WHEN DID YOUR CHILDHOOD /INNOCENCE END?

A TRIBUTE TO SONS WHO GREW UP WITHOUT THEIR MOTHERS

See my posts on :letting go of your daddy issues/mummy issues and prison of the mind 

I was watching an  interview with Dr edith eger a holocaust survivor and she said something that paused me and allowed me to truly ask myself a question and answer it as honestly as i possibly could.  She said"When did your childhood/ your innocence end?What did you see? hear? experience? That changed you forever?"

When  you look in  the mirror . Do you recogise the person looking back at you? Is that person staring back at you free or is that person a wounded soul . The outcome of a past trauma magnified.

(Short story)

Standing in the hallway clutching onto a blanket slightly shielding his face from the yelling coming from his parents room . Holding back tears he stands their comforting himself and gathers enough strength to say " mummy daddy stop fighting!" He is then carried back to his room the door locked and he is told to sleep. 

Hoping all will be well when he wakes up he does as he is told. 

In the morning he wakes up to find his father on the floor crying his mother had packed her bags and left.

He didn't understand why she would leave and leave him behind. Isn't family forever? Didnt she love them?

All he knew was that she chose to leave. He resented her for it and resented her for not fighting hard enough

His life changed and the his description of what a mother is was forever changed........

Today I asked myself,what about sons?” 

As a culture, we tend to look at the mother’s influence on the daughter and the father’s effect on the son, thinking that each provides the mirror to either the feminine or masculine self. When a man tells a woman his life story, he’ll more than likely start by telling you about his father.

It might even be  harder if the son suffered at the hands of an unloving mother? Does criticizing his mother, or even admitting the emotional pain he has suffered, fit within the narrow definitions of masculine behavior? 

The answer is probably “not.”

Does the legacy of an unloving mother spill over into a man’s psyche and his ability to connect to women in ways that are unique? What happens to a man whose understanding of women is shaped by the first woman he encounters—a damaged  mother?

Insecure attachment starts at the very beginning of life but the realization of being unloved unfolds over time. 

As they get older insecurely attached children show a significant increase in negative emotions or a decrease in positive emotions. Triggering fear,anger distress and avoidance.

Think for a moment about how boys are socialized in this culture and taught to show less emotion as proof of their masculinity sending them the subliminal message that it is dangerous or shameful to manifest such feelings and that these feelings do not have an important place within their relationships.

Think about how confusing it must be for a man in this culture to assess a mother’s lovingness. When she scolds for being a “crybaby,” when he speaks up . Is she being cruel, or just enforcing the masculine code? 

It then creates a lack of confidence; a lack of trust; trouble setting boundaries; difficulty seeing the self accurately; avoiding connection; overreacting; and replicating the bond in other relationships—other lasting effects appear to be gender-specific. 

Numerous studies, including a meta-analysis by R.P. Fearon and others, showed that insecure attachment in boys is linked to externalizing behavior—aggression, hostility, and acting out in social settings—which it isn’t in girls. No one knows precisely why this is so gender-specific; it may simply be that girls internalize these emotions more effectively or engage in less obvious forms of hostility like relational aggression. since anger in men is culturally acceptable, if often unproductive and sometimes self-destructive.

Sons clearly suffer as much as daughters do and, in some way, perhaps even more deeply because they tend to suffer alone and in silence.
So, if you are a son of an unloving mother, perhaps the gift you should give next Mother’s Day is one to yourself: Take a deep breath and begin the journey of healing. No matter what the culture says, acknowledging the pain will make you a better, stronger man, lover, husband, friend, and father.

At one point in our lives . We have all blamed someone be it our parents ,friends or people we admired for doing things a certain way. Please remember that In life it's always easier to judge someone however if you where given their shoes to walk in you might have done the same thing . its always much harder to deal with things on the inside than it is to do so on the outside looking in

CULTURE DOESN'T MAKE PEOPLE;PEOPLE MAKE CULTURE

WALK IN ANOTHER WOMANS SHOES

Every day most of us wake up go through our
daily chores,work and family lives and are privileged enough to wear clothes that can protect us from all the elements and we don't worry about these things because it's a norm.

Today I wake up in thought of the Women I have met who didn't have the privilege of waking up to the most basic of things.

Women who Woke up and never thought they would live through the day.

Women who lost loved ones in horrendous circumstances.

Women whose families were displaced little or no food or water.

Women who had lost all hope of a better tomorrow.

Women who were broken down but could still see a future for themselves even though they didn't know how they would get a step ahead .
They knew that there disparity would lead them to greater places than there current situations.

Here in Kenya we have seen or heard of all these things.
Over the last few years,we have seen our beautiful country been rocked on the lines of tribalism,terrorism and abject poverty.

Although we know of what happens and the media does cover such situations it later fades away and becomes part of a memory to those of us who are not directly affected.

However those who have lived it have to relive those gruesome moments over and over they have to deal with the loss of loved ones,the loss of places they made homes,the visible scars of nights of terror. Mental scars of not being able to live life as they once knew.

I have met brilliant Women who have suffered from domestic violence young girls who had to run away from home to avoid being married off.

We have opened our home to girls who didn't have a home and young girls whose families practiced Female Genital Mutilation and had to go through it because they didn't know how to get out of it.

Women who were sexually abused by relatives at a young age.
Women who were gang raped.
Women who turned to drinking to drown there sorrows to forget there pain just for a few moments.

We all know women whose lives have been anything but easy,some of us are living those lives.Meeting these women.

I lived those moments with them through their words.
I Witnessed the hardships they endure daily.
 I became part of their story and I am grateful to them.In life.

 If you become so focused on self fulfillment there is little to gain.

 Our individual lives are hectic however as humans we should be different we should be able to too see the pain in someone else and want better for them .

Help them through whatever they are going through not avoid them like they have the plague or talk about them behind there backs feeling for them but doing nothing to help them in whatever capacity we can.

Nobody likes to feel alone sometimes being there for them is all they need to get the strength they need to get through .

Today I would like to challenge you reader to walk in someone's shoes you don't have to go far out and visit the various centres to volunteer charity begins at home look in your life and see where you can help someone who you can see or know needs your help and do it not for You but for the betterment of their lives.

And if you are living that life listen to that voice from within telling you not to give up as long as you are still breathing you have the chance to be better to achieve the dreams hopes and goals you have.

Live,love.laugh,Learn and share with those you care about

THE SPIRIT OF AFRICAN UNITY:OUR BORDERS ARE JUST LINES DRAWN BY OUR COLONIZERS

I AM NOT AFRICAN BECAUSE I WAS BORN IN AFRICA BUT BECAUSE AFRICA WAS BORN IN ME,AND THE POWERS THAT KEEP US UNITED ARE FAR GREATER THAN THE SUPERIMPOSED INFLUENCES THAT KEEP US APART.

Patrice  lumumba said,"These divisions which the colonial powers have always exploited to dominate us.Have played an important role and are still playing that role in the suicide of Africa."

Before we colonization we lived peacefully in unity growing and supporting each other with the occasional cattle raid lol . We then got colonized and although we attained Independence of our countries . It is evident that we never uncolonized our minds.

Watching what has happened in the past and continues to happen In Africa from the Rwandan genocide to Kenya's post election violence to South Africa's xenophobia. To nigeria SARS police brutality. To corrupt leaders leading countries to abject poverty  or to the increased hate towards dark skin and how we bleach our skin to be lighter to be less African .

We have been convinced that we are inferior that we want to eliminate everything that makes us unique.what we forget is that being African comes from within it . The African spirit is greater than anything that happens to us.we where slaves and we now celebrate black billionaires .They hated our music our fashion and now it's what is seen and heard around the world

We where forced to turn against each other as they divided and conquered Africa (I'm sure that phrase began in Africa) and they ensured that we were divided to ensure that they can take from us what is ours.Because they knew the value of what we had and where threatened by the power we would and could have if we came together to improve our continent.

We elect incompetent leaders to speak for us to rule our countries and instead of helping those who elected them all they do is drive us further apart, and have us murder each other while they sit in their luxurious homes and offices unbothered.

Kwame Nkuruma said,"it is clear that we must find an African solution to our problems and that this can only be found in African unity.Divided we are weak,United Africa could become one of the greasy forces for good in the world.

We have to remember that, Hatred paralyzes life. Love releases it.
Hatred confuses life.Love harmonizes it.
Hatred darkens Life. Love luminates it.

History teaches us that unity is strength and cautions us to submerge and overcome our differences in the quest for common goals to strike with all our combined strength for the path to true  African brotherhood is unity."Haile Selassie

We are a representation of what our future will look like. I love a quote by the late
Jommo Kenyatta that says."Our children may learn about heroes of the past,but our task is to make ourselves architects of the future.
If you think you are to small to make a difference clearly you haven't spent the night with a mosquito.
Anything you can do to make the world impacts a person at a time and before you know it you leave a legacy that impacts the lives of countless people.

Let me end this post with these two quotes. Nelson Mandela said,"I dream of an Africa which is in peace with its self ." I feel for us to reach that point we have to understand what the Dali lama meant when he said ," world peace begins with inner peace.