congratulations, she's a girl.

i feel like i've given birth...to a baby elephant.
actually, i did.
i finished my narrative for Leny's book.
pagod na pagod na ako.
grabe.
grabe itong process ko talaga.

so many feelings have been churned up. not new ones. they're just moving with more purpose now.
concerted movement.
concerted effort.
move through it.
moving through it.
love myself through it.

my sleep has been erratic the past two nights.

i notice how insecure i feel.
i try to self-soothe.
i tell myself, there is no wrong answer here.
no one will reprimand you. this is YOUR story. that's it.
undo this learning that your story is wrong.
undo this learning that you can't do it right.
undo this learning that your story is not important.

i notice the tightness in my belly as i type this.
where did i get these ideas?
do all roads lead back to that damn vine?

there is no right or wrong. just my story.
my story is important. no one can tell it like i can.

here's my baby elephant.
steady.
solid.
strong.
searching.

***


i was groomed for a conventional life.

these are some of the rules:

1) excel in school so you can go onto college.
1a) preferably a large university that is very well known.
1b) ivy league is best.

2) graduate from college.
2a) do not study art or literature.
2b) focus on courses that will allow you to find stable work and earn a ‘good’ salary. (see #3)

3) be a professional.
3a) your choices are doctor, nurse, lawyer, teacher, or engineer.
3b) doctor is best.

4) get married…
4a) to a man.
4b) not a black man.
4c) white is best.

5) save money…so you can:
5a) buy a car.
5b) buy a house.
5c) consume.

6) have kids.
6a) rinse.
6b) lather.
6c) repeat.

of course, it is a little more complicated than this. my parents and i are also immigrants, and we are immigrants from the Philippines.

we came to the United States when i was less than one year old. the year, i think, was 1975. the Philippines was still under martial law. we were at the tail-end of the post-1965 brain drain mass migration to the US. my mother was a nurse, and my father was a civil engineer. their professions were their ticket out of the Motherland to the United States.

like so many immigrants, they heeded the call to assimilate as quickly and as quietly as possible. my two younger sisters were born in 1978 and 1981. we lived in the suburbs of Chicago for 13 years and then moved to southern California for 5 years. when i was in college, my parents and sisters moved to Henderson, NV.

throughout my childhood, my parents intentionally moved us to upper middle class, white neighborhoods( “for the schools,” they said, when i asked once). you could count the number of Filipinos on my two hands that i went to school with from kindergarten through high school.

i was never taught how to speak Tagalog by my parents. they spoke Tagalog (and other dialects) with each other, with their friends, and with our relatives. when they spoke to my sisters and me, it was always in English. growing up, i remember my mother saying once how proud she was of the fact that her and my dad’s schooling was conducted in English. “no other country in Asia is like that,” she said.

i was confused. why didn’t they want to speak to us in Tagalog? what was so great about English? WHY was their schooling conducted in English? Shouldn’t it have been in Tagalog? why did she seem so proud that we were different from other Asians?

because of this language barrier, i realize now that this is how my training on reading body language, discerning context, and reading energies started. if i couldn’t understand the words, i could get the general idea by how people spoke, their tone, their facial expressions, etc.

for the first 13 years of my life i grew up with a rather large extended family, and they all lived in the nearby Filipino community. we would go visit them on the weekends, shop in the Filipino stores, eat at the Filipino restaurants, and then go back home to the other side of town.

i was confused again. was it wrong to live with other Filipinos? was it okay to be Filipino, but only up to a certain point? didn’t being Filipino mean being with other Filipinos? i realize now that this began my thinking about the relationship between socioeconomic class dynamics and ethnicity.

now in my early 30’s and amidst my own decolonization journey, i can understand how and why my parents made the choices that they made.

and i forgive them. i know that they did the best they could. i can only imagine the confusion and culture shock they must have felt coming to the United States from the Philippines. i imagine their loneliness and their longing for something familiar and warm. i wonder what they did with all of the feelings that they must have felt when they experienced racism and classism, and all the other “-isms” firsthand. i can only imagine and wonder because they don’t really talk about it. they never have. and from their body language and behavior, i learned to be afraid to even ask.

i forgive myself, too. colonization is so deep. and insidious. i participated in its perpetuation because of my ignorance and my misguided belief in the myth of scarcity. as i learn about kasaysayan, Filipino history told from an indigenous perspective, i understand that the ramifications of our pre-historic, colonial, and post-colonial history still ripple out today. of course they do…

i have come to think of colonization as an opportunistic vine. it is not native to me, nor to my people. i am a tree, and this vine has grown up with me, ever since i was a sapling. for most of my life, i didn’t even realize that we were two separate beings. wasn’t the vine always with me? wasn’t i always with the vine? i don’t remember my life without it. trusting soul that i am, i even thought we had a symbiotic relationship.

this vine has wrapped itself around my arms, my trunk, penetrated my skin, my skull, bound my ankles and knees together. it has limited my throat, my voice. even creeped inside my belly and sunk it’s tendrils into my organs, weaving itself inside my bowels, squeezing my heart. my lungs were never allowed to expand as much as they were meant to. my stomach was always so tight, tense, my ginhawa imprisoned.

perhaps this is why decolonization hurts so much. i remember the shock of realizing the vine was different from me. i remember the pain in accepting that this was no benign being; this vine was actually doing me harm. and i remember the bewilderment and anger in realizing that this harm wasn’t even personal, that imperialism automatically implies dehumanization. i remember the fear that i felt, that i feel, when i realize my daunting task of removing this vine from me in order to be of true service to the world.

how do i do this without bleeding?
how do i do this without ripping my flesh?
how do i do this without killing myself?
how do i do this without pain?

my answer:
i can’t.

in order for me to decolonize, i must do it completely. for me, to decolonize completely means to bleed, to be willing to bleed, and release parts of me that are no longer useful. i’ve even come to realize, i need to actually cut parts of myself off that wish to cling to the vine, for they are amnesiac and won’t let it go, even when they see the vine is doing us harm and has done us harm. they won’t let go, even if i plead.

because of my regular meditation practice, i understand these amnesiac parts to be extensions of my ego. they aren’t really Me (often times, this is difficult to remember). they aren’t my core. they aren’t my true nature. their purpose is, always has been, always will be to keep me asleep, to keep me “safe.” this is a false kind of safety, though, an acquiescent safety due to the fear of the unknown.

i inherited this amnesia from the colonized parts of my ancestors, both recent and remote. i acknowledge that even though these amnesiac parts aren’t Me, i still feel pain when i release them, for they’ve been with me a long time, and we’ve grown used to one another. it is a curious sensation to feel grateful towards them (they have gotten me this far!) while celebrating their demise.

the progress and presence of the vine isn’t my fault; yet, i am responsible for its eradication. this is the burden of striving towards awakening, towards freedom. my life’s work is to live this journey and communicate it to those who struggle with their own vines and to those who have not recognized that they are even entangled yet. i am supposed to point a way.

and, yes, this has been a painful process.

i’ve never known such heartbreak. this kind of pain has brought me to my knees and curled me up in a fetal ball finding momentary refuge in my bed, under the covers. this pain has reduced me to a pile of snot and tears on the floor, never finding enough tissue. and, yet, something inside me tells me that there is purpose to this pain. this is the way to re-membering. this is the way to kalayaan, to freedom. and, so, i listen and i lean into it.

perhaps the most painful part, for me, has been the ways in which i recognize that i still willingly cling to the vine, to the fear and ‘comfort of familiarity’ of staying colonized, of staying asleep.

or equally painful has been my slow acceptance that to decolonize is a spiritual journey and that spiritual journeys are, essentially, alone journeys. Pinay ako, at palagi, ayaw na ayaw naming mag-isa.

for the past two years, i have lived at the New Dharma Meditation Center for Urban Peace in Oakland, CA. under the guidance of my Mitra and Teacher and together with the witness of my dharma sisters and brothers, i have learned the difference between the suffering that leads to more suffering and the suffering that leads to freedom.

in fact, my way of life at The Center reminds me so much of what life must have been like for my indigenous ancestors during the time of the babaylan. like my ancestors, my spirituality is infused in all aspects of my daily life. there is no separation, no time to stop and start “being spiritual.” there isn’t even an indigenous word that literally translates to “spirituality;” it was simply life and there was no need to differentiate it.

we practice fearless meditation at The Center, where meditation is viewed as relationship. we honor relationship in order to cultivate Presence, and cultivating Presence has allowed me to be see more clearly and embrace the state of my life, exactly as it is.

in my sitting practice, i have cultivated a certain kind of discipline with which i have been able to stay present to difficult feelings and bear discomfort while maintaining appropriate and discerning boundaries. as i shed my colonized identity, i am better able to identify and embody an internal and sustainable locus of agency. and in doing all of this, i have been able to both actively participate in and witness the dismantling of the culture of silence. it is has been an indispensable support for my decolonization journey to live with an intentional spiritual community that is transparent, receptive, and reflective about this process.

Like the Katipuneros, i view freedom, or kalayaan, as the basis for my spiritual practice. to embody freedom means that i am able to focus all of my intentions and energies in the service of social transformation for the greater good of all Beings.

at The Center, we cultivate warriorship by embodying the Bodhisattva ideal. the idea of awakened individuals holding off on complete enlightenment until all Beings are able to crossover together feels very Pinoy to me. it is not unlike the bayanihan tradition or the spirit of the indigenous balangay.

The Center is not a Buddhist meditation center. in fact, in the tradition of fisherfolk and weavers, the teachings that are offered there are an amalgam of many different spiritual traditions, including those of Buddhism, Native American practices, and yoga. there is also a firm commitment to honoring our relationship with the land and re-membering the interconnectedness that we share with all of Nature. this also feels very Pinoy to me in how creative combinations are created to highlight relationship and foster harmony.

i am currently learning Tagalog. malalim siya talaga. the other day, i learned the word, “pahingalay,” which i’ve translated as “meditation.” it contains three Tagalog words whose meanings actually explain how fearless meditation is done.

pahinga = rest, stillness
hinga = breath
alay = offering, gift

for so many years, i associated being Filipino with the colonized framework from which i perceived myself as “other,” as wrong, as less than. i realize that i used to automatically associate being Filipino with a certain kind of self-loathing. it breaks my heart to write this. there has been much for me to unlearn, and it continues...

growing up, i remember hating the shape of my nose, the shape of eyes, the color of my skin. i remember being told that i needed to pinch the bridge of my nose every morning so it wouldn’t be “so flat.” i did this for years.

once, i remember smearing a thick layer of Noxema on my skin, in a panic, after staying out in the sun too long, hoping it would help whiten me because i knew my mother would shame me and be angry at how “black” i had become.

i remember wishing so hard that i was white and the Brady Bunch would adopt me. i wished that we could have macaroni and cheese or tuna casserole for dinner instead of rice and adobong pusit, tortang talong, or nilaga.

i love my nose now. it is one of my favorite parts of my body.

to this day, i can’t stand the sight nor smell of Noxema or any notions of whitening creams or soaps. kayumanggi for life!

Adobong pusit, tortang talong, and nilaga are some of my favorite things to eat. macaroni and cheese is okay. the thought of tuna casserole makes me a little nauseous though.

the Brady Bunch makes me laugh, and i empathize, love, and forgive that little brown girl who wanted to run away and live with that white family.

i am writing this narrative from the Philippines. i moved here last month for the next year or so, as my decolonization journey has brought me here.

The irony of this is not lost on me. my parents were around my same age when they moved us to the US, and it is precisely because of their investment in a conventional life, that i am able to choose to live this unconventional one.

my intentions for this time are service, study, and healing.

i’ve come Home because i’d like to explore the context of the lifecycle of this vine of colonization. how did it get so good at what it does? just how deep are its roots and how far-reaching? the unlocking of this feels important to me in understanding how to retrain this vine and minimize its trauma upon its necessary removal.

i’ve also come Home because at the same time that i painstakingly remove this vine from my entrails, i seek the salve that will help me heal. this salve, my salve, is here. intuitively, i know that this fertile place that provided such a hospitable home for this preying vine is also the source of my healing. there is room here for all of this.

Inang Bayan has called me Home. she has told me that her rich volcanic soil and her story can help me awaken and re-member. she has told me that the recipe for this salve that i so earnestly seek includes the reclamation of my indigenous roots, my ginhawa (my center, my hara) and my kalinangan (my relationship to the land). she reminds me that i am a babaylan and that i have important work to do.

she continues to whisper to me what i need to hear, as she has always done. as i decolonize, my hearing becomes more acute and my resolve strengthens. Ina, thank you for loving me like you do.

i remember.
i re-member.
i love.