Exploring Values ~ INDIVIDUALITY

Listen to me read the post on YouTube or you can read the text below:

_{Song: “Blippy Trance” by Kevin MacLeod from freepd.com, CC0 license}

„Mom, can you buy me a tie and a white button-down shirt?” It was 1993, and Little Khadijah was in the 4th grade.

“Sure. I will pick them up tomorrow.” She replied.

“That’s it?” I thought. “No questions?” That was easier than I had expected.

For days an idea had been budding in my mind. I would where a tie with a nice white button-down shirt and black pants to school. It would surely be chic and something my classmates had never seen before. When my mother came home with my new clothes I was so excited, especially considering that did not happen often. We were never without but we also were not in a position to make shopping a habit. Even now I can remember my joy when my mother handed me the bag with my new white shirt and a small blue and green clip-on tie.

Immediately I tried everything on only to find that my vision was not quite coming to fruition. The shirt was much too big and not the fitted cut I had hoped for. Instead of looking like a 10-year-old Janelle Monae I looked more like an insurance salesman from Ohio who had given up his dreams and taken up the family business to impress his father-in-law and support his wife and two kids at home.

Still I did not waver, determined to live out this creative vision, I got dressed in my new clothes and proudly went to school the next morning.

As soon as I stepped into the classroom my tie became the topic of conversation. In Music class the teacher asked us to settle down but a classmate commented that he couldn’t. He was distracted by my ugly tie. The verbal abuse continued throughout the day. Finally, a group of students stood circling me. A girl asked if she could see my clip-on tie. I handed it to her for her inspection but when she gave it back to me the clip was missing. She had broken my tie, so that I could not put it on again.

The crowd slowly dispersed. I stood there looking at my tie, trying to grasp the truth that my closest friend in the class had broken my tie and handed it back to me with a nonchalance that said “I am right and you are wrong.”

What is it about individuality that can make people so fearful and aggressive? We are all emanations of a very loving, greater consciousness; each of us here to perform a different function and bring a special, lively zest to this fancy cocktail we call life. Still we ostracize each other for pushing open the boxes we have been stuffed into, allowing light to shine in.

Often shame is the tool we use to ease deserters back into the herd. We injure their dignity and integrity in a way that makes them think again about speaking up or stepping out. Shame has a way of asking us to perceive things in a manner that is not consistent with truth.

I can trace back my decision to give up and fit in almost to that very moment when I realized that there is something about being different that can make people inexplicably hostile. After many failed attempts at creative self-assertion, Little Khadijah developed a sensor to carefully decide when to stand out and when to fade into the background. The latter becoming over time the most popular decision. It has been a difficult and arduous task to let go of that self-protection and live the creative expression that has always been so dear to me.

Looking back at my experience, despite the unfriendly reactions, it was completely worth it. We cannot allow others to intimidate us into conformity and worse, into invisibility.  We are meant to be seen, heard and felt. YOU are meant to be seen, heard and felt.

In my experience individuality finds its way in when one understands the following:

We can embrace our individuality when we care for our visions. When we release the fear of what others will think and allow the voice within to guide us to new pathways.

We can give our originality voice by laughing with our inner child. Let’s agree to stop smothering the child within and indulge in the delight of seeing life from fresh, unadulterated perspectives.

We can offer individuality a seat at the table by asking ourselves whether we ostracize others for following that voice within that begs them to express their creativity and by answering this question honestly.

We can secure individuality’s future by recognizing that children have a way of opening this door and doing our best as a community to make sure it never closes.

We can take individuality’s hand when we banish shame by asking ourselves whether shame resonates with how we would like to see ourselves and our world.

We have the opportunity now to anchor ourselves in beauty, to take off our disguises, breathe fresh air and allow our trueselves to shine despite any heckling from onlookers. Only we know what is best for us.

It has been a pleasure to let go of superficial propriety. That voice of social expectation can be fatal to creativity and the joy that accompanies individual self-expression. We have to silence that disapproving voice we have learned to let in and instead give our creativity a chance to take the reins.

Be courageous and live your inner bright light. You never know who your example may inspire.

Please tell me in the comments below how do you live individuality?