On Being
an ethic and practice of liberation
Rebecca Mwase
“My body is my first place of geography
my first map
first landscape
it is the first place I learned of the importance of belonging
I do not want to lose it.”
— excerpt from Looking at A Broad, Rebecca Mwase
I have spent the last thirteen years liberating myself through my art. Each piece, a reflection of a wound I was excavating and healing: slavery, self-worth, colonization, disconnection, belonging, home. Each process is an experiment in community, building ephemeral ensembles one relationship at a time. The way I create art is a direct reflection of the way I want to live, to build a liberated life.
At the beginning of my creative practice, I believed that it was through art that I could receive recognition and legitimacy, which I thought would allow me to become the fullest version of myself. If I believe that I don’t belong, then I will pretend to be whoever is desired for fear of being alone. Out of this fear, I did almost everything in my power to achieve: 12-14 hour days, multiple side hustles, twisting my work to fit funding priorities, living with no health insurance. I worked and gave of myself to the extent that I sacrificed my own body on the altar of creation. In 2014, I slammed back into my body. I landed from a high jump during a rehearsal of my solo piece Looking at A Broad and upon impact, my achilles tendon ruptured. This fundamental split revealed a disconnect between me and my ground. I had literally and figuratively fractured; contorting myself into behaviors and ways of being that limited my ability to be, feel, and focus on what truly mattered.
I spent the next nine months at rest. Unable to walk, cook for myself, make money, or do any of the things that supported my livelihood, my daily rituals involved spending time outdoors re-aligning with the rhythms of nature. I wrote, grieved, and investigated my pain. I shed my old self; the ways of being in my body that I had known, the ways of working that pushed me to put production ahead of my well-being and personal evolution. I realized that I had been engaging and giving at the expense of myself, the perfect embodiment of self-sacrifice. I had traded in authenticity for pretense, outward recognition for self-knowing, being myself for doing what others expected of me. What sustained me was anchoring in my spirit and my community who loved and cared for me regardless of whether I had anything to offer in return. I vowed not to lose myself again.
“I am a liar taught to spin tales at the feet of Uncle Sam.
To root is dangerous.
Being authentic is a direct threat to the U.S. Project.
Nothing is sacred here.
I am an immigrant in my own body.”
— excerpt from Looking at A Broad, Rebecca Mwase
I shifted my process to center spirit, each whole human being. With the ensemble piece VESSELS, our intention, to heal the people, places and spaces affected by the Middle Passage, began with ourselves. What needed to be remembered, expressed, released and transmuted for you to come back into being? If I am disconnected from myself, how can I be in true connection with anyone else? What is required to rebuild the bonds of community that have been all but completely severed?
Photo from performance of VESSELS in summer of 2018. Photo by Melisa Cardona.
My answer and our practice became personal and collective rituals. We opened every rehearsal with a communal altar consisting of an object representing what anchored our spirits and an intention to guide our personal explorations. One of our first collective rituals honored a profound but uncomfortable knowing: following the pain will provide a way through. Over a two-day Ewe grief and shame release ritual, we mourned our old selves, our ancestors and their forgotten memories, what we’d lost of our spirits and the parts of ourselves that we banished because we believed they were too ugly, base or shameful to be loved.
Grounded in those truths, we began to re-integrate parts of ourselves. One of our favorite collective practices was to generate a ball of love light and spread it from our hearts to each other and beyond until it filled the space. It was a physical and energetic visualization that illuminated all that we received from being together. This work of self-recognition allowed us to mend and love each other as we re-membered ourselves whole. Every practice, every ritual, every meal we shared reminded us that, at least in this space, we could be our whole selves and be loved entirely for who we are and how we exist in the world. In this way, Vessels became a liberated space, one where the shifts and changes in each of us radiated throughout the whole, making freedom more possible for us all. Vessels was an experiment in doing so much right and yet it was impermanent.
“Art is the voice of spirit.”
— Samia Abou-Samra, Whale Wonder
Since giving birth to my child in the Fall of 2020, I recognized again how easy it is for us to lose ourselves. My pregnancy and birth were an initiation, a nine-month gestation of birthing a new life and myself, yet again. This experience made me aware of how I was repeating the same patterns of disconnection. I was still engaging in transactional relationships with some of the people closest to me, driven by a desire to be recognized, seen and loved. Instead of engaging authentically, we sacrificed our truest selves for the illusion of belonging in community.
What I want and what I’m working towards is relationships grounded in ubuntu, an understanding that I am, because we are. In order to build these types of relationships, I am re-committing to creating an authentic relationship with myself. There are so many significant milestones in life that change us. We undergo transformational death/rebirth processes alone without true containers or guides to hold and nurture us and our spirits through into full being. I want this to change. I know now that my work is to midwife myself and others through these sacred processes; creating art, genuinely spirit-filled containers, where we can become the most fully realized versions of ourselves.
What liberation looks like to me now is exercising these truths in daily life for myself and my child. So I am here being present and fully expressed in my body. I am making a home for myself. I am investing in relationships that anchor and tether me back home; ones where we are alongside each other engaging, supporting and loving ourselves into re-membering who we truly are. I am making containers for art and play and life crafted with love and rooted in freedom that can adapt to the multitude of transformations that will happen over the lives of myself, my little one, and those we are in community with. One that brings us back to our most liberated selves over and over again. This is what my creative practice is now; nurturing and growing seeds of being a true community.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Rebecca Mwase: I am an artist. My work is to midwife myself and others through sacred ceremonial processes that inspire, instigate and assist them to heal and become the most fully realized versions of themselves. Each process is an initiation for me, a birth/death/rebirth process that brings me closer to being my freest self. The containers I build and processes I lead support our progression towards a true sense of belonging in our bodies and in the ecosystem of our Earth. You can learn more at her website or find her on Facebook @Rebecca Mwase and Instagram @blackunicornpegasus
