This Is How To Find Beauty In The Face Of Discrimination

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“Sometimes I feel discriminated against, but it does not make me angry. It merely astonishes me. How can any deny themselves the pleasure of my company? It’s beyond me.”Zora Neale Hurston

Hurston understood her worth and her power despite the challenges of her times.

In the past, when I faced prejudice, I tried to “fix” whatever the other person thought was wrong with me. When I fixed one thing, then another thing “wrong” would arise. Then another. And another.

I rode on a hamster wheel of nothingness until I finally stopped and realized that I can’t fix how I was created. The universe loves everything about me, and I love everything about me too.

I thought about all the beautiful things they were losing by keeping me out of their company. They were losing:

my wit,

my charm, 

my history,

my lineage,

my soul-poetry,

my beauty.

Today, like Zora, I can laugh and truly say: “How can anyone deny themselves the pleasure of my company?”

This tendency to compensate for oneself in the face of discrimination is rooted in the very aim of prejudice: to foster self-hatred, to foster a sense of ‘I’m not as good (or smart or privileged or pretty or talented) as you,’ to foster exhaustion and soul depletion.

The truth of the matter is what Hurston says: Discrimination denies the other person the benefits and blessings of your uniqueness, your talents, your beauty, and your gifts. Discrimination causes the world to shrink and tighten, not expand and embrace. Despite this, the world is huge, and there’s a place for you in it.

There’s no need to grieve over what isn’t because there’s an entire world out there waiting for you. They are waiting for you to bless them with your soul’s blueprint.

As a unique, beautiful human, you possess all these good things. So it’s their loss, not yours. Onward.