Hello Friends,
Here we are at the beginning of another month! How time flies! As you bid July farewell and flip the page of your calendar (physical, mental, or otherwise) to welcome August, might I invite you to pause with me in a moment of reflection?
Close your eyes. Take a deep, slow breath in while feeling the inward flow of air, the expansion in your chest and belly, the diffusion of oxygen to your brain and the rest of your body. Then exhale just as deeply and slowly, feeling the outward flow of air, the release.
If the internet is to be trusted, the average person who lives to be 80 takes ~600,000,000 breaths in a lifetime. This simple action you just witnessed yourself take, is the foundation upon which life – birth to death and everything in between – is built. All your growth, discovery, love, heartbreak, triumphs, and failures will occur to the rhythm of a couple hundred million of such breaths. Incredible, isn’t it? I find that sometimes, despite my best intentions, I get lost in the mindlessness of social media and other distractions, or go from task to task, second to minute to day to week to month, without stopping to consider the fullness of each moment – the exquisite reality of being alive and embodied. This is why I cherish the practices that help me return to my body and remind me of the truth of being a part of the organic whole that is Life.
Discovering how different African peoples experience this reality of embodiment and connection to Life, as expressed in worldviews and practiced through tangible ties to family and clan, to the natural and supernatural worlds and to the relationship with the spiraling cycle of time, remains one of the most delightful aspects of curating Mythological Africans. Whether it is speaking to your Ori as the Yoruba people of Nigeria do, participating in conflict resolution rites like the Ntangle of the Oku people in Cameroon, pouring out a libation to ancestors or acknowledging the immanent sacredness of a plant, an animal or a geographical formation, the near universal attitude of African people towards life is one of embodied immediacy. Life is happening here and now. Past, present, and future occupy the same space. They commingle and influence each other for better or worse.
Even with colonial and other disruptions and their resulting traumas, this fundamental attitude, which also manifests itself in a sharpened survival instinct and a resolute will to live using all available resources, persists, again, for better or worse. It is in this attitude that I place my hope and faith, that the more we remember and the more we discover, the more we will aspire to and nurture ways of being that move us closer to the underlying rhythm of Life and the truth of being a part of an organic whole.
July certainly tested my capacity for embodied immediacy. So much happened! In addition to daily posts, updates to the African Art thread and twice-weekly Twitter Spaces gatherings, there was a discussion about African Riddles with the lovely folks over at the Radical Anthropology Group and Episode 2 of the YouTube Deep Dive Series. I also shared two short story excerpts. The first, The People We Were, came from my novel in progress. The second is a story time thread on Twitter, and came from "Songkanngoh's Friends" a short story inspired by a series of Ruud Van Empel paintings and based on the swamp and forest spirits of my village, Fieh (AKA Bafanji).
Our community also grew by over one hundred people! Welcome, new friends!
Coming out of the busyness of July, I’m looking forward to a more relaxed August. Stay tuned for the Episode 3 of the YouTube Deep Dive Series. We will also have the usual weekday posts (or reposts) following the relevant themes, as well as Twitter Spaces gatherings. I’m really excited about how these gatherings have settled into spaces for fun explorations of myths and folklore and the underlying cultures. Do join us when you can, on Wednesdays at 1:00pm and Fridays at 6:00pm ET (US).
As always, thank you for joining me on this journey!
Helen
Image Source: Grills, C., & Ajei, M. (2002). African-centered conceptualizations of self and consciousness: The Akan model. In T. A. Parham (Ed.), Multicultural aspects of counseling series, Vol. 18. Counseling persons of African descent: Raising the bar of practitioner competence (p. 75–99). Sage Publications, Inc.