The Acne to my melanin

I suspect that we don't have as much control over our lives as we believe that we do. Sure, we aren't helpless beings at the mercy of a predetermined algorithm, but we also aren't the all-powerful titans we sometimes convince ourselves we are. When things are going well, we over-estimate our contributions; and think highly of ourselves because we've done this Incredible thing. Feelings of pride, and confidence are warranted after an achievement; however, there's often a lack of acknowledgment of the factors, circumstances, and people that played different roles in getting you to the mountain top. When things aren't going well, there are often feelings of anxiety and despair due to the lack of control we have over our lives. It starts feeling like life is happening to us without our permission, and all we can do is react to each new thing that life throws at us. This is a dangerous place to be, because it can demotivate you from taking care of things that you cou...

“Don’t applaud a fish for swimming.” It’s a saying that I come across often on social media, and I get it, fish are supposed to swim. With that being said, good behaviour is to be rewarded, and in a world where things can take a sharp turn very quickly, relatively smooth sailing is nothing to scoff at. People are ashamed to speak about the small things they appreciate in life, be it from loved ones or their own accomplishments; because how dare they make a mountain out of an ant hill? No matter how small it is to other people if something makes a difference in your life; you have every right to celebrate it. You don’t applaud a fish for swimming, but in an ocean where many have fallen victim to the perils of the deep; one that is alive and kicking is cause for celebration. It is the responsibility of a parent to provide the best life possible for their children, but you can still feel a sense of joy and pride when you see how your parent makes an effort to be there for you. You can...

In an interaction, where there is a recipient and a donor (yes that is the antonym of recipient), the burden of responsibility, of proof, is on the donor. It is the donor’s responsibility to ensure that the recipient actually receives what they are giving. It isn’t the customers’ responsibility to buy your product; it is yours to sell it to them. So sell it. It is the artists’ responsibility to reach their audience, not the audience's to accommodate the artist. It is the comedian’s responsibility to make the joke land, if the crowd doesn’t laugh then the comedian failed.  There is a pandemic of donors who forfeit their responsibility to the recipient, and then cry woe when the recipient doesn’t pick up what they dropped. Comedians from the last decade, and the one before have expressed their disdain for the “current generation” for being too sensitive. They say that the audience has lost their sense of humour, and they take everything too seriously. The people, whose job is to use ...

As an outsider, it is easier to see when someone else is struggling, especially when it’s a loved one. And the most difficult part of helping them is often just getting them to acknowledge that there is something happening.  Seeing a loved one struggle and not knowing how to help them is a difficult position to be in. Sometimes, the only way to help someone on their journey, is to invite them along for your own. To push them to face their demons may be asking for too much, and could possibly cause more harm than good. However, sharing your journey and letting them see you battle your demons can be the best thing you could do for them. After all, two cowards are braver than one.   People perceive things through a lens tinted with personal experience and bias; so witnessing someone else go through something and fight the good fight always brings one's thoughts back to their own battles. They can begin their journey of healing simply by seeing and understanding what someone ...

No one ever tells you how much healing hurts. No one tells you that on your journey, you will have to open up old wounds and address new ones. No one tells you about the shame of knowing better, but still being stuck in old routines. The shame and disgust you feel because you feel like you are failing yourself.  A perfect example of the difficult road to healing is the road to recovery from addiction. It’s not a simple straightforward process where you just quit whatever or whoever your substance of choice was. Recovery isn’t a linear process. Relapsing is part of the process and may happen multiple times. When it does happen, it often doesn’t feel as euphoric as it did back then. The substance is now tainted, laced with shame and disgust. Yet you will still use it. That’s when it hurts the most, when you are most likely to give up. It isn’t the substance that breaks your spirit; it’s the shame and self-loathing that creeps up on you and pulls you into darkness. That’s the unseen d...

We often see revolutionary acts as major events such as the Soweto Uprisings, Montgomery bus boycotts, and the Arab Spring. What we often overlook is that a revolutionary act can be an individual decision based on a political decision. And if you are wondering why everything has to be political, it’s because I’m black, my very existence is political.  A dark-skinned man intentionally choosing a dark-skinned woman in a world where dark skin is frowned upon and has been bred out of the population for centuries is a revolutionary act. A man with concerningly tight pants, blue hair, and piercings in unconventional places in a conservative, hyper-masculine society is a revolutionary act. There are a lot of defiant “small” actions, that you can decide upon in your life based on your beliefs that can be your flag in the sand to make your stand. In your life, the things you believe in and believe to be right, that you can do, are your responsibility.  "Some are born great, some achiev...

Emotions, like almost everything else, exist on a spectrum. They vary from overwhelming, chest-thumping joy, to earth-shattering heartbreak. There are far more emotions than happiness and sadness and we experience them all. Not acknowledging them does not change anything except hinder your ability to deal with them in a healthy manner. It is impossible for you to only experience pleasant emotions, and unpleasant emotions are more than just sadness and heartbreak; envy is a valid emotion too. Feeling envious of others is not a sign of witchcraft or cruel intentions. It is a perfectly normal and healthy response to seeing others be abundantly blessed while your well runs dry and it is not due to a lack of effort on your part.  Envy is not only a green monster that overwhelms you to experience feelings of hatred towards your pretty sister with glass slippers and a Harry Windsor of her own. It can simply be a “why can’t I have things come easily for me like so and so…”. If you are clos...

People’s opinions are either informed by lived experiences or learned ones, and we sometimes bicker over which holds more weight in terms of the validity of opinions.  Those who are well versed in literature often disregard the lived experiences of the subjects of their study unless it is as research material for their studies. And those who’ve done the time, sometimes feel that opinions formed from outside the of the ring hold little weight because everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.  This divide, like most things, is usually between the haves and the have not’s. Middle and upper-class people often sit behind high walls, in air-conditioned homes and lead the discourse on poor people and the effects of poverty on the social dynamics in townships. They, without any true knowledge of what it is like down in the trenches, get a platform to speak on behalf of those they don’t know and they do so with a confidence that is symptomatic of couch quarterbacks and ...

It is not by accident that almost every atrocity committed against humanity has found refuge within capitalism. Racism, colourism, sexism, exploitation, and slave labour all found a home within the capitalist system. The face of the villain has changed from European nations to multi-national companies that are coincidentally from those same countries, but the rules of the game remained the same, capitalist in nature. We’ve been convinced that it is no longer Western nations that pillage and plunder the world but greedy multi-national companies with no soul. Periodically, someone is chosen as the face of this corporate greed; first, it was John D. Rockefeller, then Bill Gates, and now it is Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg. The actions of companies have been divorced from the foreign policies of their homelands and they are painted to be acting of their own accord without state encouragement or influence. What is often not mentioned is that it was not the Dutch government but a private co...

The systems and rules we live by were made by man and therefore can be changed by man. “It is the way things are” and “that’s how it’s always been done” are no longer good enough. If we could all unanimously agree that slavery was unacceptable and that no human should own another human no matter the circumstances, or religious/political, and cultural justification, then surely we can amend other aspects of society.  The people who put certain systems in place were ordinary men who had personal agendas, be they racist, misogynistic, homophobic, or a combination. These systems were set in place by those who were historically in positions of power and I do not think it would be a stretch to say that these people did not exactly have the best interests of mankind in mind when creating these systems. A simple visit to the history section of any library will shed light on this. We have already started to challenge and have changed many of their systems from colonisation and slavery, all...

Entitlement – The fact of having a right to something (Oxford Languages via Google)  Entitlement is a word often reserved for those who have done us wrong and is used negatively. It is commonly associated with those who are selfish and inconsiderate. It is not a title that anyone wants to be labeled with.  Those who consider themselves ahead of the curve and wise, often say that no one owes you anything and slap the shameful tag of entitlement on whoever dares demand or expect anything from anyone. If you expect nothing, then you will not be disappointed they say. This is a defense mechanism to protect oneself against disappointment and heartbreak. The world is a rough place and I place no blame on someone for wanting to prevent pain and protect themselves. What I will not accept though, is the notion that no one owes you anything. That is not how communities work. That is not how humans have survived for thousands of years and that is not how healthy interpersonal relationsh...

 I, personally, do not care if you think I am racist. I believe that I am not and I am pretty certain that I give all individuals equal standing regardless of their race but if you feel like I am coming up short, I do not care. I have enough reasons to be racist that do not reflect badly on my character so my striving to ensure that I am not is more than you deserve.  I have 368 years of reasons to be racist. I am in a perpetual state of anger that messes with my quality of life because of you. Every time I turn on National Geographic and the narrator speaks of the dwindling North American buffalo I am reminded that they were almost wiped out of extinction because the Native Americans were dependent on them for survival and Europeans weren’t too happy about them being alive.  My blood boils when I listen to prominent white people such as Bill Gates and Prince William speak about how overpopulation, and I remember the British hero, Winston Churchill allowed million of Indi...

Forgiving yourself is far more difficult than asking someone you've wronged for forgiveness because there is no one to absolve your wrongs. There is no fight to be had with someone that will serve as the climax of the conflict where everything that follows after is a step forward. Forgiving yourself is a process that sometimes feels like 1 step forward, two backward, and another sideways. Some days hurt more than the first day you realised that you dropped the ball, and each subsequent day hurts more than the last. What makes this especially difficult is the cruel words with which we refer to ourselves during this time. Even when someone has wronged you, you often do not say the worst thing you possibly can to them, but when speaking to yourself there is no such filter. The things you can't describe you feel in your gut, and taste on your tongue. But the sun rises again. And again. You have to keep rising with it every day, trying to make amends, to love yourself again. Do the ...

Life is all about making choices, and they come in varying degrees of significance. Some are as minuscule as deciding between two or two and a half teaspoons of sugar, and others are whether your current partner is someone whom you would want around at your lowest point or not. No one has all the answers and anyone who claims to is not someone you should take seriously. We are freestyling this life thing, but we all need some sort of method to our madness. A process of elimination to guide us when we feel lost and uncertain. A process that we can rely on so that whatever the outcome, we can live with it.   I have made many choices in my life and said a lot of things, I am not proud of some and I am ashamed of others. I find that with decisions, it is often best to choose the option that would cause the least amount of harm if it were the wrong one. If people were discussing the choice you are making in 50 years’ time, could someone defend you in good conscience without playing...

Bill Burr who is a comedian, has a joke where he talks about bravery and how the minimal qualifying criteria for it has dropped. He talks about how the understanding of bravery has gone from jumping into burning buildings to saving lives, to people just talking about their traumas and feelings. The first time I heard it I chuckled, but upon further introspection, I realised that it’s not necessarily a dropping of standards but an expansion of the understanding of the word and what it means.  Vulnerability requires a lot of bravery from you because you are allowing others to see something that cannot be perceived from the outside and only you are privy to it. They get an opportunity to see you naked without pretenses or facades. It also opens you up to a multitude of possibilities that could make life very uncomfortable for you going forward. When people find out something that happened to you or that you did, their perception of you changes and they view you in a different light....

The beautiful thing about the internet is that it allows everyone the opportunity to find a community that they most belong to. No matter who you are and what you are into, through the internet, you can find like-minded people to connect with. The unfortunate thing about the internet is that anyone can find a sense of community, for ANYTHING. The internet has a home for everyone from pedophiles and abusers to racists and homophobes.  Shaming people was an effective tool to discourage behaviour that is detrimental to the community without causing any physical harm to the person. It acted as a deterrent so that most people do not entertain the devil on their shoulders long enough to commit an offense that requires punishment from the community. The social norms of the community were meant to accommodate and protect everyone. The internet and social media enable people to bypass those mechanisms from their immediate communities and go find others of similar minds online.  Th...

Humans are incredibly complex beings with many layers and as a result, we all experience different versions of the same person. Siblings experience the same parent differently even though they all live under the same roof and have the same relationship (parent-to-child). The way the first-born child experiences their parents is very different from how the last born (if there are two or more children) experiences them. If the eldest says that her mother is “XYZ”, the youngest has no right to say that they are lying simply because they experienced her as “ABC”; more than one thing can be true at once. Someone can be a great father and rapist at once, a sweet boyfriend but monstrous neighbour, and a loving parent who is a nightmare to work with. Children start realising the benefits of not being truthful from as young as three years of age – sometimes even before they learn how to talk so how do you ever feel confident enough to publicly defend someone against an allegation as if you coul...

The name “Imbokodo” is an isiZulu word that means “rock” and comes from a popular African proverb which says, “Wathint’ Abafazi, Wathint’ Imbokodo!” (“You Strike the Women, You Strike the Rock!”). I dislike how society has put certain groups of people in a position where they feel like they must qualify themselves. I understand that on their end it is probably an attempt at self-love and is probably a net positive, but I do not like the fact that they are in a position where they must do that. I saw a post on Twitter by a young black woman and the caption was about what a blessing her dark skin was. It was also not my first time seeing a post like that. The fact that she has to tell us (and herself) that, because we as society told her skin wasn’t right fills me with anger; anger that’s only surpassed by my shame because I played a role in it too at some point.  This qualifying of your value and humanity is something that I see with oppressed groups such as people of colour, women,...

Very few sayings amongst my peers irk me like “its not that deep”. Everything is deep and everything is personal. If it is done to my person by another person then it is personal. How we treat others is directly affected by the ties we have to them, not necessarily the ones they have to us because that is just not how it works. People do the things they do to you…because it is you. There is no other reason to be honest because they probably would not have done the same to their grandma, mother, or their child, but they had absolutely no problem doing it to you. You have every right to be livid, and you can react as you see fit (if it is legal of course) because they did to you as they saw fit.  This extends to speech as well; people often say that the world is too sensitive or that people cannot take jokes anymore. They say that because they can no longer get away with being terrible people without consequences, they try and shift the blame onto those who feel aggrieved by their wo...

For something that sustains us on a day-to-day basis, platonic relationships do not seem to receive enough appreciation. Romantic relationships often take precedence over them and I can see how that happens with the added element of intimacy. Western culture's obsession with romance since the days of Shakespeare’s writing, compounded with Hollywood’s obsession with meeting “the one” has not helped the case of platonic relationships. However, considering that most relationships we have are not romantic, we sure do overlook a significant portion of our lived experience.  When people think of relationships, they often think of someone to hold hands with, cuddle with, and stroke your fragile ego. Those are romantic relationships, and they are only a fraction of relationships. If “relationships” were represented by 100%, romantic relationships would be less than 10% of that, and yet, they tend to receive 90% of our efforts. It is the non-romantic relationships with those around us that ...