Episode 48: Living With Integrity

I Can't Fux With You! Confessions of An Uppity Black Woman

The sh*t we not fuxing with today is living without integrity. For me this December means family birthday celebrations - my kid becoming a teenager (yikes) and my mother celebrating her 70th! My mother rang in her septuagenarian years with a bash in the the way only Naija people can. People came from far and wide to show my mother love and support in this season. This very in your face affair meant that the truth would have to be told. For years, my parents have not been explicit to their social circle that I, their eldest daughter was divorced. They have effectively lied by saying nothing at all about my status, although ain't nann n***a seen that n***a at any event in about 7 years. After this party, my mother enquired whether I told a close family friend, who happens to be a Pastor, about being divorced. This query so incensed me. What my mother wanted to know was whether I spoke truth about my life. She wanted to know whether I chose to live with integrity or did I wear a mask and cause my own self mental harm.
In the book, Rock My Soul: Black People and Self-Esteem, the Queen emphasizes that we subject ourselves to crippling low self-esteem when we deny the importance of integrity. This is something that Black People must challenge wholeheartedly. Our motivations for lying, living without integrity, often are based in having to navigate the worlds of whiteness and thoughts of what we may lose when we tell the truth about ourselves. The question we should instead be asking is what do we gain when we speak the truth of our life?
REFERENCES IN THIS EPISODE
Goddess Nana Buluku - Goddess of Seasons
Embracing Gele and Beadwork, by By Oko Odunmorayo, The Guardian, October 2, 2023
The Art of Spraying
bell hooks, Rock My Soul: Black People and Self-Esteem, Chapter 4, Living with Integrity

If you are an Uppity Black Woman, ready to say: I.Can't.Fux.With.You! Visit us at omuwaluxe.com to learn more about The Black Woman Liberation Formula. Sis, it is time to unpretzel and get yourself liberated.
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