“There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.”

What I am constantly thinking about are the ways in which I must tell these stories, especially since a certain kind of readership and relevance is important to me. 

It's been months since I last wrote on this blog. I created my blog spontaneously and it is this spontaneity that has sustained it ever since. Of all the 58 posts I have written on here, only few of them were actually ‘planned.’ There is a surge before any post is written. I am not one of those writers who sit down and draft and plan, it just never works for me. Some of the best ideas I have gotten, even outside the writing space, did not come from planning and scheduling. It is usually me mindlessly scrolling on the internet or watching something till I have an aha moment that sends me to google doc or my notepad or WhatsApp( yes I text myself like myself is another person) Sometimes it's a dream. I have dreamt a poem before. I woke up and wrote it and it was fire. Sometimes it's during my Bible study or prayer time, I may be inspired to write a poem about grief because I read about empty jars in the Bible. The mention of fine fabric in the Bible may inspire a short story about warmth. I am going somewhere. 

There is a creator I recently started following on Instagram, Keyede, and I really love her content. Her video on procrastination made me wrestle with my thoughts a little bit. She spoke about the sudden 3:am resolution we have to get our lives in order after wasting valuable time doing something unimportant and how it is not sustainable.  In her words,

“ If you are honest and self aware enough, you will admit that these spontaneous intervention schemes, they don't work”

Don’t they?

She also used words like habitual and repetitive, both words I cannot fully associate with my writing process. Is my writing habitual, is it repetitive? If I am to be a successful writer should it be?

I listened to Adele talk about songwriting in an interview with Apple Music and she said,

“Whenever I have a successful writing session or it's not really a session, it always comes at a really akward point in my day. I always try and pinpoint what it is exactly that has made that song end up being finished and me thinking it's good enough to be on a record to play to people, and I always try to work out what it is so I can sort of jar it and then use it whenever I wanna write a song but I never can.” 

She goes on to talk about how her ideas come spontaneously, often in the middle of the night. Now read Adele’s words again in the context of your writing experience, replace song with story and ‘on a record to play to people’ with ‘published in literary magazines for people to read.’  Stay with me. 

I started actively submitting my writing to lit mags & presses when my writer friend sent me a message on WhatsApp, during our writing workshop together. I had read one of my poems in the workshop and according to her the poem was so good she tried to find more of my writing online but there weren't that many pieces,  but then she found my blog and saw that I wrote a lot here. She wanted to know if I did it on purpose. If I was one of those writers who only preferred to publish their own pieces without caring about the visibility that submitting to literary magazines could bring. My answer was no. I just had not been fully indoctrinated into the world of submitting to magazines and saying "attached below are five shorts,” or  checking if my work has changed to ‘in progress’ on submittable or waiting as long as six months to get either a rejection or acceptance. We talked about it and I started actively submitting. Like crazy. Like everywhere. 

In that same interview Adele goes on to say that being an artist comes from deep within us and it is a necessity that we have to put it out. She feels as though art has become a transaction, a trade. On one hand,  I understand but on the other writers, artists and creatives must eat. Is it even possible to draw a line between passion and trade when you desire to make the passion a source of livelihood?

I confess that the reason I stopped posting on my blog as much is because I am fighting. I am debating a lot of things. When I get a writing idea, I am immediately thinking about which lit mag to submit it to, if it fits their aesthetic, if I would get an acceptance. I would observe something and want to spontaneously make a blog post about it and just remember that there is a submission guideline I read that somehow suggests my observation would be a good fit. I legit used to write full blown short stories on this blog before and it was amazing. I don’t think I can anymore. I am constantly thinking of places to submit them to, almost like I feel my stories are more credible if they are published elsewhere. The thing about being in this unhealthy headspace is that I am getting nothing done. The urgency and spontaneity that fueled  my writing has been slowed down by the desire to have a certain type of status as a writer, and this type of  desire can quickly become a bland burden because it is no longer about what I want to share out of love for my craft but what is best suitable for a world someone else has created. I  like to think my writing flows from God to me and that the flow will never stop, that I write from a place of abundance but I keep contradicting myself by rationing my writing at the expense of status and visibility. All I do these days is bookmark open calls  and watch as their deadlines come and go. I am not actively blogging or submitting to lit mags, so Adele might be onto something with all this talk about trade. 

Sometimes I wish I could jar the things that made up one great story and recycle it to make more and better stories that will grow wings and fly into the world by themselves so I don’t have to do the choosing and waiting. Leave me and my wishful thinking(insert tears)

If at this point you are waiting for me to arrive at one big teaching moment or to hear what I am doing to navigate this, I am doing nothing. Okay this is something; this spontaneous purgation of  emotion that has become this blog post is something. I am also trying to just write without thinking of a home for the work. I think it’s a big mistake writing to appease an audience. As much as writers want to be read, Writing for readership is a risky thing. Readership cannot be the only foundation for which your writing stands. It is not solid to write solely for readers who might see your work and decide to go a separate way. It is safer to write first for yourself. Let the fulfillment be innate; for you first. Like Toni Morrison so graciously put it, 

“If there's a book that you want to read, but it hasn't been written yet, then you must write it”  

As selfish as it sounds, let it be you first. Write whatever feels like purpose to you. Tell the stories you want to tell, stories that matter to you.

This is a note to self really. I hope to look back at this post a year from now and be proud that I had the courage to stop seeking validation and just create. And I hope this is your testimony too if you can relate to this. If you read up to this point, thank you. And as always this post was all over the place. But I hope you got the drift. Bye 

Chibok

A tribe of girls went

Missing while the government

Played monopoly with the terrorists that stole them

Some of them returned empty         some of them died burdened

Some are still in harm’s way           & others never returned

Uwa

I ask for mercy when I write poetry because here

God can turn to dust

How does a girl ask to be

Raped & mutilated, offered in front of a cross?

Tina

Any bus stop near home

Is shooting range

No one took the road in time

To tell her that standing is catfish

When the police is synonym for point and kill

Jennifer

When they say a girl is ripe

What they mean is  -                              is she old enough for us to devour?

Here, it is carnival for a child to be abused by multiple men

Girls

& for thousands of daily unfolding cases 

They ask victims for timestamps, locations & outfit styles

As though this inhumane invasion is some sort of feast

My thoughts:

Each language in my opinion gives a different kind of depth, it possesses its meaning & it has a distinct texture on the tongue. So it means so much to me that this poem I wrote about a very sad but significant event in my country Nigeria has taken meaning in another tongue, in another language - Sheng!

This means a lot to me and I hope more of my pieces get translated across the board!

Thank you, Felix!

Have you ever struggled with low self-esteem and at what point did you become very confident in your skin

I've never exactly struggled with low self-esteem for a long period. There have been times in my life however that I've let myself be down on confidence because of what people or family said to me concerning my weight. But ultimately I'm a very confident person so I eventually get back up or come up with ways to do so.

Have you ever been body shamed, how do you handle body shamers both online and offline? 

Lol, the answer to this is a big and resounding YES! All my life I've been body-shamed, from family members to relatives who feel the need to give their opinion even when not asked, down to classmates, friends and even partners in relationships.  Been fat automatically means you're a bit different from others and people will never learn how to accept different.

When handling body Shamers I always put them in their place, I've worked hard on my self-confidence and I don't need anyone to come tearing it down. I've recently been trying to put out more body-positive contents on social media and there's a little backlash especially on Twitter. A lot of times I ignore or block or respond very harshly to these body shamers, they listen to no other thing. Offline however I respond always. It is my life and body so I see no reason why anyone should have an opinion about it. 

Thank you for the compliment. I love colours and love to create looks. The truth is I love being an artist and I have an incredible passion for it. The art of transforming myself or a client is incredibly rewarding to me and I've always loved to see how far I could take it while still looking amazing. I get inspired a lot of times by just thinking of creating or putting ideas together in my head. Other times I'm inspired but amazing artists in my niche and field. 

Have you ever had people tell you that you are doing too much, that you should probably tone it down a bit, if yes, how did you handle such opinion?

I've never had such an opinion and if I ever do, you'll see me doing more instead of less. Can't ever let people bring me down and that's on period.

You are a fashion Icon in my opinion, so how long does it take you to style yourself and what do you have to say to people who think plus-sized women should only wear certain types of clothing or outfits 

I'm not a fashion Icon yet, but I like to think I'm on my way. Styling is pretty easy for me once I've paired up the outfits in my head, I always do the pairing before testing. 

To people who think plus-sized women should only wear certain outfits. I think that's rubbish and to my beautiful plus sized gals please wear what you wanna wear, if it's cropped top wear it hunnay! If it is a body con dress wear it and own your curves, own your FUPA, own those rolls baby and love yourself.

On your Instagram page, you combine patterns and prints and it's very artistic, what does being an African woman mean to you?

Being an African woman is so exhilarating to me. Wearing Patterns and prints brings out the best in me and reminds me that my skin is gold and my ancestry is full of African kings and Queens. I'm so proud to be African and Nigerian at that. And being proud of my culture leads to me imbibe every aspect of my life with culture. 

While I do feel pressured to always put out content, the pressure comes from within myself as I love to push myself to be consistent in anything I do. I feel I have created my aesthetic through my style and creativity and I'm super proud of that. And no, I never feel pressured to fit into a certain aesthetic because I have tried all my possible best to create my aesthetic and make it a lifestyle. So it's not that hard to do especially when you get  used it 

I think perfection is overrated. Nobody is perfect. Even on Instagram. And the idea of it is harmful. To an extent even I have experienced the bad side of thinking you can be perfect on Instagram. Through pressuring myself to try and be like other people or wear what they wear or do what they do. It didn't help me in any way and I had to learn to curb that need to be perfect or create perfect content like some influencer we see.  

Have influencers, celebrities or Instagram models ever caused you to think about your body image and was it negatively or positively?

Like I said it's very easy to be affected and think negatively about yourself especially when everyone around you seems to be close to perfect. However, I learnt to not compare myself to people I see on the gram. And to love me a little more every time I feel pressured to be like someone else. 

I find your younger brother very cool and handsome. Do you style him too and how important is it to educate children on body image and self-confidence.

Thank you so much. Yes, I style most of his outfits, he manages to pull them off with his insane charisma and model poses. 

I wish someone has taken the time to educate me on body confidence when I was little. Knowing that there's nothing wrong with our bodies and with how we looked at that age would have been freeing. I think it's very important to educate children so that they'd know early on how important it is to love their bodies and selves. 

Overall how has your creative journey been and is it slightly more difficult for plus-sized women in the creative industry?

Overall, my creative journey has been insane. At least that's the one thing I can fully say I achieved last year. It's been amazing and even looking through my Instagram page you can clearly see growth. 

I believe it is a bit difficult for plus-sized women. Sometimes getting people's attention is hard, and even more painful is when a normal-sized person does the same thing or less of what you did, people flock the content. That is really discouraging.

Any advice for women, especially young girls who are ashamed of the way they look and find it hard to accept themselves because of society? 

Girlllll. The one thing I have learnt this year is to fuck society's expectations of what we should be or look like. Make sure your own opinion comes first. Make sure you are your top priority and not what people think of you. Self-love is hard but it's the most rewarding thing ever. Never be ashamed of how you look especially if its something as normal as saggy boobs or stretch marks or even back rolls. Those are incredibly normal and you should never feel bad about having them on your body. 

What do you do for fun, give us three random facts about you?

I love to read Manga, Romance, fiction, play music, dance and have fun family time. 

Random facts about me; I hate honey, I'm insanely curious and I cry for every movie. Doesn't matter the genre I will cry. Even if the ending is happy or sad or scary!

Thank you for doing this!