Possession

Possessions are real. Richmond, Virginia is a place that’s proven and continues to prove possessions. My home is so possessed, we’ve built monuments to our possession, and should I speak to the right Richmonders for long enough, I’ll begin to understand that I’m not speaking to a vital individual, but a ghost. Perhaps many ghosts within one individual. Should I be strong enough to resist the terror of the realization that I’m truly speaking to The Dead, my conversation with that ghost will consist of phrases like “heritage” and “history” and “us” and “them” and “we” and “they.”

What I’m actually hearing is a hate so strong it’s become unconscious. What I’m actually hearing is a dead man’s broken ideologies gripping the throat of his great great grandchild and slapping their decaying tongue against smileless young teeth to spew 400 year old ideas that should’ve and very well could’ve died at the birth of this nation. 

Then again, maybe I’m biased. I’ve always loved ghost stories. 

However, more and more I’m beginning to think this type of possession is all too real and the idea that we may be inhabited by Hateful Others is also unfortunately, painfully, and presently real. 

It’s becoming abundantly clear in America where “things” are abundant. Our society’s dedication to “things” isn’t helping much with our inner struggles, so countless Americans have picked up cameras, microphones, and Bibles because the desire for Something More nourishing than More Stuff is so deeply embedded in us that people somehow feel compelled to render their thoughts beautifully so that others may hear them more easily. They’ve done a wonderful job. There are many many wonderful contemporary stories of rich humans impoverished by their own greed. You know them, I know them. We can tell them to ourselves whenever we want. 

So many have shared with Americans the simple fact that “Money isn’t Everything but It Is Necessary” and still some among us don’t seem to be listening. I believe it’s because we’ve ordered our government around money and financing and so have made money The Most Necessary Everything in America and the evidence is plain enough that the phrase “Money Isn’t Everything” rings a bit hollow on American lips. So how does that happen? How can words lose their meaning over time? And why is it that we find ourselves at a loss for words so often lately?

The spiritual event known as a possession is real because all words, every single word we have ever employed, is total, utter noise without the correct context and information. As a younger man, I spent a bit of time in Peru and was made painfully aware of how little I knew of how to move through the world, because I was unable to share the world with others using the Spanish language. Because my mind was so fully “possessed” by American English, it was especially difficult to intuitively rearrange my reality in Spanish. Anyone who has ever attempted to learn a new language can attest to the difficulty of rearranging their mind around new idiomatic structures and linguistic customs. Our native tongues are minor possessions that can be exorcised with the proper practice, but the native ideologies of our native tongues take much more practice to exorcise, and much different practice than simply learning new syntax and conjugations.

Suffice to say, I’ve been possessed in my lifetime and likely am still possessed. Not by any spirits or demons or any such image, but by evil ideas. Ideas so insidious they masquerade as understanding and knowledge when all they truly are are unpracticed thoughts shared with me too soon or too quickly by imperfect speakers attempting to be teachers because they lacked the strength and awareness to practice thinking more. Needless to say, their under-practiced, imprecise words and thoughts did a lot more harm before this effort began and I decided to attempt to heal myself by way of thinking longer on those thoughtless ideals I’ve inherited.

My life, then, in this lens, becomes a series of possessions leading to a “second birth” so to speak. Only, it was no spiritual event, only an alignment of the events, circumstances, and thoughts in my life that gave me the feeling of permission I need to make the following meaning:

I have been lied to by my teachers. My understanding of American History is incomplete, because what I believed was History or dare I say Scripture (a Holy text recording humanity’s struggles with and against his fellow man and God) was, in fact, a Commercial for White America.