My Mother Casts A Spell, “obo nais, obo smart!”

The most important relationship that I have is the one I have with myself. The company that I keep with myself is so important and precious. Often times, it feels like the true me is the child me, innocent and curious about the human experience. She holds no fear or judgment about experiencing life on earth because it is necessary for her spiritual growth. The human experience is so consuming and desirable that, from time to time, I forget, or worse, lose, the true reason for being on earth. Therefore, it is very important to nurture, protect, and cultivate the relationship that I have with myself. Her voice is gentle and firm, and she never second-guesses who I am. But before this relationship began, there was another relationship that came before it. It is often the one that builds the foundation of how I choose to experience this human life. This is the relationship with the first human voice I felt—the voice of my mother.

I was new and vulnerable, and her voice was my first comforting greeting. She entertained me with songs and stories and protected me with her prayers. When she grew tired and frustrated, I tried my best to hug her from inside. She was my first friend and the first voice that taught me how to speak to myself. In my younger years as a girl, she taught me to like my hair and how I looked. She taught me to wash my hair with coconut milk and make a hair mask out of avocado and raw eggs. She complimented me when I looked pretty in my clothes and how I tied my hair. She cautioned me to be mindful that sometimes my clothes can be misinterpreted by others. My mother had a jewelry box that had her beautiful earrings inside, and I always liked to open it and admire her earrings. My mother’s beauty was effortless, and I was impressed that she could put on a pair of earrings, comb, and tie her hair up, and already it magnified her beauty. She has this phrase that she says every time she expresses how beautiful I am. She says, “Obo nais, obo smart” in her native language; obo is “you are,” and essentially, she always reminded me that I am beautiful and intelligent. This is how my mother nurtured the soft voice inside me, and in her affirmation, she encouraged me to be confident in myself and know that I am beautiful. Her validation was so crucial to me as a young girl growing up because I never had to seek it out from friends, boys, or other places. My mother was my first human experience of affection and love, and she gave me the confidence to be and see beauty in myself.

Life here on earth comes with its own set of rules and norms, and navigating it on my own and trying to abide by them accordingly can become overwhelming. As a result, the noise outside can become so loud that it drowns out this soft, gentle voice inside me. It becomes even more dangerous when this overpowering outside noise becomes my inner voice. In my teenage years, growing into my own skin, at one point I lost my self-confidence. The desire to fit the definition of western beauty consumed me. I wanted my hair to be straight and flowy like the models in the magazines, and I hated my body for being too curvy. My mother never scolded me for constantly relaxing my hair, nor did she amplify the outside noise. She became the quiet, soft voice that I had ignored: “Obo nais, obo smart.” She lovingly reminded me throughout my teenage years as I tried to discover who I was. It wasn’t until I found myself in the fitting room of a department store in a different country, trying on clothes. A lady of a different nationality from me complemented my curvy body. This simple gesture of her kind words in a very brief moment was so impactful that it revived my self-confidence again. She made me realize that I was always enough and more. She made me truly feel the weight of my mother’s words.

Today, as a young mother, when I tell my son affirming positive words about himself, my heart is filled with gratitude for my mother. Since then, that day at the shop, I’ve never relaxed my hair again, and I walk in pride of my melanin curves. I know my son will have his own challenges that are necessary for him to learn from and grow through. But like my mother, who planted that seed of self-confidence in me and my sister, I aspire to do the same for my son. I hope that I nurture his inner voice to always be kind to himself. And when he sees beauty in another person, he will be kind enough to express it to them. The relationships that we create and the people that we choose to love are very important decisions that we make. They can affect the most important relationship, which is the one we have with ourselves. No matter what kind of relationship you have now with your inner voice, remember that there is still hope and that you have the power to rebuild a much better foundation and fine-tune that inner voice again.