Roots & Growth
A people without the knowledge of their past history, origin and culture is like a tree without roots. ~ Marcus Garvey
Just like a tree, we too as humans grow and mature both physically & mentally(spiritually too of course). Though growth is important, our roots are just as important.
What do I mean by this? What are our "roots'?
Our roots are the things we were exposed to in our past at a young age. Things like your:
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Personal Interest
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Talents
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Skills
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Hobbies
And all the other things that we have explored that help us better understand who we are as a person.
Our spirits will always connect most with whatever comes natural to us or at least hold deep meaning to us, most likely out of personal interest.
For me growing up, I always had a big interest with martial arts and I found myself having a unique talent for martial arts.
I used to spend hours watching martial arts movies as a kid and also spent a lot of my time by myself in the woods teaching myself martial arts.
To tell you the truth, as a kid I always spent time by myself in nature. Few kids in my neighborhood did martial arts and in a weird way I got bullied for even having an interest in it.
When most young black boys got excited for basketball and football games, I got more excited of Karate matches on YouTube or UFC matches.
Martial Arts ended up showing promise though, I was able to make better sense of myself through martial arts. It gave me an outlet to express how I felt on the inside.
Anger, rage, anxiety, depression; all these emotions I've been able to better handle, even to this day, because of my deep connection to martial arts as a whole.
Overtime as I got older, Martial Arts also helped me make sense of Life itself which actually even lead me to making this newsletter your're currently reading.
There's another big growth moment I went through that made me realize the importance of roots and that moment happen on May 22, 2020.
Rastafari Is Wisdom
Open your eyes, look within. Are you satisfied with the life you're living? ~ Bob Marley
I actually remember a couple years before the day of May 22, 2020, it was a a rainy day in June of 2018 and my heart felt numb.
My spirit felt crushed. I felt lost in damn near every aspect you could think of and for the most part I was just over it.
Whatever my life was at that moment was not feeding my life. My martial arts career was going no where. I had just dropped out of college after doing one semester. I had no real goals besides one thing.
That goal was the burning desire to become a better man.
I didn't know what it would take to become a better man. I didn't know what a better man "looked" liked. Hell, I didn't even know where to start.
That's when the journey started. The journey for wisdom began the moment I was no longer satisfied with my current state of living and began to seek after a different life that actually brought me joy.
It took 2 years of self journeying but eventually during the Covid Lockdown I found myself exploring the culture of Rastafari and the wisdom I started taking in from it complimented the beliefs I already had within myself for years.
I like to say Rastafari was essentially already apart of me but the moment I came into awareness of what it truly was, the wisdom of Rastafari "watered" my roots as whole.
This "spiritual watering", if you want to call it that, skyrocketed my growth as a person to the point where a lot of people close to me felt as if they didn't really no me anymore.
It was a trip for me too because you have to understand my whole life changed after May 22. 2020.
I had to unlearn, or uproot, a lot of old bad habits from my past life in order to make room for new roots- good habits- to grow and ingrain themselves into my new life.
I even like to look at the locs growing out my head as my roots extending out of my body; being a reflecton of my wisdom as a grow as a man overtime.
This is why Rastafari is wisdom. By gaining knowledge of the Rastafari Lifestyle, I also gained knowledge of self. That knowledge fed the roots of my past self while aslso helping me grow to newer heights by establish stronger roots as well.
So Whats The Word Rasta Man?
Bruce Lee said this best,
“All knowledge ultimately means Self-knowledge.”
The more knowledge you can gain of yourself the better you can connect to your roots of your life.
Use the knowledge you gain from other people and experiences to makes better sense of YOUR Life!
You'll never know how much you can truly grow as a person if you dont know how deep your roots run and not only knowing how deep but also knowing the history behind those roots.
If you no longer wish to identifies with certain aspects of your past, remove them! Uproot the old to make space for the new roots to take place.
In the end, your growth is all based on how you water and nourish yourself.