Confusion In New York: Week One

My Confusion In New York: Week One

This marks week one down as a New Yorker.

I am clearly not one. Yet. Or maybe ever. I’m still on the fence about this whole big move thing. I mean, you never really know if you are actually going to like something until you dive in and then figure out that you absolutely hate it or love that shit. Or eh about it.   

Although I don’t necessarily miss Detroit, I don’t want to actually be here as of now. New York is an unfamiliar place. It’s busy and loud and busy and lots of funny smells. By funny smells, I mean shit. It sometimes smells like shit.

When I used to day dream about the big city, I always used to think of it like in the movies. It was very fancy and very Caucasian. Love stories and opportunities and things just seemed quite easy.

That it not the case. It is not as easy as the movies would make it seem. Everything is close but so spaced apart. Most of my friends live in other boroughs that are about 45-minute subway rides away. Although me and my weak knees are semi-capable of trudging down hundreds of cement steps to push through crowds of bodies on the platform, it seems like so much to do just for an hour and a half of social interaction.

I am used to the ease of hopping in my car and driving 15 minutes to unexpectedly drop into my friends’ house and have snacks and talk shit about people we don’t like.

Here is not the same. They have no idea of the people that I don’t like. They don’t know shit about me at all.  

Which is a bit isolating. I just want to put my old friends in my fuckin pocket and bring them here. But, they have lives and kids, I guess. And, there’s not much room in my pocket to thrive.  

Another thing is that everyone is busy all the time here. That’s what I came for though, so why hadn’t I expected everyone to carry that same dose of grind? Detroit has a very laid-back type atmosphere that I have grown used to. New York does not. It’s a city on steroids. Everyone is on go-go-go mode.

People keep saying that I will get used to it, but will I?

On top of that, I am being semi-kicked out of my new-ish apartment after only being moved in for three whole ass days. I know that one day I will look back on this major inconvenience and laugh about it. As of now, this is no laughing matter. I am pissed. The time that I could be spending looking for jobs to pay rent, I know have to find another place plus find gigs to pay rent.

I am already tired of thinking about it.

And!!! I don’t have the credit score or income to qualify for most rooms. So, there’s that. Welcome to NEW YORK! The land of shady landlords that kick folks out after only a few days of residence.

The last thing that I will complain about and update you on would be that I do not belong. And not in that sense, I do belong in some way or another, but I don’t have a core group of folks that got my back or can shoot my photos or help me do random shit late at night.

I am starting from scratch. Just that sentence made me doze off. I have to start over again building my core people. It took me damn near years to do that in Detroit and now at 31 years old, I gotta do it again. Clearly, I like abuse because NYC is gnawing at my leg right now.  

Baby steps, girl, is what I keep telling myself. Because if I don’t, then I will pack a truck with all my shit and dart right back to Detroit. Where it is bland but at least I know people!

Xoxo,

Leah V

Fear: Taking Leaps and Bounds

Believe it or not, I am very scary. A scared person. I am afraid of spiders—well, any bug really. I am afraid of failure as well as success. I am scared of myself. The person who I may become and perhaps not like in the near future. My scariness stems from several aspects of my life. One is my obsession with control. I am the kind of person who has to try and control everything and anything. I feel naked without some kind of control. An unwanted and uncomfortable vulnerability arises from letting things flow. I don’t want things to flow; I want things to go the right way, how I want them to go. On top of that, I am overly over-analytical. The type of person that if something doesn’t go as planned, I have an internal freak out. The world will end. I will die. Like seriously, dead.

Over the years, I’ve learned how to have internal freak outs, instead of outward ones. People don’t know how to deal with the outward ones. Then they start thinking I’m crazy. Which isn’t too far from the truth anyway…

So, how does someone like me do what I do? To get where I am, where I am standing, one couldn’t possibly be so rigid, so afraid, so rule-abiding. They’d have to be fearless, able to flow like water, able to keep calm, strategize in healthy ways.

Let me tell you a story of how someone like me took a leap, a bound and dived into the unknown.

I was married. Content as a Muslim wife. Or so I made myself believe. I was in hella student loan debt and working a job that I hated making a sort of good wage. I’d stopped writing stories for years. I was angry most of the time, floating around. Wondering was this what life was like for a girl in her mid-20’s.

I didn’t know what the hell I wanted. And, life wouldn’t give me a chance, a break to explore the possibilities. What more was out there. I had to be this way for work, that way for my husband, and this way for the community. And that was it. That was my existence. Being everything for everyone else and nothing for myself.

I wasn’t allowed. I hadn’t allowed myself that luxury. If I stayed in line, then it’d just all work out. Doesn’t it always work out in the end?  

I started getting heavy back into writing: ordering all the books on editing and story-telling and even using my own money to take creative writing and literature classes. I made a promise that whether or not I get paid to write stories, I would never abandon them again. I was obsessed with stories. I wrote damn near every day. I wrote when I woke up and I wrote at work and I wrote when I got off at night. I wrote and studied and wrote some more.

My work, although getting better, wasn’t going anywhere. No one was reading it. The point of a writer is to have a reader, an audience.

One of my lit teacher’s had his MFA in creative writing from some college in Vermont. He taught and wrote. I could do that, I thought. I was about 30k in debt from my undergraduate degree and because of that, I planned on working a dead-end job, pay off my debt then pursue a graduate degree in creative writing.

Two years passed. I was still in debt and no where near putting a dent into my student loans.

What have you got to lose, but more money to Sallie Mae? You aren’t getting any younger. Your work isn’t being read. The worst that can happen is that this creative writing program is bullshit and you waste 40k…Or you can pursue this and something great happens. But, you’ll never know until you try. Writing is your passion. Fuckin do it.

So, I applied. One rejection from a university in Michigan.

My feelings were hurt. I was defeated.

Try again. Try another school out of state. How will I get there? You’ll figure it out.   

I submitted an app to two universities and was accepted to one in Pennsylvania. I was ecstatic. But, also so very afraid. I hadn’t known anything about Pennsylvania. Other than a lot of white people lived there.

When I told my husband, he wasn’t happy for me but instead bothered. “I don’t think a Muslim woman should be going that far away from home.”

“I have to do this.” I reassured him. “I’ve gotta try.”

The semester started in one month. Due to my job, I wasn’t able to attend.

Will I ever get a chance to go pursue my dream? I thought.

I’m going next semester. I don’t care if I have to quit that job. I figured out how to finesse the rules and was able to get a chunk of time off work to attend the winter semester.  

The night before I was supposed to fly out, I started freaking out. I had no idea what I was getting into. I didn’t know the faculty or the students or the campus. I was a girl from Detroit. I called my sister and told her that I’d made a huge mistake and that I wasn’t going. She said, “You are getting on that plane. You are going to that program.”

I remember walking into class the first day, stomach grumbling with fear. My flight had been delayed and I was the last one to arrive. I arrived to a class full of white faces staring back at me. I gulped. What had I done? I just signed my death wish. They’d hate me. I’d hate them. They wouldn’t get me. They wouldn’t understand my multicultural weird ass writing or stories.

Those nine days surrounded by the most Caucasian writers and artists who were nothing like me was one of the most transformative experiences that I’d ever had in my life. I’d never been around white people like that before. I’d never been around anyone who was so different from me before. That experience of understanding that we aren’t meant to be around the same people all the time, that there is so much more than the little bubble I grew up in, confined myself to. There was a whole ass world out there.

On our last day, I was so overwhelmed by it all, the connections that I made, the courage that I mustered to even go, and how deeply I loved and was passionate for the art of stories, that I cried. I cried hard.

One cannot truly live without leaping into the unknown. Letting go and flying without knowing if you’ll be able to figure out how your wings work. Or if they will work when you need them to.

Do what scares you the most. This is such a simple concept, but its by far the scariest. No one wants to wander into the dark without a flashlight, but you have to have faith, hope that along the way you will find batteries and a flashlight and then a compass then a map and maybe a guide that will lead you to a place where no one has dared gone.

xoxo,

Leah V   

The Unconventional: Thriving As A Covered Model

Sometimes I think it’d be easier to show my ass. I mean my entire meaty ass that’s filled with fat craters and stretch marks. Like the whole thing sitting up on a sink like I see the other gals doing. You know those multiple photos on a girl’s Instagram page as she takes a half body selfie in the mirror with her ass cheeks out. Do you know how much I’d save on wardrobe??? How much time I’d save locating photographers and setting up shoots? To live the life of an IG model who posts semi-nudes and has followers stacked on followers and doesn’t have to worry about engagement because, hello! Sex sells. Bare skin sells. And, oh, I forgot to add, this only works for certain body types. Not all bodies get to show and be empowered by semi-nudity. Only the right kind of bodies get that right. The right kind of thin. And the right kind of thicc or curvy.

I was scrolling down my timeline yesterday and saw a post that read: nudity empowers some and modesty empowers others. Which I totally agree with and this is not a “bash people who are empowered by showing their bodies on the internet” post so if you know me or have read my work or follow the folks that I support and even try to place that in this equation, you can go royally fuck yourself.

What I am shedding light on is the fact that many of us feel that we should show more body (for the wrong reasons) just to stay relevant or get validation or receive more likes.

And, we see this not only with influencers but adolescents as well. I feel like now a lot of girls (and boys) have this mentality that the sexier the better. The barer the skin the prettier. The bigger the butt the worthier.

Modesty equals prudishness. It equals being confined to one stereotype. It equals less popular. The inability to be sexy, feel sexy, be fierce.

Because I grew up Muslim, we weren’t taught to be sexy. Sexy was forbidden. There was no need for a Muslim girl to feel or be sexy at all. The extreme end of modesty was humble, colorless, loose clothes, bare face. The idea that you shouldn’t want or feel the need to be seen. Lower your gaze. Be bashful.

And after hearing stories of other cultures and religions having the same experience as above, it’s as if you can be only one or the other. There is no in-between. What’s too sexy and what’s not sexy enough look like? What’s true body empowerment versus an attention seeker who just wants to be validated for her body and nothing else?

I feel like I’m in a weird place as someone who lives so openly on the net. And, believe me, I am not the most modestly dressed Muslim you’ll see, but I’m also not the most nude either.

One day, I was at an indoor spa and I had on a bathing suit in the water. It wasn’t a bikini top, but it was more like a sleeved swim top and the top part of my chest was out. I don’t remember if I had my hijab on or not, but I made a boomerang and a few Muslims went hard on me. Scolding me for showing my body. It’s this idea that you are or you aren’t. There is no in-between. This ideology that many of us carry is problematic in so many ways. It alienates people. It forces them to be someone they aren’t just to please the masses, please their communities. When truly, it’s not who they want to be.

I don’t want to feel pressured to show my ass for likes. But I appreciate others who show their asses for a cause or because they want to be free or want to show others that there is confidence in being okay with your body. I don’t want to feel pressured to cover my body or hair either. To pretend to be fake modest like I had when I was married or when I was more involved with the Muslim community. When I wanted to fit in to their standards of how a Muslim should look.    

I’d like to wear what makes me comfortable, whether I get validation or likes or not. I’d like to be liked for me. I’d like to be accepted for me. Whether that’s fully covered or not or somewhere in between.

But, I will tell you right now that in no one is it easy to be a fat, Black model who also happens to be a semi-covered Muslim. Every time, I book a gig, I am all types of shocked. And all kinds of grateful because I can’t do and wear what the other models do and wear. So, it limits me. But, when I do step up, I am serving looks so hard that I want to make them forget that they have a Muslim girl on set. I am so fierce that all they see is a girl that will kill that shot every single time. So, that other girls (and boys) who are behind me or standing beside me have a chance to walk in that door and wear their culture or religion proudly in that campaign or on that panel.

xoxo,

Leah V  

Everything is Going to Change

When I was a little girl, I used to hate change. Mom would always tease me. “Amerra, likes for everything to remain the same.

Amerra, which means “princess” in Arabic, and the Islamic name I was given as a child.

I think I’m still that person. Inside anyway. Little Amerra is still in there trying to halt movements that are too fast, too uncomfortable. It’s so safe right where we are. To move in an unknown direction, to make a leap of faith is just too much for her to carry, too much for many of us to carry.

So, we remain stagnant. And comfortable. Never venturing out into the wild that is life.

It is both sad yet understandable.  

For me, I was forced to accept change. Does that mean I’m in love with it? Hell nah! But I get it. I understand—for the most part—that if I don’t move, the world will continue to move with or without me present.

When I say that I was forced to accept change, I mean that a series of shit occurred. Shit that stunned me. Shit that rendered me helpless, confused. Everything stopped. I was at the crossroads of going left or right. On the left was pain and misery on the right was also pain and misery. But, the right had some added benefits. With that pain and misery was acceptance. It was a route that I would be able to become my own narrator. Instead of allowing the world to narrate for me.

I think that too many people are afraid to take the wheel and become their own narrator because for one it’s scary as shit and secondly, it makes them accountable.

Change to me was being accountable. Holding others accountable.

Trust me when I tell you that this role isn’t easy to slide into. You come up against a lot of foolishness once you take on the challenge. I’ve noticed that people want to do what they want without consequences. Everyone just wants to be accepted as they are. But, that’s not really fair. Maybe your ‘as is’ ain’t good. Not good for you and not good for others. I know for a fact that mine wasn’t. Like at all. The person I was five years ago wasn’t good. It was doable. But not great.

Everything is going to change, I told myself two years ago.

And, would you look at that. Everything has changed.

I’ve changed. Situations have changed. Some slow and some fast. I’ve found myself being able to cope with change much quicker and more openly than before. I’ve moved less away from the rigidity of childhood and become a tad more fluid.

Yet there are still moments of complete rigidness, where I won’t bend for shit. Some work out and others, I am again forced to accept.

I’m still learning when to hold on and when to let go.

Last year, for me, was a year of hardship and discovery. I discovered that I had writing talent that I always knew I had but others wouldn’t give me the time of day to figure out. I always wondered how I was going to get my work seen. Heard. Nobody was checking for me. My little artsy feelings were hurt. But, I had talent, I screamed from the tops of mountains. Still no one cared.

When I tell you that I quit or almost quit multiple times is an understatement. It is HARD to do what I do. You, the spectator, get to look at the pretty photos and read the well-crafted sentences for free. Not seeing all the behind the scenes work that’s put into it. Not seeing me trying to drag myself out of bed every morning. Battling depression and anxiety. Wondering if anyone is reading this shit or am I just talking to my damn self.

I made a promise though. That no matter what, I’d always write. Every day. For free, if I had to. Because I am words and words are me. Simply.

This year. Man, this year, my endurance was put to the test. There wasn’t a chance to quit or tussle with change because I had gotten all the opportunities right in my lap. They piled on top of each other. After starting my blogging career in 2013, things were starting to change. For the good and bad. Friends started to drop off like flies, their true intentions revealed. I landed my very first commercial in the UK. I went to Barcelona on a random solo trip. I still don’t have a man on the account of me being too “intimating”. I’ve cultivated so many relationships with so many lady friends and have built a tribe all over the world.

“Everything is going to change,” I said to myself right before I knew I was getting divorced. Right before I knew all the foolery that he was a willing participant in.  

I felt it in my bones. In my aura. I knew it was coming whether I wanted it to or not.

And, it did come. Sooner than I wanted but that’s not for me to control. I can only control how ready I am for it when it comes.

What has changed in your life? Were you ready for it? What kind of change would you like to see in the near future?

Xoxo,

Leah V

Doing The Impossible

It’s been a while since we’ve got deep. I mean real deep. I’ve been in this reflective phase for the last few weeks because several important days have passed. And, it got to me to thinking about how everything that has happened which has led me to be right here, right now. I think we all have those questions floating around our heads. Especially as we age. Why am I here? What the fuck am I doing? Is this the right path to take?!?

I remember constantly asking people: can you tell me what I need to do? The good ones, the best ones, and most knowledgeable ones would tell me that they indeed cannot tell me to go right or left. That I’d have to use my skills and talents to figure that shit out. I’d sulk in my own misery. Wondering if they were indeed so great and knowledgeable, if so, then why couldn’t they just give me a straight answer and tell me WHAT I NEEDED TO DO TO GET MY LIFE TOGETHER!

Now, now, I know the answer to the question I so desperately was seeking from others. I had those answers all along. And, so do you. You just haven’t discovered it yet.

The two days in question that have me thinking so deeply was my 31st birthday and the 2nd year divorce anniversary. Which are only two weeks apart.

Custom Outfit: Lena Harbali (Detroit)

Because, I didn’t have any money left over and still waiting for checks to clear from my awesome yet tiring European travels, I rented a cheap hot tub and pondered what life was as a newly 31-year-old fat, Black, and Muslim woman living in the states.

It was deep. Because last year, only twelve months prior to that day, I was very down. My face in an overly spicy bowl of chili. I was more broke than I am now but also with no prospects. Everything I did seemed to fail. I threatened to quit modeling. Quit blogging. Quit it all. Just like my marriage went down. That’s how the rest of my life would follow.

The ‘You’ll never be anything without me” was finally coming into fruition.  

I was afraid. But, I accepted my faith. I was going to be another soul-less professor locked in, teaching eight courses, and making student’s lives a living hell because I was unhappy. I was prepared to live life as an overly educated person working a dead-end job that hadn’t offered benefits. I mean, I still don’t have benefits but that’s another story.

What I noticed that in my own ignorance I was living comfortably in my misery and self-doubt. The world had pumped so much negativity into me that I couldn’t even see beyond it, see what others had seen in me. I was stuck in between a rock and another rock. It’s hard to be uncomfortable. Experience rejection. It’s hard to be vulnerable and to put yourself out there for everyone to dissect and gawk at.

Whoever said success, personal or financial or spiritually was easy? This shit is hard. It’s hard to look at yourself and be like: yeah, the world is fucked up, but you are your own worst critic. You are the one that’s stopping yourself from progress and greatness.

A lot of us are. And, so was I. That hurts. I know it hurt me.

Because doesn’t society already do that? Why would we want to dim our own light?  

Fit: Lena Harbali

September 1, 2018. The 2nd year anniversary of our 10-year relationship. On that day, I had a podcast interview.

The interviewer asked me when was the moment that I just didn’t give a fuck anymore about people’s opinions where I’ve truly been able to become my best and true unapologetic self.

Honestly, I had many moments throughout my life where I was just like nope. I’m tired of being stereotyped and placed into these boxes. But, I thought about the end of my marriage. That was the epiphany, that ‘light bulb over the head’ moment.

“I’m afraid to leave you because you might be somebody one day,” he said. The ex. I will never, ever forget that. Ever.

That is something that I hold onto and use to push when I can’t push anymore. When I get too comfortable when in my head I know I can be greater. To prove to myself that on the other side of fear is greatness and that there is nothing behind that wall, that door, that barrier that I can’t take on.

By looking at me, you’d never know my story. You’d never imagine the things I’ve seen or the abuse I went through that still stick with me today. How much of the abuse was from myself at times.

Just in this year alone, I’ve made leaps. I’ve jumped across mountains, mentally and metaphorically. I’ve done the impossible. Without the people that I thought would, should’ve been there. I’ve broke down several times because of Imposter Syndrome and recovered. I’ve allowed myself to sit in those feelings of lowness but understand that it’s temporary.

Xoxo,

Leah V

What Not To Wear

We are always told what not to wear.

Bikinis. Short Sleeves. Stripes. Florals. Bright colors are certainly out of the question for a lot of us.

There are tons of articles and listicles of what women over 40 shouldn’t wear or what someone with a big stomach should avoid. We are a society of trying to hide, conceal, and alter what we don’t like. We are becoming less and less human and more plastic by the second with the influx of doggie filters and smoothing apps to make us Instagram acceptable.

We are afraid to try anything new out of fear of what others will think of our bodies. We fear the backlash of someone noticing that we aren’t wearing a body-shaper or that good ole’ girdle. The stretch marks on our arms or the sag of our boobs. Our real bodies are unacceptable.

We’re so worried about fitting in that we toss away all of the uniqueness that makes us so much more interesting. This may be cliché, but if we all looked like a Barbie wouldn’t the world be such a boring place?

I have a lot of conversations with my platform about body image. And, the stories that I hear are heartbreaking and shocking. Self-hate for many of us stems from childhood abuse by parents, bullying at school, and the media.

Can you imagine what would happen if we just loved ourselves without stipulations? Like if you loved yourself prior to losing ten pounds? Or if you loved yourself before the nose job? Before the makeup?

That’s why it’s so important to have conversations. Like, honest conversations about our bodies. No matter how weird or embarrassing. We learn so much more about ourselves when we share our stories, our struggles, and triumphant moments.

It’s kinda funny that as a plus-size model and body-positive activist, I still have my days. I still have that little voice in the back of my head that says, hmmm you shouldn’t wear that. You can’t wear that. YOU DON’T HAVE THE BODY FOR IT.

Fashion Nova Curve sent me this mustard jumper type deal and I was like oh that super cute n whateva. I kinda thought the material would be unforgiving, but I was feeling confident. I can do this!

When it arrived, I tried it on with excitement. I immediately noticed that it literally showed every dip and dimple of my thighs. My thighs and legs have always been problematic and it’s taken me a long time to come to terms with them. They always seem to garner attention that I don’t care for, making me feel like some kind of object. And, they are riddled with fat and cellulite. 

I looked in the mirror. This would look much better with a pair of Spanx, I thought. They’d smooth out the cellulite. Smooth out my stomach and fupa. It’d make everything look good.

I love my body and learning to love it more each day, but I have my days where I get sucked into the ideal of imitating unrealistic beauty standards. Then I start ridiculing myself and blaming what I ate yesterday on my ‘today’ fatness. If only I ate less and exercised more then I wouldn’t have to wear Spanx. If only I could lose a few pounds I’d be able to wear this or that with confidence. The age-old question: why not be confident right now, in the body I already got? 

When does only losing a few pounds ever satisfy us? We then get caught up in the idea that thin automatically means happy and spiral into diet culture. And as ya’ll know, it’s hard to recoup and bounce back from eating disorders and the negative effects of unhealthy dieting.

I almost didn’t post a lot of these photos because my cellulite is screaming hello! Because we don’t ever see cellulite on models or on magazines. Cellulite isn’t normal. But, every human being has stretch marks and cellulite to some extent. But, you’d never know because everyone smooths and edits now. 

I’ve gotten so many compliments on this jumper without the Spanx. With the cellulite full view. And I felt good in it. And, because I feel good, that’s the only thing that matters.

My cellulite or stretch marks don’t define me. And neither should it for you. 

There’s no such thing as what not to wear. Don’t ever listen to those anti-body love articles that box you into only wearing things that tuck and flatter. Just put it on and see how you feel. Let your body and mind guide you to what you wear.

Did you ever grow up wanting to change a part of your body? Have you come to terms with that part or are you still struggling? Let’s chat. 

Xoxo,

Leah V