what are you bringing with you?

I created the “Bringing with Me” series of Mantra Cahiers after weeks of long conversations with my mom. I have so much respect for what she’s able to speak to me as a result of the resolve she had, the deliverances she experienced, the transformations she bravely stepped into without looking back etc. As a result she carries healing with her, sings it over everyone with whom she crosses paths.

Of the many pernicious things Western society teaches us, the notion that we are living for ourselves is one of the most pervasive and violent—especially for teastained peoples. We are not existing, surviving, listening, creating, deciding, staying, going, overcoming, or documenting for ourselves but for those beyond us. What will we have to bring when “then” becomes “now”? When “When I get older...” becomes “Now that I am old...”? It’s a heavy idea we have to face NOW. This culture will tell us there’s plenty of time but we know deep within that fruits that feed the next generations take times to grow, ripen.

This degenerate socioculture has us revelling in irreverence, beholding vileness, losing our memories and leaving future generations (whether we’ve birthed them or NOT) to fend for themselves in the world our decisions would have created. And yet every day our lives are cultivating the bounty we will have to bring to the table at which they will be seated. What use will we be when the next generation grows up and asks how to continue? What will we say when we them struggling with struggles we onced faced—or will we still be facing them? What will we be able to speak of in oast tense so a sojourner doesn’t grow weary with it being her present tense?

What will we bring?

#vagabroadjournals