The tragedy of strength

Those who came before us, our grand mothers and grand fathers, our aunts and uncles, our communities etc, always taught us to be strong. Weakness was condemned and despised. And strong we became. 

Strength to overcome adversity is important, vital and a necessity particularly in Africa where as a woman you grow up being objectified all the time and given more or less the same status as children..."a bus travelling from X to Y carrying 80 people had an accident. 40 people died including 16 women and 12 children..." the story lines always remark.

But strength can be burdensome. Strength can be a heavy load to carry. Strength can be lonesome. Strength can be a liability because as you remain strong and grow stronger, you can unconsciously minimise those around you. People around you can become weak, not because they choose to, but because your strength overshadows without empowering them, it sidelines and is overarching without tooling them on how to be strong.

To be strong is to draw from a power located right at the core from inside you, the self. That process of drawing from within the depths of yourself is personal. The outcomes are overt but the process of delivering the outcomes is covert. You can only tell people to be strong but there is no manual on "how to". It is a personal journey influenced by those that were around you when you were growing up.

The tragedy with wielding too much strength is that should you ever stumble and become vulnerable and require particularly emotional support from those around you, the beneficiaries of your strength, if your strength disabled them over the years as you became the only reservoir from which strength could be drawn, there will either be resistance or failure to rise up to the challenge that is making you vulnerable. Vulnerability therefore becomes a luxury. 

That is why many strong African women I know just get on with it. There is no time to notice your vulnerability and seek that help one gets from air conditioned offices on the couch, where they recommend popping all sorts of small pills whose names are taboo to mention! 

That has been my very own personal experience. Nowadays, often, I wonder whether it was a wise thing to be strong. I wonder, I ponder, I experience self doubt, I question and even quietly weep, but I do not regret it because I was never taught weak. Strong is all I know. Strong has always been the Alpha and the Omega. I do not know how I could have been anything else but strong ~ Gloria Ndoro-Mkombachoto