27/08/2024
It’s funny how the English language can be so beautiful and damn heart-wrenching all at the same damn time.
If you know me at all, you’ll know my brain and my heart have formed an alliance as a youth and that alliance made a pact a few years ago to share my knowledge, my feelings and emotions, but of most importance; my learnings during my time on this planet with you; the people who share this space with me! This pact is also known as Human Affinity.
A project I started to bring to light my learnings and to help others see what they may have not, think about what they may need to soon and know that these things are absolutely normal!
This weeks brain & heart power combo has been in an internal gym fighting itself with this.
I love that we as humans require closure when we continue to breath unlike the ones who have moved on. I hate that in order to do that, we must get closer to them at a time where you and many others come together to celebrate the life they had shared once with you.
It’s financial torture when you are confined to post-Covid-19 flight costs that have significantly increased to the point where you realise, you may as well close the door on that idea and contribute those costs to the family to support them as they deal with the day-to-day of planning that celebration.
We celebrate so many things in life. From baptisms or religious introductions, birthdays, first-days at kindergarten and schooling scenarios. Winning at life with lotto, housie, casino jackpots, education, sports in communities, right up until our last breath; and if you’re lucky, during your journey you may end up repeating those same celebrations with your kids, cousins, nieces and nephews and with their kids and so forth.
I feel like we still don’t celebrate enough, I feel like we don’t celebrate the right things. We need to celebrate the bad as much as the good. Funerals and death tend to be the bad. Bad in a sense that we lose another loved one in their physical being, but happy that they no longer have to be in pain. Sad that we as a community come together to grieve, but happy that we all get to be in one place to do so!
But what about realising you’ve made a hell of a bad decision in life and ended up recovering from that scenario by changing up from a negative problem to a positive solution. What about the complexities of killing a negative mindset to harbouring a newly positive one that brings you satisfaction with a whole lot of self-love. We hardly celebrate these things of such grand momentum. We hardly show others how making that change is what is leading them to happiness today. Unless it’s on the Gram or you’ve started an online course to show all the others how you did it for just $11.99 per week, do we really celebrate enough when we make change in our own lives for the better?
We need to keep in mind that family trees, their structure and how they’ve been constructed are all complex beasts. It’s just not as simple as your parents and their parents. Your parents and their siblings. Their siblings and their children. Their children and their children’s children. It’s also all about where on earth they are, the timeline which they are factored into and the context of where you are moving into the future. Living here in Australia with my continuous learning of the Aboriginal culture, learning of the Stolen Generations and the ripple effect this has made on future generations; it’s really opened my eyes to the understanding of how important families and family ties should be to all peoples!
Life is basically you, chasing you. Building an understanding of who you are and what you need. A push and pull of focus, exploration and learning. We will at times lose focus of our family in order to create the life we want. You need to know that this is not bad, this is not negative; this is purely a journey you decided to take and you need to know that we always will still love you; not matter the destination, the distance, the career or choice of shoe and outfit combo for the day.
We need to, at times, step back into the family though, to bring our perspectives, learnings and stories back to our families. We need to educate our youth to be prepared for their time out in the same world you have been in. We need to show them what they may need to know. And in turn, you know they’ll do the same for you because as much as Wu Tang is for the children, the children are also there for you! They'll teach you more about Tik Tok and Robux values and Roblox character customisation than you'll need to know; but they'll love the attention and know its coming from a place of love.
We need to take the time to create closure. We need to make the time to hold close the memories of those who have passed on before us. We need to ensure we never close our hearts to them. We need to keep close their love. We need to stay close to family who are all mourning with you; even though you may have been distant in the past or are still from a distance of all that is happening. In the words of King Kendrick Lamar “I grieve different!” which means you need to realise that closure and grieving pains are all different for everyone!
In my experience when mourning the passing of a loved one, I feel like it’s your loved ones invitation to bring your family closer and/or back together! Sometimes it's a force of nature to reconnect and in times where you may not know your extended family very well, it's also connecting for the first time too. That in itself is just beauty in life. You get to see family you’ve never met and start seeing the similarities between you all.
Be strong, say goodbye the only way you would, create closure and know we are all in this together!
