I write to you from a tiny room, nestled on a not-so-quiet street of Brooklyn. I lay down in bed, duvet up my chest, and a hot cup of bone broth in my hand. I take a sip, and another sip, and before I know it, I’ve devoured it all. I hear faint pop musical notes from the Vietnamese restaurant downstairs. It’s day 8, 9, or maybe 10 of contracting covid, who knows? It’s a bit of a blur. I've been home alone for more than a week now. In “isolation." And as one would expect, that has sent my mind wondering.
What the hell am I doing here? Why do I choose to be so damn far away from home? What type of life am I trying to create for myself? What is all this for? Who is all this for? All valid questions that I’ve pondered long and hard, and whose answers I know live somewhere inside me, but on a day like this, these answers are not as easily accessible.
Regardless, I’m recovering, slowly, certainly non-linearly. Somehow, after almost 2-years of being covid-free, I thought I was invincible. Clearly a false egotistical thought. Like most of us, I had experienced some level of isolation amidst the pandemic, but after 10 days of sickness and no human contact, I find myself in an utterly existential headspace. A lot has come up for me. It's been a wonderful time to slow down and ponder.
The number one thing I ponder is why the hell I haven't followed through with doing the things I said I wanted to do last year? I longed to dance more, to write more, to express more. I longed to create a space for Middle Eastern women to be unabashedly themselves. Yet, the needle hasn’t moved much in many of these domains.
The lack of manifestation of the things I have dreamt up are really coming from a place of deep fear. I realized I am so damn scared of my own power. I'm scared of even allowing myself to take a peek at what awaits me on the other side of the wall. I know it's magnificent, it's freeing, it's grand. But I'm scared to even go there. I have chained myself to society's perception of me that I’m just drowning in people’s expectations. Unable to find myself present and in awe with the enchantment of life and my ability to build and create within it.
In the spirit of remembering: I am power and so are you. Let 2022 be the year that allows us to dismantle the structures that prohibit us from going there.