can we talk?

about trying to figure out who the f*ck i am

I want to take a stab at the conversational style of bearing my insides. I often wrap my true feelings and sentiments in clunky metaphors and dense lyrical poetry. It has been a good practice thus far — it has allowed me to make meaning out of both my deepest tragedies and wonderful discoveries, but I am starting to feel caged in my own language.

I come to the paper with an expectation to translate my soul’s content in an uber specific way and it sucks the joy out of speaking to myself. My biggest takeaway from the recent events of my life is that sometimes things don’t need to be destroyed, just reordered. To avoid belaboring the point: I am staying playful. Taking the edge off. Lowering the stakes. This is not going to be published in a global magazine anyway.

So.

I have learnt something new about myself.

Again.

If you’re anything like me, on a fundamental level of existential and identity crises — you forget yourself. Many times. Your roots remains the same, locked into place, immovable and indestructible. But your leaves grow and fall at a rapid pace, fruits die as quickly as they are born and the flowers cycle through their lifetime in a day. Rinse and repeat. I say all of this to say: you change often. You grow. You are rarely the same person throughout the passage of time. That’s a beautiful thing. And it is something to rejoice in. And I do. And I have for as long as I have been this way. But there are times in my life that this way of being gives me a headache. Because, if you are anything like me, you change and grow just to fucking forget everything you learned.

There are so many versions of myself to keep up with. As a teen, I used to cry for hours because I felt that I didn’t know myself and I am devastated to report that this feeling has not gone away. I am 23 now, young in body yet aged in spirit and I wonder where I have gone. I am here, clearly, but the trail behind me has been blown away by the wind. She probably thinks it’s funny to mess with me.

I wake up everyday, feeling like I am starting again. Still horizontal, fresh out the dreamworld, my mind floods with the possibilities of expression. I know what you’re thinking: black girl out of control, why don’t you try meditation. I have! I do! I used to! UGH!

I used to do so many things.

Be so many things.

So many.

I used to be this and I used to do that.

I used to. I used to. I used to,

The saddest three words strung together.

But I also, right now, do this. And do that. And I want to start doing this and restart doing that.

It’s overwhelming.

My point is, I am just getting started with my life…truly (fighting everyday to keep the dragon named feeling-like-im-already-behind in its cage). My focus is on building my sense of self again. Again, because I am pretty sure my building blocks are scattered all over the mat and I have to put them together once more. But I feel all over the place, up is down and down is left.

It’s annoying and frustrating because I have already done the work. I should be further by now, by my own standards. My own timing. My own journey.

Pssst. Me. It’s me. Am I sensing … a slight desire to control your journey?

Yes, me, you are.

I thought so. Let’s just put that down for a second, I’m discussing something else with myself, okay?

Fine. Proceed.

Anywho, like Cleo Sol said, “things are changing. im still here”.

And I am. But not in the way I expected, or hoped. But I am still here regardless. What’s nice is that I get to decide how. I choose how I exist. How I flow, how I eat, how I sleep, how I dance, how I create, how I speak, how I pray, how I walk, how I observe, how I play. That feels less daunting when I think about putting myself together as a living, breathing being.

Maybe then, it’s about breaking it down into smaller, more manageable chunks. When I think of myself, I can learn to see myself as the sum of smaller parts rather than Myself, capital M. Big picture. Last number.

I shall start small.

Think less, CTRL, and more FLOW. In and out. I don’t have to confine myself in any way. I think that’s my problem. I want to smush all parts of myself together, fold it and wear it as a shirt. When in reality, I am all items of clothing. And I am allowed (me!!) to mix and match. To wear this because it’s cold or this because it’s the practical option or to throw something in the wash when it’s dirty.

Solange put it beautifully when she whispered: “I can’t be a singular expression of myself; there’s too many parts, too many spaces, too many manifestations, too many lines, too many curves, too many troubles, too many journeys, too many mountains, too many rivers, so many...”

I am allowed to be what I am. I shall find the root that grows this branch of sensibility and shame and yank you right out of my foundation. I have places to go and it’s harshing the vibe I am curating.

So, yeah. That’s what I learnt about myself today. And as I wrote this.

As always, self, good talk.

Sincerely,

black girl out of control