Hey bookworms!
There are some books that reveal too much about ourselves or the societies we grew up in. These three books are a few of the most valuable books on my shelf, but I can only pick them up when I’m ready for confrontation.
These are books that defy binge-read culture. They’re not “single-sitting books.” Like an elixir or a liqueur — even a single page is enough to make you sit and reflect. With these kinds of books, I tend to always “wait for the right time.” On the surface, my logic is valid: ‘I want to receive the information with no barriers,’ I often say to myself. But I think a lot of it has simply been me running away from things I don’t want shone to light.
There are three books like this. These are books that have been sitting on my bedside table staring at me patiently…one of them with one raised eyebrow, actually. It’s been two years, and I’m still reading them.
1. Women Who Run with the Wolves by Clarissa Pinkola Estes
Women Who Run with the Wolves helped me end a few toxic relationships (work and especially romantic) and opened my eyes to how much of myself I was suppressing. This book calls me back to myself, forces me to listen to the voice inside me that wants to roam barefoot, let her hair down, howl at the moon, sprint out of nowhere, be playful, be protective, and be skittish and unpredictable — with no judgment.
When I read this book (more on this blog), I no longer see women as women, but rather as wolves who are either caged or roaming free. I become so inspired and so resolute to make decisions that serve not just the face that I present to society, but the woman inside of me that wants to return to her nature, her truth. I become a full embodiment of myself which means accepting what I am, what I’m not and what I refuse to be.
I’m not even halfway through it.
2. Pedagogy of the Oppressed by Paulo Freire
This book touches the most sensitive part of my identity: education. Traditional education has always been something I’ve been very critical of, and yet it has been the cornerstone of my life decisions. I find that in my twenties, I am doing a lot of unlearning and relearning. I was always the critical thinker — the one who asked a lot of questions, the challenger, the disturber. It made people roll their eyes, but it also made a lot of people feel comfortable enough to exist around me without the façade of having it all together. I lost that somewhere along the line when I realised that people who succeed are people who feed the system exactly what it wants. This idea — that you can only say whatever you want once you’ve been validated by “credible institutions” — is a widespread belief, and I think that kind of thinking is shaped from early-childhood education onwards. I respect all the teachers who have done their best to make education a liberal space that welcomes diverse thinking, despite the constraints of time and the syllabus.
Education exists to empower and to liberate. Self-betterment does not come from education; it comes from what we do with our education to make the world a better place. I truly believe this, but seeing it written down is sobering.
An lastly…
3. The Wretched of the Earth by Franz Fanon
Over the years, certain relationships conditioned me to roll my eyes at the “tired” notion of colonialism. And I have to be honest when I say that it does tire me. As a Black woman, I want my history to be more than that. I want my identity to be more than just oppressed and colonised — because it is.
This book makes me angry at the world because it forces me to face what is true. Anyone can yawn and say, “Why are people so obsessed with the past?” but the past mirrors human behaviour. This is not just a book about post-colonialism; it’s about the psychology of people in power and how they silence voices by making people lose sight of where they’ve come from and where they were supposed to go. It reminds me of how much I’ve tried to mould myself to fit into the very boots that once stood on the neck of Africa, and this truth makes me extremely uncomfortable.
Deep breath.
We get used to reading for escape, but sometimes reading teaches us to silence fear and face ourselves. Learning makes us so vulnerable. And that’s what most of us are doing whether we’re in school or not, 3 years old or 70 years old. Kindness helps people to be braver. So thank you for being supportive and reading this blog post all the way to the end. Let’s be patient and kinder with one another as we all fight battles and face demons.
Leave a Reply