I Am Bigger Than This Moment

I want to use my voice and my privilege for good.
I want to give ears to the earless (the voiceless actually have voices and have been screaming for centuries).
I want to step into discomfort and have the hard conversations.
I want to share the beautiful art and activism of Black people.

I am and will continue doing those things.

I am also struggling.

There was a moment within my intimate circles that made me feel incredibly small. It made me second guess the validity of existing friendships. It’s gone so far as to make me question my reality. It’s been very hard. And I feel that no one is wanting, or able, to help.

On days like these that weight on top of me is so suffocating that I feel I can’t use my energy for anything but my own healing.

And all of this has been caused by a moment. A relatively brief flicker of time.

The mantra I’m repeating to myself is “I am bigger than this moment.” There’s more to my life and my abilities than that one instance of being pushed down so far I couldn’t see the light. Light exists elsewhere within me.

I contain multitudes. My right to experience something more than just this moment far outweighs the pressure to feel lesser than.

And I mean… that’s coming from a place of intense privilege. My “moment” has nothing to do with the current movement, but I am going to try (and possibly fail) to draw a comparison.

I don’t believe in comparative suffering, in ranking any one person’s pain alongside another’s, but I do know that racialized people have been facing down a much longer and darker moment. For centuries they have been fighting against a monster so large that it infiltrates all minds.

We all contain multitudes, and unfortunately we all engage in racism. But we can also choose to be anti-racist. When we are called out on the moments when we are racist, we have to learn and be better. We have to actively fight that moment. We have to understand that just because we engage in racism doesn’t mean we are inherently racist. In other words, we are bigger than that moment. But we do have to work to prove it.