When you have been taught that humility; being a good girl means shrinking yourself to take up as little space as possible; You might realise too late that you have been abused and you should have cried out. A lot of Black women are getting sick mentally and physically and end up dying from the sickness of Resilience, of being the Strong Black Woman.
A friend once told me that she felt sick and couldn’t tell whether she was sick enough to go to the Doctor. She said she cried from the frustration of not being able to make that decision. This shouldn’t be, we need to sharpen our intuition, our self care radar.
Malcolm X in his bio talks about the value of crying out. He says his mother was especially hard on him because he was the lightest of his siblings and his father’s favourite. It was his mother’s way of ensuring that he didn’t think he was better. His salvation when his mother would try to excessively punish him would be to cry out make a real spectacle of it and it worked.
I have a pic of myself as a 5 year old of the most beautiful day of my childhood. At least as I can remember. I had refused to go to church and my uncle took me to town and spent the day spoiling me. I learnt that day, that protesting may get you a hiding but it can also get you rewarded.
In the Netflix crypto swindler documentary. It is narrated that when things went south in that company, the loudest protesters were paid first. It pays to speak out, to protest, to cry out. They may call you a victim, divisive. It doesn’t matter, they want you to keep quiet so they keep abusing you and say that you’ve enjoyed it.
I have protested and left relationships-family, friends , religion and institutions. Protesting though it made me some enemies, attracted disapproval and has had detrimental financial and emotional consequences to my life has bought me freedom. The freedom to practice self reclamation and self sovereignty. That is my most prized possession and my wish for all Black Women who desire it.
I dream of a world where everyone would embody true self-sovereignty. Where we will all relate in our full power. Where there is no need for others to be inferior or shrink to relate in harmony with others. Where there is no need to subordinate, to shrink, to wield power over others.
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Black Women in the Workplace 