are you being real or respectable?

I’m a black, queer, cisgender woman.

But I’m more than that.

I’m an entrepreneur. I’m deeply spiritual. I’m a psychic and a medium. I’m a wife. A person living with mental illness. A woman without a child. I’m a woman who struggles with body image.

Those are just some of my identities. There are more. And they all intertwine in messy, complex ways to make me who I am.

But how many of these do I talk about every day?

How many of your intersectional identities do you hide, precious?

Why do we hide these parts of ourselves?

And just what are we so afraid of?

I think we’re afraid of being seen as different.

We’re afraid of standing out.

We want to be presentable. We want to be seen as smart, put-together, perfect. And I think we worry that if we reveal all these parts of ourselves to the world, we won’t blend in as easily anymore.

Now there’s a word for this phenomenon. Two words, actually.

Respectability politics.

We fold away those parts of ourselves that don’t fit in comfortably. The parts of ourselves that we hide because they don’t seem marketable.

Somehow, we have this idea that the only parts of ourselves that are useful are the parts that are universal.

And that is SO fucking far from the truth. That’s the narrative that dominant cultures spin to force us to assimilate, fit in, and not take up any extra space.

Well, I say, screw that.

We need to reclaim every single piece of us that makes us who we are.

And if that puts somebody off or weirds someone out, let’s show them the fucking door.

Your past, your experiences, and your identities weave together to create the beautiful person that you are. There isn’t another person in the world who has the exact same combination of experiences, emotions, talents, and identities as you. That makes you rare. And special as fuck.

You deserve to be stepping into 2021 as your whole, brilliant self.

If that sounds like a goal you want to focus on, check out the details for my group coaching program, Revolutionary Rising – we’re enrolling now, and we begin the next cohort in January.

Apply before December 17th to grab your spot (and before December 9th if you want in on an exclusive live private training session I’ll be hosting for all selected applicants).

And honey, remember that you were put on this planet in all your complexity for a purpose. So unfold yourself, and take up all the space you need to be who you really are.

Until next time,

Gieselle