Emancipation Day 2021 feels like the perfect occasion to begin truly freeing ourselves from that which does not serve us.

This blog post is late.

According to the arbitrary schedule I’ve set for myself, I drop a new post about a timely topic that moves me every Thursday/Friday. So this blog post is quite late.

And that’s a good thing.

My default setting has always been to consistently run myself ragged doing everything at all times. I suspect this is the result of my less-than-emotionally-healthy childhood (with, perhaps, a sprinkle of the stereotypical Virgo characteristics in which I only half believe).

This tendency has been very beneficial to my employers and to certain individuals who delighted in the perks of being in the orbit of someone who derived their sense of self-worth from being of service to others. While I won’t say that this predisposition is a net negative, I will say that a lack of diligence in vetting the recipients will definitely lead to some very negative consequences.

Which brings me to why this blog post is late.

It didn’t have to be. I could have met the professional deadlines that displaced this week’s post AND burned the midnight oil to turn out a strong post about this week’s topic. It would’ve made me a hypocrite, but I’ve been this kind of hypocrite before. I have spent a lot of time lovingly and sincerely encouraging people I care about to take the rest they need even as I drove myself to the brink of exhaustion (and, occasionally, past it) because I genuinely believed that everything had to be done at the same time.

However, as I’ve mentioned before, the pandemic has taught me some things. It’s had to teach me some of those things more than once.

Of late, I’m realizing that I’m not the only one learning these lessons.

When Naomi Osaka publicly expressed her intention to preserve and protect her mental health by skipping a few press conferences (and a particular subsection of the world predictably lost its mind), I was reminded of the moment when US congresswoman Maxine Waters turned a common legislative statement into a powerful expression of black women’s determination to be heard.

I could see a thread connecting these two moments and extending beyond them, connecting countless black women who have dared to demand the respect they deserved in a world that has consistently refused to even acknowledge their humanity, let alone their dignity. I saw – and felt – how huge it would be to publicly refuse to engage with the world in the ways we’ve been conditioned to, ways that require us to endlessly grind ourselves down to nothing in exchange for praise like “strong” and “powerful” or else face condemnation for being “ungrateful” or “weak”.

I could also see how we could actually create space for our humanity within the sphere of “Black Excellence” that we strive to occupy.

Then along came Simone Biles, a woman who has so dominated her sport that the governing body has, disappointingly, decided to throttle her scores. In response, she continued to not only excel, but to publicly affirm her commitment to showing women worldwide that it’s ok to not only be the best but be proud of it.

The only meaningful competition she faced heading into this year’s Olympics was herself. So, when she pulled out of the women’s team final due to a mental block that threatened her team’s medal chances and jeopardized her literal life, particularly given the level of technical complexity at which she performs, surely everyone understood, right?

Nah.

She did, however, receive enough support to prompt an IG post that has been stuck in my head since I read it and, in turn, served as a source of inspiration for this very blog post:

“… which I never truly believed before.”

I’ve not been able to get this part of her caption out of my head since I’ve read it because it encompasses the struggle of being the type of person who always strives to give their absolute best better than everything I said at the top of this post.

When you grow up surrounded by indications that you’re only as worthwhile as the results of your efforts, you inevitably tie your self-worth to those results. When you find that, for whatever reason, you are unable to deliver those results, you’re left with some very harsh conclusions about your worth.

And that’s just us nobodies. When you have a reputation for excellence on the international level and you realize that you need to take a step back… I can’t imagine.

The fact that the world’s best gymnast needs to take a break did not shock me. I never imagined that her excellence indicated that she was any less human than any of us and I don’t feel entitled to witness any more than she’s already given the world simply by doing what she does best.

The fact that the world’s best gymnast fell into the (in retrospect) all-too-human trap of believing that she is the sum of her accomplishments, though… that gave me pause.

And I did pause. I’ve been reflecting on it on and off for the past three days.

I’ve come to the conclusion that, regardless of what the usual narrative would have us believe, global black excellence is not the real revolutionary act.

Don’t get me wrong, we are black excellence. It’s not accidental that, despite the fact that we’re often in the minority and despite all of the systemic barriers folks are fighting tooth and nail to protect, we manage to rise to the top of so many fields.

Trinidad and Tobago alone, a tiny little pair of islands at the bottom of an archipelago, boasts way too many talented global pioneers for it to be a coincidence.

That said, at this point, where we have the opportunity to re-examine and redefine the status quo, perhaps the real revolutionary act is in setting boundaries.

This is a world where a woman could be the G.O.A.T even as the sporting organization tasked with protecting her turned a blind eye towards the abuse she and her teammates endured and then be called “a quitter” for choosing not to endanger her own life. This despite the fact that there have been more than enough examples of what happens when athletes don’t feel empowered to draw that very boundary.

So maybe the lesson here is that, whether we’re pursuing excellence in our fields or striving to keep a roof over our heads and food in our stomachs during a whole pandemic, we deserve REST.

So simple and yet so critical.

Perhaps it’s also pretty timely on the 36th anniversary of T&T’s decision to become the first independent nation to commemorate the abolition of slavery by making Emancipation Day a national holiday. In the absence of the traditional national festivals (yet another in a long list of this pandemic’s cultural casualties), I suggest we take a moment to reflect on the revolutionary act of resting when we need it.

(And while we’re at it, let’s remember to send a little love to our Haitian fam, who led the way in setting this particular boundary and STILL have not received the justice they deserve.)

fwiw, I think our ancestors would heartily approve.