i can see in color ... i have a new song to sing

Now, yall know that I have been on some "Precious" type mess since jump. "Push", the book by Sapphire, is real, raw, and inspiring to say the least. It was from this book that "Precious" was made into a motion picture.

Precious is one of those movies that gets inside of you. One of those movies that drills its energy into your soul. One of those movies that brings out your own inner most memories and elicits the most intense emotional response your body can muster.

For those who haven't seen the film yet (really?!), it recounts the life of an obese, black teenager who has been impregnated with her second child, both products of incest and rape by her father. Precious lives with her emotionally, physically, and sexually abusive mother. And endures ridicule, beatings, and poverty while desperately seeking more from the outlets and people surrounding her. Precious attends an alternative school, where she meets an intensely passionate teacher, who encourages Precious to find the core of healing, the power in self love, and the dire strength needed to carry the weight of what her life has beaten her down with.

Now, I can't even talk about this movie without getting that lump in my throat. You know that one that arrives because you are trying desperately not to open the tear valve. It's my body's internal reaction to an external stimuli that seeks to unveil years upon years of my own pain.

And that's what I want to talk about.

I want to talk about it because that is what healing is, my people. I want to let yall know that I am a survivor. And that's more than just the tool of empowerment women's groups use to label someone who has overcome abuse. That is the truth. It is the power of feeling, reliving, reviving, and reconstructing the experience of having been hurt in ways no one should ever experience.

My story comes with more than just my own pain. My story comes told within the resounding chorus of voices of women (and men) who have been shattered at the core of who they are because of abuse.

And it is shaming, that act of betrayal. Whether it is one singe episode of violence or years of abuse ... whether it is the first hand experience of or the witnessing of another, it is shaming. The power of shame silences people. It drapes the essence of you, the most delicate and vulnerable and light filled places of you and chokes them. It chokes them until parts of yourself die.

And I can't lie, those parts of you that die can't and won't come back. I haven't been renewed and made whole again because of my healing. And knowing that demands more than the act of surviving. It demands that we do everything in our power to keep us from ever having another part of our souls die again.

And when you have been silenced and shamed you find fear. You find fear not only in the world around you, in the dark alleys, under the covers of your own bed, in the eyes of every reflection of the hands that harmed you ... but you find fear in your own body. You find fear in the most common acts of living. The handshake, the smile, the hooded sweatshirt, the sound of doors opening, the whisper. And those are your triggers. Triggers that turn into road blocks. External manifestations of inner turmoil. Physical reminders of what you can't experience in this life anymore for simply what they are.

And you build a fortress. A home away from home, a world of solitude in the sky. And you live there. You live alone, devoid of feeling, for fear of what feeling becomes. And you sit silently.

And then a movie like Precious comes along. Or you meet a kindred soul. Or you listen to a song that speaks a chorus of words that shoot straight to your heart. And you have found something, someone that just read your own story back to you.

And that story doesn't look the same. It doesn't have the same characters or time frame. The plot doesn't unfold the same way, and the faces don't have the same details.

But it is your story.

The woman speaking it is you. And I cry.

I cry for my own pain, I cry for the pain of others. I cry for the moment my heart found something, someone who knew my story without ever hearing my words before.

And I want to talk about the power of sharing. The power of finding just one other person who can touch your pain through their own heart. And the power of using that soul shifting moment to re-learn trust. To re-learn faith. To re-learn life felt without shame.

We do not share enough, women. We do not share enough, my people. We do not open our hearts to the power of what our own stories can do for each other and in turn ourselves.

We are more beautiful than we could ever imagine. We have souls that shine like a million prisms of light, and we can not allow the pain and limitations of our bodies to keep us from feeling the beauty and peace that is intrinsically in us.

Please know that I feel you. Please know that whatever you are keeping under your veil of shame and silence is beautiful. Not the act that destroyed you, but the parts of you that can't be touched. The parts of you that will learn how much more magnificent a million broken parts of you will grow.

And the healing continues. The healing continues with each conversation, with each step, with each recognition that we are magnanimous beings. There is healing in the mediums that spark a new light, a new perspective, a new meaning for what we have experienced. Use what is around you, embrace what is inside of you, and share.

Share you.