in a building, where there is a choir, and where there is someone who is able to not only recognize my personal relationship with God but who can welcome me into their spiritual home to listen to their thought provoking and spiritually/intellectually stimulating interpretation of an ancient script that contains so much wisdom.

When I am not attending church I am living my life in relation to that higher power and in accordance with a set of broad yet influential and significant principles that direct my actions. As I live in the midst of my personal relationship I don’t find myself concerned with what others say or see, as I said it’s personal…

Don’t Be Cheated

I meditate… I sit and think about my life and experiences and as I sit I leave my ears, eyes, mind and heart opened to whatever the universe brings to me. Comedic mental pictures, childhood memories, images of me ten years from now, the wise words of my elders, they all come streaming in and in those moments I find the most beautiful things. Discovering things may not be as awakening as creating things though. In my moments of reflections I create short sayings and phrases, or lessons that draw upon the things I discover and I deposit those lessons or words into some hidden place I carry deep within me. The most recent one which I shared with friends was simple: if you want to know how it feels to be cheated, let someone else determine your value.

In our agencies of socialization, (school, family, church etc) we build relationships which are pivotal in our development, yet in our lifetime we will each find someone who has the potential to be pivotal in our demise. People, even without malicious intentions, can challenge the beliefs we hold about who we are and what we are worth. We let others determine how we should dress, how we should speak, what we should do with our lives, who we should love or date and even what creator we should worship. Though we need an outside perspective at times, when it comes to determining who and what we are and how much we are worth, the only person who needs to be consulted is the one we see in mirrors, clean glass windows and on the surfaces of placid lakes.

When we submit our value and self-worth to someone else’s opinion we sell ourselves short and we kill a significant part of who we are as individuals. It may sound entirely cliche, but if it’s been said one thousand times, then let it be said one thousand times more so that I will always know that I am not alone in my belief that we cheat ourselves when we allow others to decide how valuable we are.

Of God, Of Joy

“Have you ever met someone who loves what they do for a living?” This was the question that the author of a small passage I read recently on following our hearts, used as a hook to catch and maintain the interest of her readers. It’s an interesting question because it gently draws a distinction between the act of labor and the motivations that drive our labor. Indeed, most people work for a living. To provide for ourselves and for our loved ones we sell our labor. Some of us are in a position to sell our labor to the highest bidder, but most are lucky to find anyone who will bid on their labor with a job offer and so we don’t even question the value of our work. Instead we allow the bidder to determine and settle the fee for us which we graciously accept with the appearance of being delighted though we subconsciously calculate the financial struggles that may persist despite our salaries.

This is the experience for many of us. Yet there is an entire class of people in our society whose work is motivated by more than money. By class I do not draw a distinction between this group and those of us who labor primarily for pay on the basis of socioeconomic status, but this group of individuals consists of people from all economic backgrounds who do what they do because there’s some force deep within them that directs their actions. They follow their heart’s desires and in the process they provide for themselves both spiritually and financially.

Sure they don’t all live comfortable lives and certainly their success does not come easily, but when it comes between the 22 year old college graduate who earns just enough to get by as he starts a hip-hop band with his friends and the 45 year old secretary who still dreams of being a dancer while she makes enough to pay bills and buy groceries for her kids, I’m beginning to think that the secretary is the real struggling artist. Only someone with great artistic capability can paint on a smile every day before he or she goes off to the job they secretly loathe as they constantly ask themselves what if–what if I had the courage 20 years ago to follow my desires?

If “de” means of and “sire” means father or lord, wouldn’t it make sense that our desire is the spiritual light that can direct our journey to discovering true joy in our work? Perhaps this is the reason why we all desire to do different things and to be different people. It’s the universe trying to tell us how to get to our respective places in the world. If you know just where you should be, why are you not there?