insatiable
Recently, I’ve been trying to confront my shadow of insatiability.
In the past, it was centered around “things”. Frankly, the life experience of living out of suitcases, and watching thousands upon thousands of dollars wasted and left behind along the way really did cure me of that. At least, until my mind gets bored (more on that later).
Now, it’s more related to transformations, growth, and inner work. At some point, none of that shit matters unless you’re putting it to practice and really being an active contributor to the world.
I, however, have a bad habit of hiding….
While I do suffer from my chosen isolation, and crave deeper connections with others, the truth of the matter is that a part of me is actually terrified to accept who I actually am in public. I’m more than comfortable being my little confrontational self in my own, safe, space, but really embracing the true call to my soul, publicly? Damn, that’s a whole new kind of ask.
Everything about my aura, life path, inner desires, spiritual call, <insert whatever fucking rhetoric you want to use>, is all about transforming the world around me to be better. My particular brand of this is to…help… things burn down. Really tearing down the unnecessary so the leftover raw materials can be used to create something better for everyone in the future. And, naturally, this all starts with applying the same energy to myself. The amount of ego deaths and hell loops I have seen, by my own hand…. jesus christ….
This path is pretty hard to continue on if I’m spending most of my fucking time hiding. (I like to call it" “hermitting”, and sometimes “blobbing” - as a shapeless and lazy blob - but apparently too much of a good thing is not a good thing…)
Hiding is soooo alluring, though. Being the sensitive lil lady that I am, I find it way easier to dive deep into the realm of my subconscious with my lil books and my music and my lil decks of cards. And, to be fair, I think this will always be some of my most favorite and cherished activities that I do on a regular basis. But, it kind of means fuck all if I’m not interacting and growing with others.
The insatiable nature of my fire within is essentially what pushes me forward, and what keeps me in the constant awareness that my life is supposed to be more than what it is now. I’ve lived a lot of lives, and met and burned bridges with an uncountable number of people, places, and things. As a highly sensitive and internally-intuned person, I don’t have the audacity nor the self confidence nor the conscious desire to be publicly seen or recognized in any way. Especially since being recognizable seems like a life burden I could do without. But, the fire within won’t quit. The subconscious will have it’s way, whether I take on the driver’s seat or not. So, I might not believe that I have something exceptional to share; but, if I listen to the fire within, I know that my soul sure as hell does.
But, if I’m honest, I know what the fuck it is.
I’ve known for awhile. And my mentor called me THE FUCK OUT by attributing my story to Jonah and the Whale. I’m Jonah, and last year, I ignored the call. So my beautiful little apartment in Santa Monica was symbolically my time in the whale’s belly. I called that place my “Ivory Prison” as I watched so much of the life I thought I was returning to in the States just simply…die…Die off, completely, until I answered the fucking call, again, course.
The issue is, despite knowing what I’m supposed to share right now, it’s honestly not…. exceptional. It’s actually the direct fucking opposite of exceptional. I’m not here to share my triumphs and good vibes (if I hear one more goddamn person say this phrase non-ironically, I am going to lose my goddamn mind #blessthem). I’m here to share my, very active, motherfucking dumpster fires.
The confronting reality is that I feel called to expose my own trials and tribulations with my own fucking misconceptions and learned ignorances. That’s right, all those unbaked, unfinished, and potentially completely ignorant and incomplete ideas I have almost entirely refused to share with others…. are exactly what my intuition is screaming at me to share. Why? Because I’m so brilliant? LOL yes because I am so brilliantly incorrect, most likely, in a way that maybe others are also incorrect. But how the fuck would I know if I don’t say it out loud?
Feels like a real “Brick” calling, if you ask me.
I’m just SUPER stoked to put myself in the position to constantly be corrected by others… and, frankly, by others who do fuck all with their lives. Let’s be honest, the internet is full of fucking unfulfilled people shitting on others because they probably hate themselves. Our world right now is so goddamn focused on “knowing everything” and “being informed” that no one fucking admits to just not fucking getting it… Which is probably why it’s getting increasingly more important for some of us to start vocalizing that we don’t fucking get it…without the White Victim perspective, course. And, in all fairness, I’m sure some of my ideas and misconceptions are entirely shared. As humans, we have unique elements about ourselves within, but as a group -statistically- we’re all pretty fucking similar…ly stupid. So maybe others can learn from my mistakes…
*story time*
When I was in college, I took Ancient Greek in the Honors College at Baylor University. There is way to much to unpack around how I got there, and why….but the TL;DR is that I was simply revoking all personal dominion and responsibility, and just did exactly what others “who knew better than me” told me to do (LITERAL BARF). The second semester of Ancient Greek gave me one of the only two C’s I’ve ever had in my life. (Remember, I am a recovering perfectionist. Anything less than an A was not acceptable to my younger mind, so I was willing to break in a 1000 pieces for a better grade. Obviously, in this case, that did not work…). After the final, the professor literally followed me out of the class to tell me, “You know, Emily, you really helped a lot of students with your questions. Your take on Greek was so wrong, and so incorrect, that the others really learned from your mistakes.” Granted, this was like 10 years ago, so my emotional memory of what he specifically said probably altered his exact words, but that was my interpretation of what he said, and that’s all that matters here….
*end of story time*
So, accepting this as my path forward, why don’t we just rip off the fucking bandaid? As they say, go big or go home (…I am home… but still..). Let’s dive in to my most unbaked, completely triggering, politically incorrect but highly relevant, and probably extremely ignorant perspective of the following: global racism.
(Lol don’t bother grabbing popcorn. I might infuriate you to the point of feeling ill).
My life truly is exceptional, by all superficial counts, anyway. I’m a well-paid Data Engineer from the United States living in Brasil, legally, and with full health benefits, both in the US and here. I built this life myself, using my own intelligence and grit with little to no help from others, and I just simply keep hitting the goals I set for myself. It takes blood, sweat, and tears, but the loses always fueled my inevitable successes.
….So….jokes on me that this was all underpinned and financed by me being white and from a country that has essentially bullied all others into deep submission through manipulation and sheer force….
I’m currently living in motherfucking Brasil with US dollars, as a white woman from the US, and with a smile and presence that strangers seem to enjoy. Apparently, while being a healed person does help my aura not be a complete burden to be around, the reality is that there is unspeakable privilege at work, here, and that’s what makes my life so exceptional. I might have gotten myself here…. but the world gave me all the assistance I needed, like unrolling the fucking red carpet.
Pride hits aside, it is fucking insane to really think about this, from a 3rd person perspective. All of this experience of moving in and around the world these past few years has basically melted down and decimated all of my preconceived notions that “not everything is a race thing”. As it turns out, almost everything is, in fact, a race thing. Almost exclusively so. This is clear to me even with my probably forever-ignorant perspective of the full reality of the world. Turns out, I will never, in fact, experience most forms of aggression directed at me because of the almighty white skin and the US status. It is literally insane what the world prioritizes, and what it doesn’t, because, at this point in my life, I have done fuck-all to deserve this level of “respect” and collective catering to my smallest of needs.
So, how do we change it?
Fuck if I know.
It’s actually part of the reason I’m in Rio, though, and in Brasil in general. Brasil’s racial tensions and culture of violence are so kindred to that of ours in the US; it shocks me how close and similar it is, and how I had little to no understanding of this prior to coming here for the first time in 2022. LOL to be fair, I was taught in school that racism was eradicated in the 60s and I believed them, so my life perspective was probably too small, and too delusional, to understand what the fuck was happening outside of my little white neighborhood utopia (bleak shout out to where my perception started… it’s definitely…humbling…). I’m currently struggling my way through NEGRITUDE: USOS E SENTIDOS, which talks about all of these things and more, but it’s in português, so it is notably a slow go for me…
I do hope I am still blindingly ignorant about where this is going, because the more I learn, the more hopeless I feel about it. I don’t understand the root, or why so many are holding on to our ancestors’ mistakes. Part of the role we all have on Earth is to transform what is, not maintain what shouldn’t be. For all rights and purposes, with all these baby souls out there wildin’ with the most ignorant ass bullshit and with a air of pride that I will never understand, I think the world needs a bit of healthy breaking and reformation. (Sorry, obviously late to the party. Clearly this line of reasoning is well seasoned throughout MANY generations prior to my white ass thinking of such a “revolutionary” idea. But I have arrived none the less.) The discrepancies are pretty rootless.
All I know is that, with complete certainty, whoever leads the world to a new era is not going to be fucking white. We are far too goddamn blind, and too selfishly invested in the way things are (yes, as I said, the subconscious will have it’s hay day whether we intend for this or not), so no “kumbaya” moment* amongst the whites is going to lead to any real change for others. We simply do not have enough skin in the game to really make the changes that need to be made (…punny…. LOL too soon?). Plus, I’m not in the business of following someone more blind, and probably weaker, than me, for christ sake. I am a lady of fire, after all; can’t follow anyone weaker than me, unless of course I want to burst into a ball of blazing rage. It’s just that dainty nature of my being. :)
*Note: The “kumbaya” reference is from a video I saw on Instagram.. that has mysteriously been deleted… where South Africans were discussing Apartheid, and how it ended because it was economically worse for the white class travelers, not because of healings with racism. The black woman speaking used this term, and the above justification… Not surprisingly, she was talking to whites trying to lead the discussion, and they were cutting her off as she spoke. For the life of me, I cannot find the video, anymore, but I trust someone on the internet will.
In summary, without a doubt, this is a topic where I clearly have no fucking idea what I’m doing. Which also means that there is probably no shortage of confrontational bullshit I need to face in order to power on forward… another reason why I would rather keep my failures in observations and deductive reasoning tucked in tight… but the goddman fire within…. also, I don’t want to go back into that fucking whale’s belly, again…. I’m good on the acid baths for now, thanks.
So, is this what I should be sharing? Maybe. Maybe the world needs to see people failing forward a bit more often, instead of these clean cut 30-second videos of “powerful enlightenment” (that fill me with a blind rage that I am struggling to contain within). Maybe we need to be more honest about when we don’t know the fucking path forward… Just acknowledging this to ourselves, out loud, means that we can then be directed to those who do actually have this wisdom, who do have suggested paths forward, and who are already leading those paths forward, successfully.
Sometimes, the best way to lead is to follow.