I was going to title this “Why I want my kids to suffer” but with age am becoming too superstitious to do something like that. (In my heart that’s what I want this piece to be named, though.)
There are people in this world that have 1. suffered more than me, and those that have 2. suffered less than me. By suffering, I mean who has “gone through more shit?” And I think somewhere in my quick judging-to-understand process, that’s one of the big things I check off.
1.Playing “we are not strangers” in a cabin with two [seriously] extremely privileged [white] girls. There’s a question about what our most embarrassing moments are, there’s questions about the lows and highs of our lives. I used to think [most] white people just didn’t want to get deep with *me*, then I thought okay maybe they just don’t get that deep in general or as easily, and now I feel like I’m starting to see that that’s because it just doesn’t get THAT deep. The emotions and the experiences can suck, yes, and are valid, yes, but they’re just not that bad compared to ‘the rest of the world.’
What seem like the sensitive parts of life to me, financial struggles growing up turning into really deep worries and constant sinking stress (even though my dad had a job and everything!) Seeing my mom trying not to cry after speaking to her mom-in-pain in India over the phone. Not being able to breathe or eat for stretches at a time when I was younger because of [what I have now realized was] anxiety. Crying with my mom for loss in our lives, deep depressions, frustrations. Realizing my own entitlement when adjusting to life in India that was so fucking uncomfortable compared to the States. It’s just hard to even describe these moments, let alone *want* to describe these moments. Especially in fear-of-annoyance of them being followed by stories of how these people relate to those emotions. Weight loss journeys, bad breakups, job stress, a rude comment someone told them in elementary school...
And more than that, it just feels these people don’t have much deepness and insight in thought and feeling, don’t have an understanding for spirituality in the world in the same way. They haven’t really seen shit, maybe they work in the Bronx but have no idea that the *majority* of the world experiences something so completely foreign and unknown to them. Ignorance. Assumptions made with a foundation of this ignorance. Life perspective wrapped around this pole of ignorance. And white people, especially, obsession with the self and all that individualistic shit.
2. However, I also feel a certain kind of way on the other end of it, when I am with people who make it clear they come from an oppressed background, those that embrace those backgrounds as their primary identities, *especially* ones that say things like “you wouldn’t understand” (even though I was just doing that up there so)
Sometimes it’s cool to see these people embodying those feelings and realities and symbols so proudly and openly. Other times I get annoyed and critique the culture of self-pity in any capacity and bring up the existence of identity that isn’t defined by just what you look like or where you grew up. Part of being super socially aware is that it changes one’s perspective of haves and have nots, being defined within the terms glorified in discourse is toxic. There is somehow a glorification of coming from nothing, in a way that people that don’t come from nothing WANT to come from nothing. Some people that don’t have EVERYTHING don’t realize how much they do have. I don’t want to say it, but what about third world countries can I show you a fucking picture? (There is some ignorance tied with thinking your oppression was the worst oppression humans bear and face. Of not having that perspective of others have it much worse. This is for people that are not grateful for the endless comforts America does offer in comparison. No, people do not NOT suffer because others suffer more, but perspective is important.) Then again, we all know how powerful all these forces are in shaping people psychologically. (Human strength versus human resilience ?????) Is it a choice to let your oppression define you and your experience of life? At all? Feeling like a huge hypocrite right now.
Definitely lacking humility here, thinking that I have the perfect balance of hardships and deep shit and having a personality that is sculpted and deepened by my circumstances, while being world-aware and having perspective and being humble. I feel sometimes like I want to work on this, bringing out the lightness is super heavy oppressed people. And not judge people for having chill lives without much suffering. That’s a good fucking thing, what we are striving towards, and what everyone deserves.
But then the [white] girls go describing a time they got some mud (dog shit whatever) on their high school crush’s car and I can’t help that feeling of wanting to salt something so badly. I don’t want my kids to lack empathy for the ‘realer’ things in this world. I want them to be sculpted by seeing shit and realizing what’s more important so they don’t fixate on stupid things like body hair. But obviously I don’t want them to feel suffering. But again, the fact I’m here worrying that maybe my kids won’t ‘have personality’… god help them.
