- S U T R A -

writer | medic | musician | thinker. I blog about faith, culture & art in its multiple forms. Here, you could find yourself. Here, you might find me. Here, we will be broken.

[youngthatiam]

Where To Find Me These Days (If You’re Still Looking):

Hi. If you’re new here, welcome. And if you’ve been following me for what feels like a very long while (!), thank you. My name (among many others that you do not yet know) was Sutra. Now, it is Sanaa. If you’d like to follow my new newsletter, come join the party over here. You can also find me at my website, or listen to what has come and what is coming on soundcloud.

[youngthatiam]

you wouldn't believe it if I told you how much has changed and how much remains the same. new experiments coming to Soundcloud. if you want to listen, here's the first one. follow for more xx

[youngthatiam]

Announcement

Tumblr fam,

A couple of years ago, I opened my heart on here and found a community that I grew with. I found myself and my passions, was encouraged, all through here. Although I am no longer blogging here, I am making a huge announcement tonight and wanted you guys to know it too.

I’m releasing new work, including my first book.

-----

I learnt early on, that words hold weight and stories have power. For the past 3 years since the release of my first music mixtape, I have grown + learnt about myself and my community.

My next release is a body of work named Marrow; it will be released as a sequence of work centred on my own + others journeys of healing + being made alive again.

Its limbs are:

- a book of poetry + prose (release: 5th July)

- my first music EP (release: 7th July)

- a second short film (to be announced)

My inspiration for naming this work comes from my understanding of the word 'marrow': The essential part. The bare beginning of everything.

Our bone marrow is where our blood cells - which sustain our life - are generated. Without blood, we are not alive.

It translates to the idea of soul work, nourishment + deeper fulfilment. To womanhood + the feminine experience + our capacity to sustain, nourish, empower, give life, destroy + heal.

I hope this work finds you, exactly as and where you are. More info now on my new site:  https://iamsutra.com

Thank you guys for your support xxx

[youngthatiam]

I mentioned a while ago that this blog was closing, and then I reblogged a few stuff after that. This time, I’m really leaving. And I just want to thank you all for the community, encouragement, perspectives and love you showed towards this space and towards me for all this time. This is the final post. I’m on instagram , Twitter , Soundcloud and - at least for now - this other Tumblr.

Email me anytime: [email protected]

All my love,

-S.

[iamsutra]

5 Ways to Begin to Save Your Life:

(an expanding list)

Speak. Especially when you feel that you are sinking. You know these moments, those secrets, the feeling of falling slowly into silence when all your mouth wants to give out into the world is a scream for help. This is the time for a sound. You do not even need to trust yourself, open your mouth for Heaven’s sake. Your spirit knows to say this: I need help.

Accept. Try hard not to push truths away from you. Truths know how to grow, whether you make the room for them or not. Did a thing happen? Accept it. And now, the trying question: Can you change it? Perhaps not, but did you not survive? Did you not see, and hear, and taste each day of freedom, finding that you do not need to live chained? Acceptance is not for God, it is for you.

Find. What gives you joy? Can you incorporate these things into your life more? Nothing is too small. Can I tell you a truth? When you are low, the things you are most resistant towards, the things you keep postponing and making excuses not to do: are some of the things you need most. Putting off playing your instrument? Writing? Starting a project? You need it. Do it. You are capable.

Remember. Life can change, in marvellous ways. What do you have today that you can be thankful for? Family? Friends? Who are the people who you know pray for you? Not everyone has them, and they won’t last forever. Thank God. Thank God, that love is a rising force.

Decide. You have so much power, far more than you realise. Mountains can move, seas can roar, but at the end of it the choice is still yours to decide. Do you want to move forward? Do you want to save your life? Learn to speak your decisions to yourself, even the small ones. The decision to get out of bed. The decision to complain less. The decision to write today. The decision to pray. The decision to forgive yourself.

Here are 5 ways to begin to save your life.

[iamsutra]

My music film #W (co-directed with the baddest @davidedem_ ) was screened in Tokyo this past month. Which is madddddd in itself but here’s another fun announcement: MY MUSIC IS NOW AVAILABLE ON ALL MAJOR MUSIC PLATFORMS!!!!!! Spotify, Apple Music, Tidal and more. You people asked, it got done. Thank you for all the love and support. It moves mountains. I will always be grateful xxx

[iamsutra]

The soft silence:

It’s the early hours of a Sunday morning and the world outside is still at rest. Inside of me, my heart is alive. My mind is settled. Quite suddenly, it hits me: I am content at this moment. I am content today. There is so much I have in my hands, to be thankful for. And it moves me, this realisation. _

Recently, a friend pointed out to me that I have begun to complain a lot. I laughed at the time, but then I recognised there lay a truth: yes, i have begun to complain a lot. What did complaining give me? A safety netting in case of disappointment. By giving more power than was necessary to the imperfections of a thing or a situation, I was rejecting the possibility of a thing being able to thrive in spite of. Because then, there is no need for hope. Hope is hard, anyway.

_

I know the roots of this in my own life. But until that moment I hadn’t realised what I was doing or why. Hope is not only hard, it can be draining, it can feel like madness, it can be the ground giving way beneath your feet. But what’s interesting, is how quickly we turn our backs to it. I heard a wise saying the other night; it was this: “it’s okay to be happy” and it silenced me. Where had the lie come from, that the opposite was the only way for me, the way to live that I deserved? Why do we punish ourselves as though hope doesn’t stand in the doorway to fight with and for us? _

There is so much to thank God for. Right now, I’m thankful for my family, for real friends, for stability, for hope. Hope as a thing that can stand when the water is too shallow, or that will swim when the darkness is deep. Hope as a companion and lifter of chains. _

Do you complain a lot? Do you know why? Could you do it much less? Yes. Yes. Yes. These all are answers, but the loudest question of them all: _

Would you allow yourself happiness if it were placed right in front of your eyes? _

Could you dare to hope?

May you live again.

Amen.

[iamsutra]

#JulyJoy: Day 10: An Anniversary.

A year ago today, I graduated from medical school. Words can’t describe the vast spectrum of emotions I felt on that day and the days after it. Partly because there were a lot of contradicting feelings and thoughts running through my mind at the time. Medical school had started off as my most exciting adventure yet – at the time, I was 18 and full of energy and the cliché (but appropriate to insert here) zest for life. I’d worked incredibly hard to make it in, for several years right from the decision to become a doctor at age 10. I remember vividly the first day of an anatomy session, when 100 or so of us were ushered into a big warehouse-like room, put in groups of roughly 8, and allocated to a body for the year. This was how we were going to learn about the human body, by opening up the body of one who was dead – and had offered their body while alive, for furthering science and medical education. I remember, that at 18 many of us had never seen a dead body before. About 10 students dropped out soon after that. The year ground on, all the while the faces of the bodies were kept covered so we could be detached as we cut, and learnt, and were made to crowd round and have vivas. Until one day I asked that the sheet be removed from our group’s cadaver’s face. I would like to say that I remember it, but I have seen dead bodies since and cannot. But I remember that my heart felt something, and that it was the first of many times I would have a curiosity and blunt awareness of death and the limits of a physical body. I gave the cadaver a name, I will not share it here. My colleagues were puzzled by this, but agreed. In my mind, this was our way of thanking, of paying respect to a body: giving it a name.

-

In the spring of my first year, I began to search for God. By the summer of my first year, I had ended my first relationship and had my first experience of the ground slipping from under your feet. In the midst of the fall, I learnt by experience that God is a strong, patient, catcher of the falling (and the fallen). Slowly, my heart began to heal. I lost friends because of my faith, and found new ones. I started a blog, and God became my closest friend.

-

In my third year, I began to teach myself guitar and threw myself into my creative passions. I wrote poems, plays, songs, pieces. I got baptised in a church I tried really hard to be a part of but never fit in. I performed and saw performances. It was the most nerve wrecking phase of my life, but it came with a realisation of how strong I am, and who I am. On reflection, these things were a coping mechanism: Medical school had begun to feel like a chore. I began to doubt myself.

-

In my fourth year, there were more setbacks, from day one all through the year. I hated medical school. Hated lectures, felt out of place, couldn’t remember why I was doing it, hated the environment I was in, felt weary, felt disillusioned and I was struggling with my faith. I worked as hard as I could through the year and made the most of a pretty disorganised situation but missed the mark: I failed the year by 1 mark, literally. Lately, there are comparatively few memories I have as clear as day, but I remember that late afternoon on results day. I had been practicing my suture technique in the hospital to settle my anxiety about the results but felt sure it sure it had gone well enough. I had begun to feel settled in my environment and had a great group of friends – med school seemed to be picking up again. I went to my room and gave myself a pep talk, logged on to see my result and when I realised what had happened I eventually stood up, locked my door, and lay on my bed staring at the ceiling. I remember the room so well. It must have been 15 min of silence before I gathered the courage to ring my parents and call my sister to cry. But in 15 minutes I gave up many things: the loudest loss was my faith.

A few weeks later I was preparing to sit retakes. Some days before the exam, my phone rings one morning. My mother is screaming. “He’s dead! He’s dead!”

My uncle had been murdered in a robbery that morning.

I failed the papers and had to redo the entire year.

-

Fourth year (fifth*) was a year I battled with anxiety and depression. It was also the year that I became humble. I could no longer rely on myself, I had to lean heavily on my family, best friends, and a God I didn’t want to believe in any longer. It’s quite hard to say that a thing doesn’t exist when you find yourself in a place where it is the only thing you can hold on to to stay afloat. It was the weakest I had ever been, but one of the times God was loudest. Medicine is a rewarding profession, but the training required to transform you from the average human being to a servant in service, is unforgiving. Mentally, it takes huge tolls on you. The things you see, the things patients confide in you, the risks you place yourself at on a daily basis. The constant feeling of inadequacy, and the financial and physical strains from not having the time or even the energy to take care of yourself. To this day, I don’t know how I got through that year mentally, physically and emotionally. But I will never forget that I survived the strains of that year. I survived. I can not deny God.

-

In my final year, a year later than I would have graduated, I was still depressed. And then I went on a 2 month trip in Southern Africa and it changed a lot of things for me. I learnt that joy is a thing, that life can be more than surviving. And that it can be simple.

-

On 15th July I crossed the stage and went from “Miss” to “Dr” in the space of 2 seconds. It was crazy, I couldn’t believe I’d made it. And by the end of the day I was still in shock. I needed to be rid of a city and a place that reminded me of so much pain. That night I joined my year group in drinking the night away at our Ball. It was the most drunk I have ever been (and will ever be). Good riddance, good riddance, good riddance.

-

A year later, I’m reflecting on my first year and I think I need an entire week to process how different it has been to what I thought it would be. In the first week or so, I texted my friend telling her that it felt as though I was doing what I was meant to. I’ve had good days and awful ones, met incredible people, moved to a new city, started to dance and breathe again. I’ve been tested almost daily as I deal with new challenges and different patients. I’ve learnt so much about people and about myself. And I’ve found some peace, some routine at a point when I’d been shaken up by so much. I’m still not sure about a lot re my future and direction but thank God today for the power of an anniversary. A reminder that I made it. I remember that there is more to come. Looking back now, I think I hated medical school the most because it aged me. I become an adult in that place, in ways I hadn’t bargained for. In raging towards the adulthood I had designed for myself, I didn’t think to leave room for the responsibilities it would bring. The mental heaviness, the second guessing, the difficulties of womanhood, the constant peaks and troughs of identity and self-belief, the threat of madness. But here I am. Today I make my peace with all that is bitter in me about my experience there. I let it go, I let it all go. Happy anniversary to the first loudest victory of my life. There have been more since.

Will you shout “victory!” with me?

You too will win.

[iamsutra]

Day 4/25: words from Dad as I sink 3 feet into a shadow:

The Bible is bigger than the church.

God loves you so much.

Can you hear me?

I said, God loves you so much.

Don’t rely on anyone but God.

Are you listening?

I am going to help you.

You are going to have a testimony.

Don’t ever stop praying.

I love you so much.

Today, as I stood in a public place, I had a very clear memory come back to me. The day after my heart almost stopped on a flight, I had surpassed even my own expectations, and landed safely in Accra, Ghana. I still had a needle in my arm from when a doctor on the flight had dramatically put it in mid-air so a drip could be connected. I don’t remember the events of that flight very often, but lately i’ve been paying more attention. I remember my blood sliding down my arm. I remember watching everyone and every thing as I lay across three seats, completely detached. I remember the arms of the doctor as he raised the bag of saline high above his head and squeezed as hard as he could, forcing it down into my vein until the bag was empty. But more than this, I remember the moment when — the day after — my father rushed to the airport and saw me. I remember his face. It was an expression I hadn’t seen before, one of multiple things all at once. It was pain, desperation, worry, relief. But how resounding, the relief! It was so loud. I saw in his eyes something that I imagined one must feel when they very nearly lost a thing they loved in a nightmare and have awoken to find that it was not the truth. This was the memory I had today, and I started to cry. For context, let me tell you where I was standing at that moment: I was in a church and I had some bitterness in my heart, for reasons mostly linked to that church (surprise, surprise) but quite suddenly I had this memory and I imagined that God must have such a face, yearning and seeking and relieved for each of us when our eyes have met His. And it was so beautiful and freeing an image that I couldn’t help but cry.

It’s Day 4 of #JulyJoy and today I learnt that God is love, and God is a Father, and God is bigger than the church, bigger than bitterness and rejection and whatever else. There’s a story I remember from the Bible about the prodigal son, and as I type this I can’t shake the image of God running like a desperate father towards His child, seeking them, overwhelmingly relieved that they have turned toward home, no matter the journey and no matter how long it took. So ready to love them. So ready to hold them.

God can run.

I shout amen as I rise out of the shadow.

[youngthatiam]

Ayeeee listen I'm making playlists on Spotify all month long as part of #JulyJoy - there are 10-15 tracks per list by some of your faves and some incredible musicians you've probably never heard of! You can follow for a list every 2 days - the next one will be an Afro house one 💫 List 001 and 002 already out - link to the former in my bio. ✨ (at London, United Kingdom)

[iamsutra]

#JulyJoy: Day 1/25

It’s day one and i’m not looking forward to work tomorrow. But! I’m determined to fight for joy this month and I promised I’d persevere with this, so: Welcome to day one. My name is S and i’m challenging myself on what joy is and how I can get it, for the rest of this month. 

Here are ways that you can get stuck in too:

Consider having a plan.

Take a minute to pause now and think, what are four separate things you could focus on in your life that would help you be more positive or which would help you to understand yourself better? #JulyJoy is running for 4 weeks, from today until the 31st July. If you’re interested, here’s my four — one focus for each week. You can come up with your own too!:

week one: the sources of joy — a week of paying attention to what makes me happy, and how I can make those things a part of my daily life/more frequent. You can read my thoughts on this at the end of this week.

week two: the questioning of joy — a week of challenging yourself to think about why you have an affinity for certain things and how that ties in with your identity. If you can appreciate this, you can begin to broaden your perspective and open up to more options. For example, I have an affinity for music. The reasons for this are multiple but one is that it makes me feel alive. So then the question is, what else makes me feel alive? Dancing. Now I have opened myself up to exploring other options.

week three: practical joy — a week to consider practical ways of immersing yourself in the spaces that give you joy. And more importantly, it’s a week to give joy back. Whether by being generous, lending a hand to someone, or cooking a person a meal.

week four: the God of joy — a week to question who God is and what He says about joy. Is it even possible? Is joy not a thing that you affiliate God with? If so, why?

2. Have a Gratitude List.

(Because who doesn’t love a good list?)

As you live through this month, try to stick to putting down random things that happen/that you realise and are grateful for. For example, I’m grateful today that work didn’t suck. You know the feeling? Yeah.

3. Create (a) playlist(s) of music that lifts your spirit.

I’m actually going to aim to put up a short playlist every couple of days/every week for you to enjoy. There is so much great music out there to discover! And i’d love to share it with you guys. There’s a playlist already up — see iamsutra.tumblr.com and go to the post that’s about to follow this one. #telepathy

4. Set yourself a daily challenge.

This doesn’t even have to move mountains. For some of us, a daily challenge is getting out of bed. Set that as your daily challenge for a couple of days and you better celebrate the small victories. Believe me, they will always count. Examples of daily challenges: eating breakfast every morning, sleeping before midnight, not losing my temper, asking for help when i need it, driving at the speed limit, exercising patience.

5. Active grace.

Actively make the effort to be gracious to yourself. What does this look like? This means being honest when you’re struggling and allowing yourself that. Just because one is struggling, doesn’t mean that they have lost. Be kind to yourself.

Happy July!

[iamsutra]

At this moment joy for me is listening to Jaime Woods music on Youtube and remembering the sunlight on the day I took this photo.

[iamsutra]

On Joy:

I don’t think that a person can ever know how powerful a thing is until they have lost it. For me, one of those things has been joy. When I think of what it means, what joy means, the answers never ever fall in straight lines. They are yellow, always yellow, sometimes lightening, sometimes thick, molten gold. Being carried through depression, I’ve realised that joy is precious. But also that it is more often a gift than a choice, it can be a lifestyle, constant sacrifice, endless freedom. Sometimes it sits besides me when I am alone in my room. Other times it is sudden sunlight through my window. I have seen it in the love of other people towards each other. I have seen it in the hands of people doing what they were born to do.

Joy intrigues me. It seems pretty elusive when you’re going through a dark place. But this post isn’t about that so much. I guess you could call this the start of a month long investigation into joy. It’s starting off as a personal querying of my own self but I feel like this will extend to others. And to you.

Two years ago one of my best friends and I started a monthly journal challenge. It started with something we labelled #FreeinFeb in Febuary 2015 and we challenged people everywhere to come to terms with some of the bigger questions and lies we ask/hear ourselves. It was great but life hit us both pretty hard soon after and the movement fell away. I’m not so sure that this will be a journal challenge (actually — I highly doubt it) but i’m calling it #JulyJoy. I’m going to write posts on here every day about my thoughts on joy and personal challenges i’m setting myself on a weekly basis to be more content, and more joyful. Because, what even is joy?

If you’d like to read my thoughts, just check this blog often! I’ll be sharing music, inspiration, posts, book recommendations, photography — you name it. Just things that are inspiring me right now/giving me life. If you have a blog or social media how about you do this for yourself too? And if you read some of the weekly goals I set for myself and feel you’d like to try it for yourself, go ahead! I’d love to hear from you if you do, or even if you’d just like to share some thoughts :) Also — you can suggest stuff to me, please please do. “Ask” on the blog (can be anon) or send me an email ([email protected]).

Let’s see what July holds. Check the hashtag (and use it for your own posts) on all social media daily: #JulyJoy

x

[iamsutra]

velvet

I think that there are ways to be reminded of oneself. Ways that envelope, others that expose you towards a light. And when I cannot write, it is then that I know that I am grieving or that I am afraid, or that I am losing. Because the trouble isn’t always that one cannot recollect — or regather — their self; it is that the battle doesn’t always have a name.

My friend tells me that she cannot find God. I ask her where she thinks she has misplaced Him, because then maybe we can know where to start to look together. The question makes her laugh, and then she is very quiet. I watch a deep shadow cover her face. I don’t know, she gives up. Where do you keep your God safe?

And so I tell her that God is God. That it is I who is the fleeing one. But that if there were a place I had seen Him last, it would be in the velvet of the night sky, His smile as bright as the moon. If it were a place I had heard Him last, it was when I heard His songs as calming as a river, felt His hands as warm as the sun, believed His words as a soft promise. The sort of promises that know how to comfort the chest.

It is midnight.

This is the joy of the beginning.

I tell my friend that I cannot find God. She asks me where I think I have misplaced Him, because then maybe we can know where to start to look together. I tell her I don’t know but I am in a war with my self and all the versions of loss have found me. I shake my hand at God, I say terrible things I do not mean, You don’t care! You don’t care! And look we are dying. The songs are no longer calming, they are haunting me. The night sky is too smooth, velvet is no place for madness. The hands are too hot, I want to stay cold, I am done with soft promises let me stand firmly on my rage.

It is 6am.

This is the rage of a middle.

God cannot find me, my friend tells me. She says He has misplaced her. That if He were watching hard enough, long enough, He would have seen where she was headed and warned her soon enough. What did God expect me to turn into after this? I wrap my arms around her and try to never let her go. Holding her, trying to love her so she doesn’t escape. But we are both suffocating. 

I gasp.

She is gone.

It is 12pm.

This is the confusion of a break.

God cannot find me, I tell my self. I say He has misplaced me. That if He were watching hard enough, long enough, He would have seen where I was headed and warned me soon enough. My legs seem useless. The twenties are a disillusioned place and I cannot run free of this feeling. Working, sleeping, working, paying, working, mistakes, trauma, working, trauma, forget, trauma am I a zombie?

I’m doing what I’m meant to be doing.

Right?

It is 6pm.

This is the exhaustion of a workplace.

Lately, my eyes are open.

My hands have started to shake less.

My body aches in new places.

My muscles are strong.

I shake my head because: I do not know how I got to this place without walking a great distance under fire. But I remember some of the things that carried me through the journey. I remember the velvet of the night sky when the terrain was sharp, the bright night moon when the way was dark, the calming river in the torment, the warm sun after a shadow, and the softness of a voice that has always called me by name.

It is midnight.

This is the joy of the beginning.

The start, of a journey through ways that will envelope, others that will expose you towards a light. Until you recollect, until you remember. To:

Name

your

self.

[iamsutra]

15 lies that terrify the body:

1. It isn’t worth it.

2. You are finished.

3. Nobody is listening/watching/caring.

4. That could have been you. But it’s not. Because, you’re you.

5. You’re a mess.

6. Did you think that you would win?

7. What a waste. Such a shame that you will never amount to anything.

8. “Can’t you be more like..”

9. Don’t bother, today. Don’t you know yourself by now?

10. You’re going to end up just like your father.

11. You’re going to end up just like your mother.

12. Stop fighting.

13. It’s too late for you.

14. You’re alone.

15. Be quiet. There is nothing of value that you could say.

I’m writing this post because at one point or another, I’ve heard every single one of these lies (externally and internally) and believed them. Nurtured them. Befriended them. And clung to them. But lately some pretty important questions are being brought to remembrance. I have been asking more, this is a voice but is it the truth?

Is it true that it is too late? True that there is no point fighting? True that I am alone? The answer is no. And it’s the same for you. I think you’re reading this especially because it is meant for you, too. Our stories are our voice. Our voices are important.

I have so much to share with the world, and so do you. You don’t need to know or understand everything, but there is a reason you are still here. There is a reason you are where you are, facing the things you face on a daily basis. There is a reason that seasons change.

Sometimes a question brings necessary silence. I have heard this question amid the noise, rising quietly at first, trying to get my attention, trying to turn my head away from the negativity. Glowing, growing, until I can see it in the corner of my eye. Until the 15 lies are static and time has stood still. I turn to the question and hold my breath.

Do you know who you are?

[youngthatiam]

3/3 Final piece of the set: "Sutra" Glorious art work by the formidable Isaac Opoku (@afroscope ). So honoured 💛

[youngthatiam]

When do we get another mixtape/album/EP from you luv?

Hol’ tight hol’ tight g