Killing the Good Girl

Had an AHA moment recently….these have be coming steadily this year as I’ve eased into 30. At first, I kind of dreaded having to close the door on my twenties, but now I am sitting comfortable and pretty in 30. (Sidebar: I’ve also been attracting younger men lately who all tell me in shock, “Wow! You look good for your age!” HA!) Anyway, as I ripen in age, I’ve realized something about myself that I need to lay to rest. A part of me, collecting dust over time and not holding much use. She has pigtails and a kool-aid smile. I call her “Good Girl” and this chick has to go!

It began for me as a child. You would have loved to have me as your daughter or student! I was quiet, dutiful and very smart. My mother loved to brag on me too, “Yes, Tameka is ALWAYS on the honor roll! She never gets anything less than a B!”I loved standing out for doing “the right thing”. I loved getting attention for being right so I worked really, really hard at being the best good girl around.  My teachers said go to college, so I went. Not only did I go, I went to one of the best and most expensive colleges around, NYU. Preacher said that Jesus said don’t have sex unless you’re married, so I stayed a virgin a long ass time and married the first man I had sex with!  

I was driven by a need to be recognized as “good” in the eyes of others and also to master whatever the standard for good was. I’m a Pisces so we have this uncanny ability to melt and merge with others, which is why we make such great actors and artists. The issue comes when we are so busy merging and melting, that we loose sight of what we want….

This really came to heads for me when I was trying to decide to leave my marriage. I was looking for some outside authority to tell me that it was ok. What if I made a mistake? What if I ruined my life and even worst, my son’s? What if I am WRONG! Gasp! This good girl cannot be wrong! I’ve always gotten it right! I cannot tell you how many spiritual readings I had trying to get a clue into my decision. Every oracle, medium pointed the divination back to me. It is up to you, they said. You must decide and once you decide the great forces around you will back up your decision. Hunh? How could this be? I was looking for someone else to tell me, some textbook, some scripture to let me know what to do. But it could not…

So, for the first time I was forced to not be “good” but just be true…So, that was three years ago and I made the right decision for me. However, lately I’ve been noticing how I still have some of this “good girl” complex and a fear of getting it wrong. This complex has had me running around thinking it’s about reading this book or taking this class or following what the 'great-so and so' said.  Whatever system I plug myself into, I go hard and try to perfect it to a T…Afterall, shining and being the best has always gotten me the limelight….But no more. I no longer care if I get it wrong, or if anyone else agrees. Fact is, I can’t get it wrong; it’s life and everything is a new experience to learn from.

So I’ve decided to the kill the good girl. Yup, this goody-two shoes bitch got to go! I kill the need to seek authorities outside of myself and for others to validate what I am doing. Yes, I will continue to take in information, seek elders, read books etc. but I will always ask myself what do I think, what is it I want. I will be the final authority over what is going on in my life. I will not try and fit some mold and be “perfect” within it. I will not bend to the expectations of what others think I should be. 

It is so refreshing not to feel bound to a group or a single ideology of what one should or should not do. Today, I spent time walking through the mall and thought honestly about what I like.... I like to wear tights and I’m going to buy me some with leopard print. I like vegetarian food and being a “granola” but I will eat me a reese’s cup if I want to. I love the arts and being an artist but don’t think it is particularly creative to starve. I will make lots of money from my art. I love my juju-vodu-law-of-attraction-what-the-fuck-is-she-talking-about-mumbo-jumbo and it's fine if you don't get it or believe in it.....I will do a photoshoot...in the nude. I will talk about Harriet Tubman and sex in the same sentence. I am creating my own rules and will bend or break them as I please.

Dance to my new theme song!

Wet With Expectation

Funny, the topic of my last blog was “watching sadness” and now this one is about being uhhhh…..happy! I figure I ought to express it before……NO! Not going to say that! I am in the now and the now is eternal, all there really is. I AM HAPPINESS! At the start of this year, I made a deeper commitment to manifesting what I want in my life. For many, the new year actually begins on September 21^st, the beginning of harvest time for many people around the world and the fall equinox—a day where there is equal day and night, energy ripe for planting your desires into the universe.

So at the beginning of this cycle, I made an oath to myself to go hard or go home! I have decided that every single day I am going to work toward my goals. As many of you know, I’ve been working on my poetry book this year but what you might not know is that this project began over six years ago! I started compiling my work before I got pregnant with my son—who is now five! And then I got caught up in the windmill of life (read Married and Divorced by 30 my very first blog). So, somehow this huge creative aspect of my being got shut down, packed away, put aside and placed on a shelf marked “Dream Deferred”. I even began to feel like my creativity had leaked out with my son’s amniotic fluid. And yes, giving birth to a child is probably the most single creative and miraculous act in the world, but now I am giving birth to me!

In my young days—I mean real young days—I was no joke! I was no regular sour face sitting-up-in-my-bedroom-why-does-life-suck-youth-poet, I became a national award winning writer by the time I was eighteen. I performed my poetry at the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C., I spoke at the White House on the importance of arts education and was one of twenty young artists in the nation to have the honor of being a Presidential Scholar in the Arts. I was also first place winner in Philadelphia’s Young Playwrights competition; my play got produced at Temple University, The Philadelphia Theatre Company and countless high schools and youth detention centers. Whew! I was a beast at 18!

So the past two years, I’ve been looking back at my life like WTF?! I took all of that, all my writing, all my voice and stuffed it inside of me! Why? I could blame getting married too young and having a child but the root of it was really something else….a four letter word that is the seed of destruction in the world: FEAR! Fear that despite all of these damn awards and accolades somehow I was not enough. Illogical right? Fear never is logical. It makes no sense. I do not believe in a devil but if one did exist, it would have to be the sickness of fear within ourselves that causes us to doubt, worry and worst of all, deny who we really are inside. The devil is looking in the mirror and not seeing who you truly are, greatness!

So, when something has been planted in your spirit, when you have come to life with some kind of mission, you either must fulfill it or you will self-destruct. Period, end of story. It don’t matter if you put it off for five, ten, fifteen years even, it is always going to resurface as a itch in your soul telling you that something is not right. We all know those people who surrender to the pitfalls of life, get lost in security and live a life of “I usedtos”…I usedto sing, I usedto write, I usedto be healthy etc. and have now resigned to being comfortable and safe. Nothing wrong with comfortablity or safety per se but life is about expansion, not stagnation. Whatever is not growing is dead…

("Common Threads" mural by Meg Saligman in Philadelphia. I was actually so self-conscious when this went up, lol!)

Last week I got a sign from the heavens! My sister sent me a text message showing an article published in the Philadelphia Daily News about a mural I posed for over 15 years ago being retouched to last another 30 years! I was only 15 at the time, in high school and at the budding of my creative exploration. Being chosen to be the largest figure on the largest mural on the east coast was amazingly scary!  The craziest thing was, I didn’t have to “do” anything to “get” it. We can say it was some good karma I had, a gift from the universe or my ancestors. Folks want to know the story but it is very simple. Artist came to my high school, photographed a bunch of kids and chose me. This mural being rededicated is symbolic of me being recommitted to my purpose for expansion and hell, greatness! And even deeper than that, the ability to allow good things to flow into my life! All that is required is that I be me, period.

This is not my normal tone, I am sooooo not one to go around tooting my horn or singing about the great deeds of my past but pardon me while I indulge this moment to connect to the fact that we are ALL magicians and have the power to create whatever life we choose. I am all of these things yet I am none of these things, what I am mostly is creator.

(In this video Will Smith talks about the power of thought and creation. I listen to this EVERY morning!)

So when I wake up these mornings, I do so with excitement! I’ve been getting up around 5am almost every morning to meditate and “launch my rockets of desire” into the world. I can feel the pool of my spirit becoming clear, the waters calm and wet with expectation…get ready for this tsunami…

Watching Sadness.....

Written on 8/21/09

I am watching the emotion of sadness. It is living somewhere around my heart center. Not radiating a huge area, spreading down to my appendages and through my toes but it is pulsing, faintly like the lifeline of someone just coming back from the dead. Its’ color is gray or dark purple, maybe about the size of a mouse. That’s it, my sadness is a small purple mouse with a slow pulse. But I can feel it there. Like something I ate that got stuck in my teeth. It’s funny because when I have expressed to my friends that I was feeling down or cried they look at me like really? I did not know you were…… sad. I am always surprised by that, that others seems me as stoic, strong, stone -- some mythical Amazonian Black woman who sheds no tears. I guess I am somewhat to blame for my own stereotype. I present myself as strong, intelligent and very, very Black. Original Black Afrikan Woman. Black Afrikan women cry indigo tears but only during childbirth—maybe. 

Or ghetto Black women get to cry blood red tears when they are panthers raging at baby fathers or no good niggas. White women get to cry silver tears. Everyone gathers by to cup them in their hands and sing to them like precious jewels. White women are the best criers, everyone expects them to cry and trips over their feet to let them see a rainbow again. But Black women—be they Queens or Bitches or both only get to shed tears of hysteria. And when she lets it out no one wants to touch her to tell her it will be okay for they fear drowning in the monsoon. They fear she can no longer carry their weight for them and their backbones will break. They fear the end of civilization. So no one encourages her to let it all out, she is encouraged to say fuck it. Scream and fight—cause your anger is common and expected or cloak yourself in Afrika and let ankhs and words in Kiswahili be your shield, being the mother of civilization is after all enough….

So why am I sad? What was my trigger? The humidity and the rain? Watching my son get into some other woman’s car with his father? Not having much contact with another adult for a week? Seeing all the Black women around me confused and sad? Being a fulltime mommy and trying to figure out how to discipline my son without being an emasculating Black bitch? Because I haven’t had a man in over a month and miss being soft and having arms to cradle me? The one who used to hold me stopped calling. The one who I am married to, I don’t want to touch me and the one who I want to touch me probably never will. Why? Because I am scary because I am serious. I do smile but I am serious. I laugh and joke but I am serious. I am sexy but I am serious. Act like a lady but think like man. Be sweet and shinny. Rub his back. Feed him, fuck him and don’t complain. Be mythical. Be manipulative and give good head. But when you are too serious you are dangerous because questions are asked and hey, he’s still young.  And I could go on and talk about slave masters and Black studs but I won’t. I could conjure up Aunt Sara and the Hottentot Venus but that’s another essay.

I am watching sadness boiled down to a purple mouse that lives inside my chest. It acts up sometimes like arthritis when outside is rainy and gray and no one calls. It responds to chocolate, poetry, meditation, herbal teas, prayer, tears and sometimes fantasies. At other times I just take a movie for about two hours and lay on my couch. When I am feeling really mystical I’ll read a book on Afrikan Vodou or watch a youtube clip of someone dancing Oshun. Tonight, maybe I’ll pray over some honey to remind me that I am a goddess or take a bath in some blue water made salty by my tears.         

The Massage--poetry book sneak peak :)

Ok, yall I'm wrapping up my first week back at work and I am tired!! I want to write but I really just want a massage so here's a sneak peak at a short but sweet poem to be featured in my upcoming book. Dedicated to all the tired hard working women who need some love rubbed into their backs!!

The Massage

I need someone to dig in and loose these knots

Burrow deep inside flesh and muscle

hard and soft

fast and slow

Send some fresh blood to break up

the tension and stiffness

Lay me out till I am a limp noodle

a body without bones and sharp edges

Pry me open

till I gush,

screaming a steamy river

I need someone to dig in and loose these knots

Pound a new rhythm into these tendons

pulse and vibrate

sound and silence

Awaken a beat to send me spinning

Lay flat the old patterns

till I am a sea of call and response

A song without breaks and blues

Stretch me open

Till I roar

Singing a sweet volcano

SACRED SEX

                      (me dancing at Freak Nasty, now known as The Sweet Spot)

It’s been a while since I blogged!! A lot has been going on in a good way! I have been putting the pedal to the metal to churn out my poetry book so most of my creative energies have been going there. I had a GREAT summer, though in many ways it was quiet, I finally did what I have been intending to do for the past 5 years, work on my writing! I also performed a few times which too was one my goals.

Recently I spent time reflecting and realize that for the past five years—maybe more—my throat, sacral (sex) and root chakras have been underactive while my solar plexus chakra has been overactive. What is a chakra? Energy centers in our body that govern certain mental, physical and spiritual faculties. (If you want to know about these energy centers and whether you are balanced, overactive or underactive in them check out www.whitetigertantra.com). When these energies are out of wack this often manifests as a disease of the physical body. An example is that while I was married, I was not writing and performing like I used to and not verbally expressing my true feelings of discontent about the relationship; as a result, I was constantly catching sore throats that would cause me to literally loose my voice (throat chakra).

Having an overactive solar plexus chakra and underactive throat, sacral and root chakra means that in the past I have been ungrounded and uncreative, did not express my voice, was not connected to my sensuality and was in many ways, too rigid and critical of others. Yup, this was me in a nutshell. I call the former me the “Afro-Centric Nun”. 

                           (me during my afro-centric nun days. i still love malcolm x)

You know the type: headwrap, long skirts, Bob Marley t-shirt, rapping about the devil of the white man! Now don’t get me wrong, this is still me but my sense of self now has expanded to be a fuller expression of who I am. So I still have my headwraps and will rock them from time to time but I also will rock booty shorts, fishnet stockings and take a pole dancing class if the spirit moves me. As Erykah Badu said, “It’s all me!” I can’t be confined inside anyone’s box.  Many parade around in costumes, dressed as their representative and not who they truly are for fear of what others might think. I have the privilege of being 30 now and not giving a fuck…..

So as I heal my energy centers, it is only natural that I become more creative, expressive, vocal and sensual. In fact, the sacral chakra contains both our sexual and creative energies which really are one in the same. To be truly creative one has to have a deep connection to their sensuality for sexual energy is the force of creation in the universe. For this reason, I have noticed that I am most creative when I am ovulating or on my cycle....

This summer, I wrote a lot of poetry and had a lot of sex! It was beautiful! Many of you know that I am completely fascinated and entranced with the practice of sacred sex and tantra. I dare not say that I am a practitioner or master but I have been reading and engaging in certain exercises that deals with the magic, sacredness and healing aspects of sexual energy. In fact, during this summer I experienced crying for the first time after having sex. Not crying because it was wack and I was frustrated but because a certain energy point was touched and pain was released.  I also experienced going into trance (altered state of awareness) during sex. Ever been filled with the holy ghost during sex?! HA! You should try it. It feels soooooo good to be connected to my sacral and root chakras. I wish I could describe it but it is as if I have swallowed the sun and she is buzzing in my yoni (sankrit word for vajay-jay meaning origin, source of life). It’s that energy you feel when you see someone you are really attracted to or when a song that puts you in the mood comes on. It is one of the most powerful energies in the universe and when channeled the proper way can heal you and manifest your desires in the world. If you are connected, than you should be able to feel this energy throughout your whole body after having sex. I circulate my energy and send it to heal me. While having sex, I can literally feel it in my throat cleansing and healing that chakra. I’m getting excited just talking about it!!

So this has been my journey thus far and I feel it is only a minute part of the beginning. I am returning to work this week (I’m a teacher) with a bit of melancholy cause I enjoyed my freedom of the summer so much. But hey, I am a magician, I will create my life. I am connected to a powerful engine of manifestation roaring between my legs. I AM the power of creative divine feminine energy moving throughout the universe. What a beautiful path, won’t you come with me?

  (shiva and shakti- representative of divine feminine and masculine energy- in sacred embrace)

Love and Sex

So there’s this hormone that is released when you have sex with someone called oxytocin. It is a bonding hormone. It is the same hormone that is released when a mother nurses her baby. Scientists theorize that prehistorically the hormone helped ensure the survival of the baby by bonding the two parents together; that a child would have more chances of living if it was raised by two parents. So nature has wired us to link love, sex and babies. I also read that repeated sex with the same person also increases the release of the hormone. So, sometime around the fourth time knocking boots, a bond is really cemented.  Women are often seen as not being able to separate love from sex. Time and time again I have seen chicks get turned out if a man puts it on them right. But I too have seen the reverse though men show it differently. The fusion of love and sex for women becomes, “I want you to be my man. ” We want a title, a badge that can be worn on our chest and shown to everyone that says “He’s With Me!!” In my observation, for men it seems much more about cock control. “You betta not be fucking nobody else!” They want exclusive access to your pussy despite in many cases whatever they might be doing on the side to taste the spice of life.  I don’t think it is possible to have long term casual sex and somebody or both parties not start feeling the effects of the oxytocin (This is why many men hit it and quit). However, let us question, once we start catching those feelings, how do we manage it?

Our concept of love or “bonding” is often associated with ownership. We want to have royalties on our loved one, exclusive rights to distribution. He better not even think about another woman! She better not be letting some other dude feel on her booty! Why? Be cause you are mine! You belong to me! Why do we think this way? Because the thought of our lover being with someone else sends us reeling over the edge like Thelma and Louise. But is this really about our lover or is this about us? In truth, it has nothing to do with our lover. One word for the culprit of our controlling love police: EGO. Why does it rip me to shreds to think about you with someone else? Because if you need someone else than it means I am not enough and truth is, me not being enough is my greatest fear. Is she prettier than me? Have a bigger ass? A better cook? Does he fuck better than I do? Does he have more money? A better job? A hotter car? (in New York, does he have a car period?) All fear thoughts that put us on this cycle of policing our lovers to make sure they do not show us what we fear most of all: that we are not enough. Truth is you are everything and yet you are nothing. No one person can be the “be all end all” for anyone. Many people go on a search for someone who can be that, but they will never find it. So your lover can never be the “end all” for you, and you can never be the “end all” for them. Period. 

I call this kind of love Lower Self Love. We all go through it, in truth we have to. As soon as we meet someone we really like, we desire to possess and control that person. That oxytocin starts kicking and we become addicted to how they make us feel. It is like we are an empty tank and we fill up with energy while we are around them. When we leave them, we still experience that high, until the energy slowly starts to dwindle down and down until it is gone. Then we starting feening for another hit of that person. So much that we begin to associate the feeling purely with that person and then in turn want to control them; not knowing that the energy is residing within us. The other person is the catalyst but you are fully capable of experiencing this bliss any time you want. In truth, we were made to connect and bond with others and I guess that is why these hormones exist anyway. The problem just becomes when we try to possess and control the other person and forget that we must also be full with our own energy. The energy of two full beings coming together can change the world!

This of course is a journey. Ego is evolving and we must experience Lower-Self type of love in order to experience Higher-Self Love. In my opinion, Higher-Self Love goes a little like this:

Dear Beloved:

I love YOU! I LOVE you! I LOVE YOU! I do not desire to posses or control you. You are not an object for me to manipulate. I trust you and respect your journey. I trust God/the Universe to be conspiring for my best interest by bringing you into my life. I know you have come to teach me something about myself and I have come to teach you. I fully enjoy being in your presence and I learn a great deal. However, I do not turn you into my savior. My entire experience in the world helps me to evolve but you, my intimate partner play a very special role. For it is you that reflects back to me my deepest Self. You help me to clean out from under the bed of my Self so that I can grow. I cherish each and every moment we spend together for it is truly a reflection of the Divine’s love for me.

**We teach that which we most need to learn so forgive me if I sound preachy. In sharing with you, I am sharing with myself for these are lessons that I too am learning. May we all love from our Higher Self. Ashe.

River Walking aka Ready for My Man....

I really try not to have all these blogs be about men but oh well!! My relationships are my reflection so I guess it’s about me anyway. And in fact, there is only One so when yall reading about me, you’re reading about yourself too! So I have decided that I want to be in a relationship. I know I posted a blog previously called, “Why I Need a Man” about me needing masculine energy balance in my life and even one called, “On Being Open” about me beginning to cultivate vulnerability. But the feeling that this blog is coming out of is different and new. In fact, I only made the decision 3 weeks ago that I am actually ready for a relationship.

For the last three years I have enjoyed not being anyone’s woman and not “belonging” to anyone. (Well there is that one last legal stipulation I’m still working on that says I’m someone’s wife. It’s hard to fund a divorce by yourself so I’ m accepting donations. If I get 700 people to donate a dollar or 350 people to donate 2 dollars I’ll be at the lawyer’s office in a jiffy! ) I have enjoyed my freedom of moving in and out of connections and taking a break when I needed to clear the energy. I have lavished in dating and enjoyed my frivolous playing in the field. However, something unexpected happened three weeks back….

 I am a theatre teacher and approximately three weeks ago came my end of the year production where I single handedly coordinated and directed close to one hundred kids in a show. It is one of the most intensely stressful and equally rewarding experiences I have all year. For at least two weeks before the show, I run around like a headless chicken barking at 12 and 13 year olds, buying costumes and coordinating dance rehearsals with little boys who want to “dougie” and “catdaddy”. So the show is up and running, going great. My students are performing myths, resurrecting Ike and Tina Tuner’s “Proud Mary” and executing scenes from Lorraine Hansberry’s “A Raisin in the Sun”. It was a great success! At the end of the night, I got kudos from my colleagues and principal and I finally exhaled. Then something strange happened as I was walking back to my classroom that evening to pack and go home. My consciousness witnessed a thought that kind of went like this:

Thought: Wow, your show was a great success, wouldn’t it be wonderful to share it with somebody else?

Me: Excuse me? It was shared, with like three hundred parents and kids.

Thought: You know that’s not what I mean. Someone to share in your success and support you.

Me: Like a ……aaaaaa???

Me and Thought: A man!  (gasp)

Me: Really? You want a man, like a boyfriend?

Thought: Yes, Shepsa. You deserve a mate, a partner. Somebody to support you and be by your side.

Me: Damn….I think you’re right.

So this was a new thought, a new conversation I was having with myself. I could feel the air around me longing to be filled with a presence. Now, I have previously thought long and hard about exactly what I am looking for in a man. I made the list years ago and now have it memorized. But this was the first time I have actually articulated a real desire for “him” to manifest. This desire crept up on me like a bandit and I was the unsuspecting mark but now it is here; taking up residence and getting comfortable…..

As a juju woman, it is only befitting that I harness my magical powers to aide in this process. I have begun river walking, a ritual I read about in Kenya K. Steven’s book, “Change Your Man”. Go check it out yourself and be transformed! There is an ancient Yoruba Goddess of the rivers named Oshun who’s domain is beauty, sensuality and love and it is to She I am making my petition.  I am excited about this process and the fact that my subconscious has articulated that it is ready to begin some real work, cause that’s what relationships are about. I do plan to keep my work real sweet so the honey in my pot will always be brewing J.

As a matter of fact, I am going to speak to “him” as if he is already here (and who knows, he might be).

Hey sweet and sexy. Wow, when I look at you, I see the best in me. You challenge me to live my best life now and keep my keenly aware of the fact that we are both Divine. You are knowledgeable, well spoken, creative and can wrestle with me mentally. But you are so dope, that you’re not all brains and stoic spirituality but you know how to have fun too! We have a ball together and when we dance, the world disappears inside of us. I love making love to you and in fact, it is the most intense pleasure I have ever known. You are honest, responsible, trustworthy, loyal and a great provider. I also love how we define for ourselves the structure of our relationship and do not let society dictate to us how our love should go. I know without a shadow of a doubt that you love me from the fabric of my being in the same way I love you. You also love my son and are a great example of manhood for him. We are purpose partners and co-create major movements that shift this world. We share a passion for Afrikan people, culture and history and progressively move toward creating a better future now. You are truly a wonderful person and we grow together each day. I love you blissfully, can’t wait till you get home tonight!

ASHE! And so it is!!     

The Giving Tree

And the tree said, “I wish I could give you something-----but I have nothing left. I am just an old stump…”. I know we all read Shel Silverstein’s book, “The Giving Tree” in elementary school. Spoiled little white boy comes and visits and takes from the tree year after year from childhood to old age. He plays in the tree’s limbs, sleeps in its’ shade, takes the apples, chops down its’ branches to build a house and finally uses the trunk to build a boat. All the while the tree keeps giving and giving until it is sad because it has no more to give and all that is left is a stump. Well lately I’ve been feeling like that stump. I am tired of giving; I don’t want to become anybody’s old stump……

I am not usually one to complain or play the victim role---that is so not me at all. I take complete responsibility for my life and have been doing so since a very young age. I depend on no one---no doubt classic case of Super Black Woman syndrome learned from my mother. But this past week I have grown tired of this.  I have been feeling very drained. Being a teacher and being a mother I recognize my attention is always going out to nurture, coach and develop someone else. Not just sometimes but everyday. Practically all day. When I get home from work I usually do not even sit down for two hours as I prepare dinner, wash dishes and give attention to my son. I know this is not just me, this is the life of many mothers—both single and married.

But now I am also recognizing a pattern with some of my friends and partners; folks dump their shit on me! Their problems, what they’re going through with their man or woman, their new ideas, projects etc. all lay at the foot of my tree. They probe me for my advice and ideas for their issues. I notice sometimes in conversations with others that the majority of it is about them and whatever they are going through. Even when I bring up my stuff, at times it is like they are not even listening. I know we all have friends like this, constantly caught in drama and we become part time counselors and psychologists. I know I now have to recognize my own co-creation in this, so here it is: I am the one who has created this stoic tree like image of myself!

I know in some ways I am more emotionally stable than most. I’m tooting my own horn perhaps but fuck it, it’s true. I know my strengths and weaknesses. My strength is being strong and my weakness is lack of vulnerability. I also recognize that a large part of me likes to help people. I chose to be a teacher and know that teaching is a major part of my destiny. But now I am taking a deep look at my motivations. Do I feel like I can help people because I secretly believe I am superior to them? Somehow I’m smarter, wiser than others? That’s ego. I think part of the persona I have created for myself is of one who is perfect and not easily bothered. In school, I prided myself on being a top student, the best creative writer and getting into a top university. These accolades became how I identified myself---I want to be the best in everything. So now, in my adult life everyone knows me to be pretty stable and successful because that is the image I have projected, one who has the answers. So it is this image that attracts people to come to me with their problems because apparently, I can handle it all. This is what I want everyone to think anyway…..

Well, I can’t handle it all, I’m tired. Give me back my branches, stay out my shade and don’t you dare cut down my trunk! I need to be nurtured gotdammit! I need to receive. So…….

Last week, after a long day at work when I did not have to go pick up my son, I went to the park to do a ritual. I did not plan on it but it just happened. I was feeling drained and the weather was beautiful but my inner world did not reflect the outer beauty. As I walked through the park, I began to feel drawn toward the trees. The dark green foliage suggested a coolness I longed for and the tall limbs reached out and over me; it’s leaves shimming and whispering in the breeze. I sat on a bench underneath a large oak atop a hill and began to breathe deeply. I visualized myself pulling in energy from the tree. There was so much energy in the park; all the trees seemed to rustle with my breath as it went in and out. I saw myself being bathed in a white light, the holes that I felt in my aura being patched up. I felt myself being fortified by basking in the strength and power of this immense, ancient aspect of nature. Even as I took from the tree inhaling the oxygen it exhaled, I knew I was giving back to it by breathing out the carbon dioxide it needed. As I sipped its’ life force energy, I acknowledged that one day my body will be returned to the earth to replenish its soil. As I felt rejuvenated by the tree, I received the sunlight that shone through its branches and allowed it to fill my open palms as if it was water. I took the energy from the sun and “washed” my face with it. I left three pennies at the foot of the tree and said a prayer of thanks as I departed….

So through this I have learned that there is no glory in being stoic, no joy in being able to “handle it all”. And there are times when I welcome being able to help others and there are times when I need to replenish and rejuvenate myself. Right now, I need some self nourishment so if you see me sitting under a tree, please know I am not crazy (I won’t be hugging the tree). I am just taking in some energy and hopefully, giving some back as well.

On Being Open

On Being Open….(A Treaty of Love )

The sovereign republic of Shepsa Godwombman aka Tameka Jones hereby declares in this treaty of love that all former boundary lines set up by the ego for protection are now eradicated. Henceforth, those members within the republic (heart, soul, mind, body) will open their borders for commerce, allowing free and open trade with the members of other sovereignties.  The imports and exports of love, truth, authenticity and passion shall be duty free and unlimited.

One of my goals for this year (via Juju Mama Cn365 program. Check jujumamablog.com) is that I want to become uninhibited in my intimate relationships with men. I think when I first created that goal I was just thinking about sex. I wanted to become a better freak! I know it was more than that but I wanted to experience pure freedom in the bedroom. What I realize now is that intimacy is not just about the physical sharing but the emotional and spiritual share. I know, I’m a woman so this is supposed to be natural for me, right? Well, it hasn’t been. I have come to a realization: I have NEVER been completely unguarded, my defenses laid down, legs and heart both open with a man! Never. In fact, in all my conquests over the past two years since I separated from my ex I have taken pride, secretly delighted in my ability to cut a nuggah off and not develop some emotional attachment or addiction to him. Unlike some women, I can separate sex and love quite easily. Sure, there have been men who I have liked but none that I have wanted to become “my man”. So they could come, they could go and it was no thing. If I cut them off first, I felt empowered. The rare few that cut me off, my ego would be bruised for a while but then I knew I’d get over it because “I didn’t want him to be my man anyway”.  They were all too something; too short, too lame, too bipolar, too broke or too controlling.....

I realize now that I too have control issues—with myself. I pride myself on being cool, calm, reserved and poised. I am not the type of woman to blow up your phone, come to your job and cuss you out, slash your tires or bust the windows out your car. The most you’ll get from me is ice-cold ignorance, a rolling of the eyes with an arrogant flair. I save my drama for the stage and not for my relationships. But I realize now that in some ways that is great, but in others I have walls up that are not allowing me to be completely open with a man. Even in choosing my husband, I chose someone who did not have such a stronghold on me that I’d lose control. I never allowed him to really permeate my being. There are in fact few, very few men for me that have struck that cord inside of me where my emotions were allowed to run their full course from bliss to pissed. And none of those ended well so herein lies why my wall is up. I think perhaps on some unconscious level I have allowed myself to fall for men that could not enter into a relationship with me so that I would not experience the lost of control.

I am now in a place where I am ready and beginning to experience openness—openness not just of the legs but the heart. I am now beginning to let the men who I am intimate with permeate me. My definition of love is not control or ownership; so I am also in a place where I am learning to love without placing boundaries on my beloved on who they can experience, as I desire the same. In this journey I have attracted men who see me and appreciate me. See me truly without makeup (what are we making up for?) and can pierce through my walls. A striking energy that can make love to my thoughts…….

I have attracted two men to learn from. There is “Jay”. When I first met Jay I completely put him in a box based on what he did for a living and the assumptions I made about his intelligence level. (I can be an arrogant ass!!) I agreed to go out with mostly because 1. He was tall 2. I deserved to be taken on a date by a man who finds me attractive and 3. Dates eat free!! He also sparked my attention because when we first met, I believed myself to be looking a hot mess! I was literally wearing my pajama pants and a t-shirt. When I noticed him looking at me, I couldn’t believe he was serious. After we went out for the first time, I asked him if he really was attracted to me in my pjs. In his sexy Jamaican accent he told me some story of how when he was younger, a woman told him “if you really want to know if a woman is beautiful, look at her first thing in the morning….. “ That was all she wrote...

So within Jay, I have found a deeper connection than I anticipated. He has a way of reading me that is kind of unnerving. He dreams shit like me and guessed that I was married when I had not told him a thing about that. I get the feeling that I cannot hide with him and have to become open despite my normal pattern of simply dangling my feet from my wall…….

Then there is “Andre”. Andre is also tall! I connect with him in an intellectual, spiritual and sensual way. Unlike Jay, who told me I was “fucking crazy “when I told him I believed in open relationships, Andre is a believer in open relating like me.  We have a lot in common like teaching and having been married. With him it is refreshing to have conversations on a shared level of desire for conscious expansion and judgment free sensuality. He is one of the few men that I have met who is vibrating at the same frequency as me. And in truth, nothing gets me more open with a man than a conversation about the esoteric; throw some tantra in there and I’m yours!

I am enjoying these connections and looking forward to how they will grow me. As I open up for the very first time, I drop my need and desire to be in control and welcome the vulnerability of climbing down from my wall.

Why I Need a Man....

I need a man.  After moving yesterday I realize this. Forget what your girlfriend said, forget what your mama said, women need men. I know, I know. Didn’t my mama raise me to be a strong Black woman? She did. In fact, my mother is one of the “strongest” women I know. Now is she happy? That’s a different story.  In fact she constantly repeats the infamous mantra of many “strong” Black women, “Niggas ain’t shit!!” As a young girl this idea was pressed into my palms and sown into my thoughts. Chanted all around me like Tina Turner did nam myoho renge kyo.            

Niggasaintishitniggasaintshitniggasaintshiiiiiiiiiittttt!!!  

Long before I even had the opportunity to experience a man in any relationship, other than my father and brother, I was raised with the expectation to be disappointed and suspicious of Black men.

            Granted women like my mother have their reasons for believing all men are no good. My mother was abandoned by her father and, unfortunately at the time of their marriage (yes, my parents were actually married), my father was off the hook too. Why I’m sure he loved my mother and I know he loved his three children, but his addiction to drugs ruptured my mother’s love for him. Now, I don’t know what it’s like to be married to a drug addict and even though my father was one, he never abandoned me.  He’s been clean for majority of my life and we have a great relationship.  But still my mother reminds me, “You do not know what your father put me through!” She’s right, I have no idea. My mother is very strong……

             I do not have the desire to always appear “strong”. I believe this is an idea sown into us from slavery, from being bred as chattel. It is a dangerous myth. Michelle Wallace wrote a book about it called Black Macho and the Myth of the Superwoman. I read it when I was 18 and I was suffering from strongblackwomanitis. This idea that I should be able to take any amount of pain, struggle and suffering because I am a Black woman and not even shed a tear. Not only should I be able to take it, but that shit should be a banner across my chest. A sash announcing to the world who I am like Ms. Virginia in the Ms. America contest. “Here comes Ms. Strong Black Woman. Able to work forty plus hours a week, and raise five children with no help from their father! Give her a round of applause!” It is a trap because it becomes an excuse for the world to heap more shit on our back. Then we turn around with a paradoxical mix of pride and anger and say, “Look at all the shit I got piled on my back!”

But after moving yesterday, I realize I have no desire to break my back to show the world how strong I am. There are some things that a man should do. Period, end of discussion. Call me sexist. I should not have to touch garbage. When I was married, I never ever took out the garbage. Yesterday, I took out so much garbage from my apartment, it looked like a garage sale! Now, I did hire movers though. I ain’t crazy! Those Russian men were sweating and breaking their backs carrying my boxes, bed, bookshelf and dresser down the stairs. But they are men, that’s what they are supposed to do. 

As a woman, I don’t want to have to lift anything heavy, or put furniture together. Now I am not the prissy type. All of you who know me, as either Tameka or Shepsa know I am not prissy. I probably look very strong to you. And I am in the way of being focused and handling my business. I know how to get shit done and I know what I want. But what I have observed from women—beautiful women like my mother who do not have a man around---is a hardening of their shell. They begin to take on a sort of roughness, a coarseness that smells like the aroma a’la angryblackwoman. We have all smelled this before. On the train or the bus with the woman who probably really loves her children but is cussing them out. Why? Cause she’s angry! She’s tired and frustrated! She, by nature is feminine but life has forced her into this masculine sphere for her survival. Does she really wish she could be soft? Yes. Does she want a man to come and take care of her and her kids? Yes, yes, yes! But right now she’s being the man and the woman so her energy is way off.

What I am saying is that I have no desire to be that way. I desire to have a man/men (wink) around me to fulfill the masculine sphere so my energy will stay in balance. So why did you leave your marriage then? Hey, I explained that in my first blog! I have no desire to be single forever (I have no desire to be legally married again either). What I do desire is deep, intimate relationships with men who can lend me their yang as I nurture them with my yin. And this is not just about moving furniture. This is about moving life back into balance.  Ashe.

Letter to My Man (for tonight.....)

Letter to My Man (for tonight)

(summer fling 2010)

I am thinking of you letting you in.

Your words having already copulated with my thoughts,

speaking to me of healing our tribe in East Flatbush

with herbs grown under the sun and moon of Mexico.

Made ripe from squatting in moist virgin forests,

wet with potency.

My medicine man,

you speak a language to me that vibrates on frequencies

ears cannot hear.

Shooting out God-rays, your mouth is the sun,

come rotate them around the equator of my hips.

Claim this earth as your inheritance.

May your hands map my body’s topography,

plant your fingers in the valleys and sticky rivers of my geography.

Yesssssssssssss………

I have decided to unravel for you tonight.

The redness of your eyes whispered to me that you needed a healing.

I’ve got some new medicine for you to uncover.

There are rose quartz and peacock feathers,

Sade and sandalwood

burning.

Anoint my chakras with the blessing of your tongue from

Crown to root.

Let’s massage a new recollection into each other’s flesh.

Awaken in me our hidden histories,

sensually stimulate the recall of our past life memories.

Whisper to me how we made love under palm trees in Ghana,

you draped my body in kente cloth and gold.

Heal the scars left behind when they sold you away

from me on a Georgia cotton plantation.

Reunited in another life we made love and Revolution,

naked under black leather and berets we fucked for freedom.

So tonight, your body is a temple of the familiar.

My kisses are prayers dancing across the sanctuary of your chest.

Your amber arms cocoon me,

balancing my feminine with your masculine energy.

A magic wand pulsating inside of me.

You are a thunder god between my thighs,

I am a honey river for you to swim in.

You be butterfly soft yet black panther rough.

My hips make figure eights around your tip

as I ride you into infinity.

Watching our orgasm explode in each other’s eyes,

our love spell echoes

into the ethers of eternity. 

Married and Divorced by 30

So today I did it and it was so, so very easy. I initiated the meeting and began the conversation of telling my husband I wanted to divorce. I had been having dreams about him for the last two weeks. In a lot of the dreams I was cussing him out, once when I was ovulating we were actually having sex! Whatever the content of the dream was, my subconscious was telling me it was time to deal with it. It had been two years since we separated and had any conversation about our relationship. Severing any relationship—especially a marriage is not easy. If children are involved then of course there is no complete disconnection but a new way of relating—as parents solely and not lovers.

Why had I waited so long? Because I was afraid. I had been the one to choose our separation; he wanted to work it out. As a Black woman to have been the one to break up your family is a hard pill to swallow. In my mind, it was as if I was standing in front of a counsel of old grandmothers with them asking,

Dem- Is he cheating on you baby?

Me-  No.

Dem- He beat you?

Me- No.

Dem- He got a job?

Me- Yes.

Dem- Then what the hell is wrong with you?!

Me- I’m not happy.

Dem- (Raucous, uproarious laughter) Chile, PLEASE!! Get outta here before we throw the shoe at you! Happy? Ha! Get real! Nobody’s happy chile!!

To leave a marriage because you were unhappy seemed like some white woman’s shit. An honorable discharge from a marriage for a Black woman usually involves more drama. Drugs! Domestic violence! Multiple baby mamas popping up around town! A nicca that can’t keep a job and leaves you to foot the bill for everything! All real life shit that my mother and plenty of women around me experienced. My reasons were more esoteric. I want a man who is my spiritual partner. A man who is actively on a journey toward higher evolution. Some of them were more womanist—for lack of a better word. Why do I have to be in the house all day taking care of the baby while you get to deejay parties, play basketball and interact with the world? I often felt like a single mother though I was in a relationship. But honestly none of this was his fault. It was none of our faults. I never articulated what the hell I wanted in a relationship, what I thought my family should look like. I was operating without a vision, reacting badly when things were not going my way. 

Slowly, I started to realize that this was not the intimate life partnership I wanted. I realized that I in fact had never really dated or experienced any other relationship. I had always been very serious and goal oriented. As a teen and in my early twenties, this made young men run. All my energy went into me and I accomplished great things because of it. While other young girls were getting finger fucked, I was leading the debate team and winning writing contest around the country. In fact, when I met my husband I was a virgin at 21! I was suffering from chronic play it “safe” good-girl-ness . So I wanted to experience more of life, more of myself. I wanted to be free....

I was questioning all of the beliefs I held dear. When I married him, I also married a spiritual community. A global community with temples around the world. Hard to explain unless you’ve been in that community or ones like it but it was like changing your citizenship. My whole way of thinking, living and breathing literally changed. It was beautiful and intense but I began to feel limited. I needed out of there too. I needed to experience other traditions and find the path that is right for me. I started having religious affairs and began checking out other systems. I even had an emotional affair and began to desire another man. That turned up the heat in my marriage real quick!

Things were falling apart, so I left him. I left the people eating tofu, chanting and wearing all white (though I still chant, sometimes eat tofu and wear all white). It was hard. Hard because I felt bad that I hurt someone who I cared about. Hard because my son still cries sometimes when his dad drops him off. Not the gentle tears rolling down the face quiet crying. No. Full out tantrum, stomping on the floor top of the lungs screaming, “I want my daddy!” crying. Hard because I knew that despite it being hard, this is what I needed to do.  So all our interactions over the past two years were limited to conversations about our son and the few remaining financial connections we have.

Until today.  Today we met and I told him that I harbored no negative feelings toward him. I do not blame him for our marriage going wrong and asked that he forgive me for anything I did to him. Especially not telling him how I was really feeling. I told him how when we first met I was very, very young and inexperienced at relationships. I didn’t know what I wanted and now I’m finding that out. I do not regret our relationship and was happy to have learned from it. He echoed my sentiments back to me. He too was young (we still young, lol!) and inexperienced. He holds no ill feelings toward me and no regrets. I took a sigh of relief as the air between us began to clear out and breathed in to push out my next declaration. As I stammered getting out the exact words he said with a smile, “Yeah, we gotta get the divorce.”

I was relieved. No screaming, no crying. No finger pointing. We spoke about our terms and came to agreement. It was so easy. No need for child support orders or over paid lawyers! Shout out to 60minute.com! Their slogan is, “Got an hour? Get a divorce!” We will be going there next week. We have promised to work together for the best benefit of our son because no matter what, we are still family. And you can’t divorce your family, we are in each other’s lives forever.