Here we are at the end of yet another year. If you’re reading this, you made it! I’ve noticed that for many people, 2019 was a monster they’d rather forget. As we reflect on the previous 11.99 months, allow me to offer my own commentary on the things we as Black women need to send to glory once the clock strikes midnight.

Rabid political advocacy

You can tell from my last post that I’ve been thinking about Black women’s political power and how it’s being used against us. Unfortunately, we have become co-conspirators in that erasure. In 2020, let’s think about what benefits us specifically and advocate for those things. Let’s stop fighting with each other in comment sections over the plights of men and other groups not known to reciprocate. 

Pettiness

I know in 2017 and 2018, being petty became the cute thing to do. 2019 seems to lead to a pettiness explosion. I’ll admit that I participated and it was fun while it lasted. But, in 2020, let’s handle our sisters with more care. If you have a grievance against another woman that matters to you, bring it to her live and direct. We cannot lament the weakness of Black sisterhood while simultaneously using subtext and puerile statuses to unnamed (but very clear) targets. Disagreements are human. If you claim to respect or love a woman in your circle, give her the respect of allowing her to reciprocate those feelings through working it out. If that’s not possible, staying above the fray costs nothing.

Ignoring our mother wounds

This ties into #2 perfectly actually. Many of us, because of the way the collective Black community is mentally and emotionally shaped, have deep mother wounds. I won’t go in depth on the matter but part of what makes it so hard for many of us to form authentic bonds with other women is the way we were treated by our mother. In 2020, let’s go to counseling, have those hard conversations, and decide and that it ends with us and our daughters. Further, let’s agree that when we encounter another woman who seems to always need to contend with us (and other women) for no obvious reason, it could be her own wound and if we can’t help, we should do no harm.

Putting entities, traditions, and things before ourselves

This easily leads to a hard conversation – which means it needs to be had. Many, if not most, of us have the uncanny knack of doing things that benefit everyone but ourselves in our personal life. We take jobs that don’t want to pay us what we’re worth. We agree to take our 2nd cousin’s kids while she finds herself. And we birth children we can’t manage because church told us abortion is wrong so we just need to suffer through it and trust that everything will be okay. We don’t make rightful demands of people because we don’t want to inconvenience them though they have no problem inconveniencing us. In 2020, we have to become full of ourselves. We may not have control over everything in life but we have control over our choices. Let’s make the choice to put our well-being above everything and everybody else. 

I sincerely wish you a fruitful 2020 and the joy that comes from knowing who you are and your value in this world. I wish you the peace that comes from knowing that your journey is yours and that no matter what happens this year, nothing meant for you will pass you by. 

Blessings.