One of my favorite moments from my conversation with A.J. Haynes came when she spoke about the Sankofa philosophy. Sankofa is often represented by a bird looking backward while moving forward. The lesson is simple but profound: we must return to what has been in order to move toward what can be.
In a culture obsessed with optimization, reinvention, and “what’s next,” I found this idea deeply comforting. So much of modern self-improvement asks us to become someone new. To fix ourselves. To upgrade ourselves. To leave our past behind. But what if the path forward isn’t found in becoming someone else? What if it’s found in remembering?
A.J. spoke about an upcoming artistic residency in which she’ll create a space centered on “re-mothering”, an invitation for artists to revisit their lives with compassion, curiosity, and care. A chance to offer ourselves some of the support, protection, encouragement, or tenderness we may not have received when we needed it most, and the idea stayed with me.
Because lately I’ve been realizing how much of my own life has been shaped by trying to outrun certain feelings: Fear. Shame. The need to prove myself. The desire to be chosen.
I’ve spent years imagining that confidence would arrive when I achieved enough. When I booked enough jobs. Released enough music. Earned enough recognition. Became enough. But the older I get, the more I wonder if confidence has less to do with accomplishment and more to do with reconciliation. Not becoming someone new but accepting I am whole.
The Sankofa bird doesn’t fly backward forever. It doesn’t live in the past. It simply knows that there may be something worth retrieving there, a forgotten dream, a lesson, a version of ourselves that deserved more grace than they received…
For me, this has shown up in unexpected ways recently. In revisiting old dreams. In questioning old beliefs. In mourning my grandmother. In reflecting on my relationship with art, ambition, and success. In asking myself whether I’ve truly believed in myself as much as I’ve claimed to. The answers haven’t always been comfortable. But they’ve been clarifying. Perhaps moving forward isn’t always about charging ahead. Sometimes it’s about turning around long enough to gather what we’ve left behind.
To remember who we were before fear got involved and reclaim what was always ours. And then, with those pieces in hand, continue forward not as someone new, but as someone to be more fully ourselves.
My conversation with Grammy Award-winning artist A.J. Haynes is available now on Mucha Malentía.
