10d (edited) • General discussion
Take your power back: Your vote counts
Yesterday, South Africans went to the polls. If you were among those who stood in a queue and casted your vote, I salute you. It may have felt like a small act. It was not.
It is hard to hold on to hope when everyday life feels like an uphill battle: rising food and petrol prices, dry taps, and potholes so large that giraffes could play hide-and-seek in them. Senseless wars, based on greed and inflated egos, leading to the Strait of Hormuz remaining closed, which in turn leads to petrol prices skyrocketing. It is easy to feel overwhelmed. Disappointed. Powerless.
The honourable former Minister of Transport, Mr Fikile April Mbalula, now the Secretary General of the ANC, declared this week that potholes exist because of climate change. Ja nee wat, these are the same political leaders some of us choose to keep in positions of power.
When taps run dry, and explanations offer little comfort, we need more than words. We need accountability, and the courage to keep asking for it. James Baldwin puts it this way, “Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced.”
Voting is one way we exercise that courage. It does not fix everything overnight. It says: my vote matters; my voice matters; my family matters; and the conditions we live in matter.
I understand the temptation to treat election day as a holiday and leave the politics to someone else. Disappointment can wear us down. Yet every person who showed up chose contribution over resignation.
My son, Kitso, reminded me why that choice is deeply personal. Yesterday, he said, “Of course we are voting, it is the least we can do to honour the time Mom had spent in jail all those years ago.” His words brought me back to what that struggle had cost, and what we had hoped it would make possible.
In the powerful words of Steve Biko , “The most potent weapon in the hands of the oppressor is the mind of the oppressed.”[1] Mindset shifts are required to remain engaged in civil society matters, despite disappointment.
In my book, Patches: Coaching Stories of Overcoming and Possibility, I write about a song we sang in prison during Apartheid: “Freedom Isn’t Free.”
There’s a price to pay
Freedom isn’t free! Freedom isn’t free!
You’ve got to pay a price,
You’ve got to sacrifice
For your liberty.
Freedom is a word often heard today,
But if you want to keep it, there’s a price to pay.
Each generation’s got to win it anew,
At that time, we, the political activists, fighting for liberation, were idealistic and hopeful. We believed that leaders who had shared our history of unimaginable poverty and deliberate exclusion would remember it when they came into power. We believed they would stay true to the ideals found in the Freedom Charter. How silly of us – eye roll.
We sacrificed so that our children and grandchildren might know political and economic freedom. Some gave their lives. To see those hopes betrayed is painful. I will not pretend otherwise. But I refuse to allow disappointment and hopelessness to have the last say.
Your anger is real
In Patches, I explore ways to reclaim our power and exercise mindful control over our lives. One is to make room for righteous anger: to acknowledge where we have been hurt, disrespected, or treated unfairly, rather than normalising the new status quo of greed, inequality and corruption.
I quote Marge Piercy, who says, “A good anger acted upon is beautiful as lightning and swift with power … A good anger swallowed clots the blood like slime.”[3]
What might it mean to act intentionally on our anger? Perhaps it starts with naming the experience of injustice, asking difficult questions, demanding accountability from our political leaders, or joining others in their call for change.
We cannot control every outcome. However, we can choose to use our voices for justice, fairness and equality.
For me, that is where the struggle for freedom meets everyday life, not only at the ballot box, but in the empowered choices we make, daily.
If you are asking how to move forward without denying what hurts, I invite you to read Patches. These stories of overcoming and possibility is an invitation to face injustice, reconnect with your agency, and claim your dignity. The struggle continues, and so does the possibility of personal awakening and freedom.
[1] Freedom isn’t free. Patches: Coaching stories of overcoming and possibility. Alicia S. Pieterse
[2] Freedom Isn’t Free is a song written by Paul Colwell and Ralph Colwell in 1965
[3] Patches: Coaching stories of overcoming and possibility. Alicia S. Pieterse
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Take your power back: Your vote counts
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I coach managers to grow from overwhelm and self-doubt to self-belief and self-trust and to become confident and resilient leaders within 10 weeks.
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