i think hustling is my trauma response

not the kind Van McCoy was alluding to, worse. hope that helps xxx

DISCLAIMER: First things first, sorry for my lack of subby's, i've been too busy hustling (like for real) x

I think that’s all…my new hyperfixation is the vanilla cupcakes from the Hummingbird Bakery. Maybe I almost gave up writing? I don’t know, whatever. Let’s begin!

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YouTuber turned entrepreneur Patricia Bright recently released a podcast episode with the title ‘Husting as a Trauma Response’ on her platform, The Break Social. To say it called me out is an understatement.

In the past year, I’ve had to reflect on the life I envision for myself, the woman I want to be, and, therefore, the goals I want to achieve. With my pending alliance to the 4b movement, my chronic fatigue and my growing intolerance for bullsh*t from most people I interact with, I fear I’m straying further and further away from the things I’ve always aspired to (or my period is due, in which case, this whole newsletter could return void).

Nonetheless, when I turned 18 just over six years ago, I started looking at all of my options when my ‘dreams’ felt like less of a possibility. That’s so young; what was I thinking? Amongst them, or rather positioned almost comfortably at the top, has been becoming so professionally successful and, thus, wealthy that I would be able to adopt as a single mother.

Whether married or not, I’ve always wanted to adopt — that has been a lifelong dream. I feel like it was potentially part of my mother’s also, as she told me once that she wanted to adopt children, too. If you know my family, if you love me, they love you, and suddenly, you’ve unofficially taken my last name. It’s how it’s always been, and it’s one of the things I’ve cherished most, coming from a large family and growing up a 15-minute drive from my grandparent's house, where (mostly) everyone was welcome through their doors.

I have to interrupt my thought because I feel like people will read this and think: ‘What is the rush?’, ‘You have your whole life ahead of you’, ‘A child thinking about a child’. My response to that is that you’re probably right, and I have no response xxx

It’s a sentiment I’ve always wanted to continue myself. Of course, things look a lot different now. The chances of me buying a townhouse in South West London for near enough five digits is closer to 0 than the end of the scale, whatever the limit is, and actually, I don’t think I’ll ever want that many people in my house…respectfully :) But it’s a tradition amongst minority groups and families that I will forever admire.

But hustling can also become a ‘tradition’. So many people have just worked themselves to burnout and kept going. I know for a fact that I’ve been burnt out since April, but I have just kept going. It feels as though no matter how hard I try to prepare myself, usually through over-compensation, it’s never quite enough. Then, I’m trapped in the cycle of ‘keeping the momentum’, ‘never giving up’ and ‘striving for greater’. What if my peak of greatness looked like a life I’ve already achieved, but because of how things have accumulated, it’s not enough?

Confessions of a Thought Daughter… I love Lola <3 my forever queen

I recognise I’m complaining about something that a lot of people have a harder time dealing with, and I’m not trying to minimise their experience. In circumstances like this, I’m always reminded of my photography A-level teacher and her blatant favouritism towards very particular students. Somehow, despite responding to her feedback (and more) for two years of the course, I managed to get consistent B’s, and that’s what I left sixth form with — three marks off of an A, actually. Despite her false kindness (sorry not sorry, I saw right through it), I went on to achieve everything she told me to be realistic about, including attending Central Saint Martins. When I told my mum what my Photography grade was, she, too, rolled her eyes. “Why would you want only a few students to get the best grades when the whole class is capable?” she said. Those words have stuck with me through all of my academic (and learning) experiences, including my own now on the other side of that as a teaching assistant at my alma mater.

Where the trauma response lies is in the unbelief that my 100% isn’t good enough, so I attempt to give 150%. What does that even look like? Sure, in terms of tangible, quantifiable results, the outcomes tend to be good, but I am failing myself miserably. A few years ago, I started attending therapy sessions. I was tired of tiring myself out of my efforts to save myself and sought professional help. Thankfully, I was in my placement year, living at home, and had the disposable income to participate in this extra self-care. We won’t talk about how the therapist I was allocated fell asleep on multiple occasions and trauma dumped on me every session. One massive takeaway, however, was that she raised (greater) concerns about things I’d turned my head from.

Self-diagnosing became such a trend during my time in secondary school. It sounds sick, but put a bunch of young girls in rooms with each hour for 7 hours every day, and they’ll band together (or at least some of them will) to curate some absolute nonsense. Some of it was very real, others not so much. Nevertheless, at this point, I had been medically diagnosed with GAD and CD, but what came next was a little shocking. “Have you ever heard of PTSD, Aswan?” my therapist asked me. I had, of course, but I didn’t ever think it was something I was worthy of suffering with. Life is life, but mine hadn’t been that bad…had it?

We began unpacking some of my traumas, often the ones that nodded to things from my other diagnoses. And then, upon one of our next calls:

“So, I want you to go to your doctors and see what further medical help you can receive for PTSD,” she said while simultaneously eating her yoghurt and tending to her dogs (sigh).

“Oh. Okay,” I said, gradually tuning out from whatever words she uttered next.

I never saw her again after that. Perhaps to a fault, I refused to believe it, and honestly, I didn’t want to add another thing for some doctor or GP to tend to, knowing that I wasn’t going to get the help I needed — or have the time to care for it. Final year was looming, I didn’t know what that was going to look like, and I didn’t want to address any mental health issues because the work had to come first, or so I believed.

“I didn’t get all A*’s and A’s at GCSE when people expected me to. I still didn’t get full A*/A at A-Level. University was my final chance to get that First Class or none of it was worth it.”

This was a genuine thought I had for all four years of uni. And don’t get me wrong, hustling can be productive. Through self-determined ‘failures’, I knew I wanted to work harder to achieve better grades. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with wanting better! But, actually, what I really needed was to make time to respond to those traumas and heal. I didn’t need to work efficiently and effectively enough to be able to take care of myself medically. It was the other way around entirely: I needed to take care of my health so that I could work efficiently and effectively.

But I missed that opportunity for ‘the hustle’. A hustle that has begun and never quite stopped since — or that I never stopped. I’m saying all of this not for pity but because this hustle culture is more real than ever. On every scroll, on every social platform, someone who became a millionaire at 21 is telling you to work harder, and the only self-care instruction they give you is to eat healthily and go to the gym — even when it’s their private chef that cooks their meals, and they spend most of their time with their personal trainer. Those things are all valuable implementations that we can incorporate into our lives to make us feel better internally, but unless nurtured correctly, simply doing them won’t cut it.

It’s why people run to faith, to community, to investing in their health. It’s a growing frustration that a country that was able to tend to this well is no longer able to. It truly, truly saddens me. I remember crying in A&E, not because I stupidly got my ring stuck on my finger (it was the summertime, my fingers were swollen, and I slept with it on), but because there were people with life-altering casualties and needs that were waiting longer than me to be seen and tended to. My mum reassured me not to feel guilty, and that’s what the service is for, but still. You always hear news stories about how London has a mental health crisis, but it’s the whole nation - the world even. And if London has it the worst, which I doubt we do, I bet I could tell you why: ✨hustle culture✨

Has Charlotte ever been wrong? (The answer is absolutely yes, by the way).

On her podcast, Patricia said: “Hustle became my way of protecting myself from ensuring that something bad wouldn't happen or that somebody wouldn't be able to take away something from me.” It’s a real fear, but it’s one we have to not let rule our lives because the hustle could also end up causing something bad to happen or be taken away.

I think we should remind ourselves, and I don’t want to become complacent in this mindset, but there are systems that you could work tirelessly your entire life to overcome and beat, yet would still remain at the bottom of the chain, especially in corporate structures. We’ve seen it happen, heard about it, experienced it ourselves, or someone we know has, and it’s not stopping either.

So why are we working towards a measure that was never built for us to succeed in the first place? I don’t know why owning property in one’s lifetime is now a success story when it was treated as a right decades ago. And I celebrate anyone who has achieved this, truly. It’s no easy feat, and I don’t mean to come across as undermining that accomplishment. But it has become a trophy rather than a need. I could go into a whole spiel about how we’re rapidly losing our right to ownership, but I’m currently nannying, the kids are asleep, and I’m realising I need dinner.

Now, change ‘occasionally’ to ‘Most of the time’, and I think we’ve got it.

I know my parents, my grandparents, and others who came before me fought the good fight for us (my brother and I, and many others, to be honest) to live a fraction of the life that we’ve been so blessed to live — and yet, they’re still so committed to us gaining more. I’m very thankful. But there are times when their priority, as with many, has been to keep going, keep pushing, and keep striving when they should’ve just been resting. For as long as I can remember, my Dad will break the silence to sing “And you don’t stop” which I’m sure is a rap quip from a Nas song or A Tribe Called Quest or the Wu-Tang. (He will probably call me upon reading this newsletter to clarify who it is; I will bet good money on this). This is the same man who says, “The hustle never stops baby,” when I hear the click of his keyboard and the rolling of his mouse when it’s 8 pm and he’s on reporting season at work, usually nearing the end of the quarter.

The definition(s) of hustle is:

to push roughly; jostle.

a state of great activity.

a fraud or swindle.

None of these definitions are my portion unless the ‘great activity’ involves eating great food, buying great clothes, and spending a great deal of time with my loved ones xxx

On the contrary, the opposite of hustle is peace, in which a few of its definitions are:

freedom from disturbance; tranquillity.

mental or emotional calm.

a state or period in which there is no war or a war has ended.

If those are its meanings, and that is the opposite, I know for sure what I am searching for amidst the chaos, or dare I say, ‘hustle and bustle’? I don’t know what a culture of peace could look like in our darkening 21st-century world, but more than ever, I relate to those pageant presences who stated it as their aspiration in life. But to even envision that takes a great deal of privilege.

Unfortunately, this is not about me…my Pinterest boards are a mess. Glad we cleared that up x

“In certain circumstances, hustling and hustling is based on a spirit of fear,” said Patricia. And she’s entirely right, working hard can be masked by fear of the future. Still, I’m reminded of a scripture that my mum would always tell me during tough seasons:

“For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind.”¹

So, while I (we all) work through, and hopefully out of, this forsaken internet-driven, (honestly, mostly) patriarchal culture, I hope we take moments out of our every day to bask in the moment to feel that peace, to know, hold and cherish it. And, most importantly, to maintain it.

How blessed am I?²

1. The ASV translation says: “For God gave us not a spirit of fearfulness; but of power and love and discipline.” [2 Timothy 1:7]

2. Or really, how blessed are we?