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Quote by Mokokoma Mokhonoana

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Mokokoma Mokhonoana

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“The emotions we experience don't reflect our external reality; they reflect our internal reality. We don't see the world as it is; we see the world as we are. That's why prayer is so critical. It's a way of seeing reality - and, more specifically, the reality that is beyond that reality we can perceive with our five senses. Some things cannot be perceived with the five senses; they can only be conceived by the Holy Spirit. Some things cannot be deduced by deductive reasoning; they can only be imagined by the Holy Spirit. Some things cannot be learned by logic; they can only be revealed by the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit compensates for our sensory limits by enabling us to conceive of things we cannot perceive with our five senses. Think of it as a sixth sense. The revelation of the Spirit gives us extrasensory perception, in the truest sense of that phrase. He helps us see the invisible and hear the inaudible. But that sixth sense has to be cultivated, much like our five senses do. Our spiritual vision develops much like our physical vision does.”

“When we’re not fighting a feeling, we ironically allow it to pass quicker and, in the process, create the silence and space to hear its message.”

“Black people are expected by the white world to be strong but not angry. Pain must be hidden. Daily slights are to be borne with grace, humility, even gratitude. Weakness is intolerable. Vulnerability must wait until the day is done and the mask can come off in the privacy of our won homes. And by then we are too tired or too stiff to feel it. This is not just true for black people living in Europe or America. It is also true, in a different form in Africa and the Caribbean, where black people are the majority. People in former European colonies must see their lives in relation to the lives of white people. As communities, as individuals, we have been told we are inferior. Our economies, our livelihoods, are reliant on Western economies, white people's livelihoods.”

“I once heard Pema Chodron explain that no emotion lasts longer than 90 seconds. You heard that right: no emotion we feel lasts longer than a minute and a half if we let it run its course without interference. Emotions, the result of chemical response to a thought, appear, intensify, de-intensify, and subside: and they do this in less time than it takes to microwave a frozen burrito. What prolongs them isn’t emotional wiring gone awry but the stories we lay on top of them that keep our brains dumping more of those chemicals into our system. A prolonged emotional experience is the result of the stories we keep alive in our heads.”

“We've got this idea that there are only two options in grief: you're either going to be stuck in your pain, doomed to spend the rest of your life rocking in a corner in your basement wearing sackcloth, or you're going to triumph over grief, be transformed, and come back even better than you were before. Just two options. On, off. Eternally broken or completely healed. It doesn't seem to matter that nothing else in life is like that. Somehow when it comes to grief, the entire breadth of human experience goes out the window.”

“If you are not dealing with your emotions and the unresolved trauma trapped inside of your body, you are revictimizing yourself. Being sick and hurt is the single greatest way we gain power over others, because what happens when we get sick and hurt? Everyone comes to our rescue.”