Life Beyond Survival: 5 Steps for Becoming Your Truest Self
So many Black women spend their lives focused on survival, for both practical and generational reasons.
No one ever tells you about life beyond survival.
We get glimpses of having peace, joy, and pleasure: Those moments with family at the cookouts, celebrating and vacationing with your homegirls. Some people find it on Sunday mornings in church. Others on Saturday nights with the red cup in the sky.
Solange even wrote a song about it.
“I tried to drink it away
I tried to put one in the air
I tried to dance it away
I tried to change it with my hair
I ran my credit card bill up
Thought a new dress make it better
I tried to work it away
But that just made me even sadder”
But what does it look like to have sustained ease, peace at your fingertips, radical spiritual connection, settled serenity?
Few of us had anyone teach us THAT phase of life.
There are 5 keys to living full as the full person you are designed to be.
1. You have to know who you are as a spiritual being
To know who you are as a spiritual being means understanding that you are more than just your body, your name, your title, your service to others. It’s about discovering the deeper, inner part of you that makes you unique and connects you to your Ancestors and Creative Source in the Universe.
2. You have to know how to master your energy
Mastering your energy means learning how to stay centered in life’s storm and also using your magic to meet your needs. It’s about using ritual to ground, restore, cleanse, and protect.
3. You have to know how to connect with your inner guidance and spirit
Connecting with your inner guidance and spirit means listening to your gut feelings, your intuition, your highest Self. It’s about knowing who your Spirit Team is and how to access them. It’s about trusting yourself and knowing that you have a special wisdom to guide you through life.
4. You have to know how to express yourself and manifest your desires
Expressing yourself and manifesting your desires means showing the world who you really are and going after what you truly want. It’s about being honest about your dreams. It’s about mixing the magic and the mundane to make shit shake.
5. You have to know, heal, and integrate your inner child
Knowing, healing, and integrating your inner child involves telling the full truth about your past and forgiving yourself. It’s about releasing the past’s grip on your life. It’s about honoring the past and honoring its presence in your life.
If you reached this far in the article, then I’m probably talking to you.
There’s something in your spirit that is sick and tired of the okie doke, claustrophobic box that society keeps trying to put you in.
You are ready for liberation.
You are called to:
Be unapologetic in your truths, joys, desires, contradictions, and intersections
Thrive in joy, pleasure, and satisfaction
Use your voice and unique talents to change our world
Hold space for the next generation
Stand on the shoulders of our ancestors as we live the lives they dreamed
Revel in true, authentic sisterhood
If this is indeed you, take the first step to learning who you authentically are.
