“It’s in a black person’s soul to rock that gold, spend your whole life tryin’ to get that ice.”
This probably goes without saying, but here goes: there is something different about being Black in America.
I can certainly rattle off many of the ways, quote the statistics about achievement gaps, the disparities in sentencing within the justice system, or provide numbers about the buying power of Black women (particularly in the beauty industry).
I can link articles about the manifestations of the practice of redlining, or about how Black farmers lost so much land.
I can write about the quote above, or about the psychology of luxury.
I can write about product junkie-ism or about collection as sport.
But, I’ve named this site Afro Minimalist because I often find that navigating the space between “Black” and “Minimalist” requires a particular brand of patience and reprogramming, in ways that are unique to Black experiences.
This doesn’t mean that this blog isn’t a resource for everyone. At it’s core, this blog is about stepping off of the hamster wheel, unplugging from our distractions, and eliminating the things in life that drain our time. Minimalism can be truly transformative for anyone, all we have to do is buy in.
The Afro dimension is a way of signaling that my journey to minimalism is grounded in my own lens, a perspective that isn’t widely represented in the minimalist community. There are a lot of levels to it, and if you’re open to learning about it, I’m certainly open to sharing.
