JhenĂ© Aiko’s New Album, Black Love, and the art of alchemizing emotional whiplash
Why does love hurt the most when you’re trying your hardest to keep it? There are so many things Black women, including myself, have had to learn about love the hard way. This week I would love for all of us, not just Black women, to have a safe place to understand each other and hold each other accountable. Coincidentally, JhenĂ© Aiko’s new album, “Westside Whimsy”, is the perfect concept to use to get us started.
When I heard JhenĂ© Aiko was dropping a new album, words could not explain how excited I was. Shit, I still get chills listening to it today. It’s safe to say that having a love life in college is extremely difficult, especially in our generation. Most people say they want love, but don’t understand what genuine love is. JhenĂ© has been in a public light for quite some time now. She has gracefully shared her pain with the world, despite all types of negative comments regarding what she has endured. Regardless of mine, yours, and the rest of the world’s opinions on what she has going on, no one can take away her talent. She is able to articulate complex emotions that many of us feel when dealing with unhealthy relationships. I sat down and listened to every single song on her album multiple times, because I just have that much time on my hands. My favorite overall is without a doubt “Ghost”. I truly believe she was talking directly to me when she made this song. Like, girl, why are you in my head.
“I’m goin 90 on the 90
I’m tryna leave the past behind me
Not tryna let the pain define me
But it always find me
It’s all that I know
All that I know
All that I know
Now I am a ghost”
(Written by Jhené Aiko)
If you have been through any sort of heartbreak, this verse probably touches your soul. It’s so simple, yet so soulful. Some of my other favs are “A Living Light” and “I Don’t Mind”. I could go on and on about every song, but then I wouldn’t leave anything for y’all to listen to yourself. JhenĂ© Aiko has always had a way of making complicated emotions sound effortless. Leaving people from all corners of the world asking, “How does she know me so well?” Did you ever notice that a significant amount of Black women resonate so deeply with music about complicated love?
Maybe it’s because so many of us understand what it feels like to love someone while simultaneously knowing that person is no good for us. A lot of us grew up watching our parents experience some version of this. Whether it was abuse, separation, or simply watching two people stay together and constantly argue. I don’t want to assign this dynamic exclusively to the Black community, but the reality is that many of us were introduced to complicated versions of love before we even had the chance to experience romantic love ourselves. This leaves us with an impression of what we believe love is supposed to look like. We were taught to thug it out, to never divorce, to stand by your partner’s side no matter what. When really a lot of our parents should have been divorced. They say they’re staying together for the kids, and then the kids turn out miserable and evil. Then throughout time, we become old enough to gain experience with our own relationships and end up in situations that mirror what we witnessed.
They say you look for your dad in men, but what about the girls who didn’t grow up with one? Maybe you find yourself chasing behind a man who is indecisive about how he feels towards you. You mistake his inconsistency for something you have to work harder to earn. They say you look for your mom in women, but what about the people who grew up without their mom? Maybe you find yourself giving your all in a relationship without even realizing you’re receiving the bare minimum, because you never had that nurturing love modeled for you. All of these experiences can shape the emotional whiplash that comes with these “situationships”. I won’t even say relationships anymore cause y’all know good and well most of them don’t have a title. I’m not even judging cause I’ve been there myself, but we won’t talk about that loll. That push and pull between ‘I need to leave this alone’ and ‘but I love them so much’ is what we call emotional whiplash. It’s painful. It’s confusing. And it’s sure as hell not fun. You know you deserve better, but every part of you is wishing this individual you love could be better. And they probably could one day. But that’s not a day you should wait on babe.
When any other person goes through these emotional situations the world’s reaction is much different than when it’s a Black woman. My opinion might ruffle some feathers but I don’t too much care. Why when a man or woman (we don’t discriminate) drags a Black woman through the worst of it, the first question asked is why did she stay? The lack of empathy towards us is so concerning and disheartening. I will say, there are many cases where that question is valid, but most of the time people will worry more about how it looks superficially and not the underlying reasons a woman could be enticed to stay. Starting with the fact that MOST of these men are liars and users. We live in a generation where most of the media we consume regarding relationships is F women, F love, I just want sex, I’m a playa, I’m this and that. When a woman decides to start moving the same way, now we’re 304’s and for the streets right? I don’t even move that way, but I definitely understand why someone would. Perfect example, Megan Thee Stallion and Tory Lanez. I don’t care, I will die on that hill. This woman literally got shot in both feet, and so much of the public conversation became about her choices, her sexuality, and whether she was somehow responsible. I couldn’t dare imagine being shot by a man, by accident or on purpose, and people start asking me what I did. Ouuu I would smack everybody, so now we all have a reason to be mad. Hopefully one day the world can stop undermining Black women’s pain. Either way, we will thrive.
Throughout history, we have shown the world that we can alchemize our pain and make it something beautiful. Similar to what Jhené did with her new album, whether it be through music, artwork, writing, activism, motherhood, entrepreneurship, or pouring into our career paths, the list goes on. We have always found ways to turn our experiences into something that gives us- and sometimes other people- meaning. We have and always will be the foundation of our communities. We are what these men want to claim as theirs while simultaneously finding every way to tear us down and deter us from our purpose.
So, to answer my earlier question: Why does love hurt the most when you’re trying your hardest to keep it? Maybe it’s because love was never supposed to require us to lose ourselves to keep it alive. I wish I had all the answers for us honestly, it’s a struggle. It’s hard to be a genuine soul and stay open to trying new connections when you’ve been hurt so many times. We’re just expected to be strong and get through it like it’s another developmental experience we’re supposed to climb. I guess I missed the memo cause I definitely do not want to participate in this fiasco called “love” for a while. Nevertheless, still we rise I guess.