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Alicia T. Crosby

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Progressive Christian
I’m Not Ok, You’re Not Ok, So Let’s Talk About It

I’m Not Ok, You’re Not Ok, So Let’s Talk About It

Last updated on: March 18, 2017 at 2:51 pm by Alicia T. Crosby

I’m Not Ok, You’re Not Ok, So Let’s Talk About It 2017-03-18T14:51:49-04:00 Alicia T. Crosby

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I’m not ok.

Most days I struggle to get out of bed before feeding myself, knocking out a few hours of work, taking time to rest, and then getting lost for a few hours in my curated netflix-hulu happy place.

I’m not ok.

It’s a struggle to be around people some days and I crave the stillness and silence that sleep affords me. Solitude has become a refuge and a reprieve for me because in those moments of being alone, I can almost remember what being at peace feels like.

I. Am. Not. Ok. And I haven’t been for a while.

We are so encultured to project that we are alright that we’ve forgotten how to admit when we aren’t. And in that forgetting, we’ve also lost the capacity to rally around each other when one of us is not well and hold each other in some capacity.

I’m over it. I’m over projecting wellness, answering polite questions about my state of being with feigned answers, and inauthentically showing up in the world.

I’m grieving and my spirit is sick. There are days that I sit weeping on the floor, dry heaving into my toilet because of the depth of my lamentation.

I read the news alongside the stories of those I care for or those who share their identities and find myself suspended in a place between quiet rage and profound sorrow holding the inexplicable pain that one does knowing that those they are in community with are at risk for targeting and violence.

…Knowing that I am at risk…

We live in a time where we – the marginalized, the vocal, the unapologetic bearers of our truths – suffer the violence of deportation, bans, stripping of rights, illegal detentions, raids, hate crimes, state sanctioned abuse, harassment, the psychological and emotional warfare that comes with the distortion of truth, and death. Violence centered on us because people have allowed fear and hate to subvert the celebration of our difference and so we becomes targets because of who we are, what we believe, where we come from, and the ways in which we cry out over and against our oppression.

I’m not ok because I know that my fellow country-persons so deeply want to hold onto the power they believe themselves to have that they voted a megalomaniac in whom the truth does not reside into the office of president in my country.

I’m not ok because that president and those he surrounds himself with are doing whatever they can to concentrate power and accumulate wealth while pushing an agenda that’s a toxic sludge of hegemony, supremacy, and elitism that will see many of us left dying, dead, or destitute.

I’m not ok because so much of who I am yearns to see people healed and well and living into who they desire to be but I wrestle with heartache as I see systemic barriers being reinforced as to mute our hope and keep possibility bound up in the place of dreams.

I’m not ok because this season feels like treading water when there’s no land to offer respite in sight.

I’m not ok because my being a black, queer, woman who holds justice as close as she does Jesus means that our civic and social reality weaves in and out of every area of my life leaving me with no place that grief does not touch as I still fight for my joy.

I’m not ok and I share this because I know that others are in the same place.

We perform, we function, and might even be doing those things well but some of us are in a place of heartache, exhaustion, exasperation, longing, and pain unlike anything we’ve ever known before. The sensitivity of our spirits is heightened and we navigate thoughts or inner dialogues that have no resolution and elicit more questions than responses.

So I share all this not to give you hope that feels trite but to let you know that you are not alone. Not in the least.

I’m not ok, you’re not ok and that’s fine because there is a lot to be grieved in our world right now. Just know that you’re not alone in holding all that you do.

I recognize that some of us feel like we don’t have places to vent our grief. Please know that if you need to share, I’m available to lend an ear via email and social media. You can email [email protected] or follow links on the page to connect with me on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

xo Alicia

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