This week, I’m joined by cultural critic, researcher, and creator Tahirah (@sincerelytahiry) for a conversation on what counts as knowledge, burnout, and why Black women are often expected to be everything for everyone.

We talk about Tahirah’s own spiritual and intellectual journey into this work. The conversation is grounded in her recently published, gorgeously written, and deeply vulnerable piece, “A Dying Star,” and explores what using the sun as a metaphor for Black women’s lived experiences reveals about care, labor, and exhaustion.

Our convo moves between questions at the heart of religious studies, Black feminist thought, and Islamic intellectual traditions: Are feelings a form of knowledge? What does it mean to trust your intuition? And who gets to decide what is considered “real” knowledge?

Follow the brilliant Tahirah on YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, and Substack @sincerelytahirah and read "A Dying Star" here!

Chapters

00:00 Opening & Introducing Tahirah

00:28 Where Are You Finding Grounding Right Now?

07:07 From Pre-Law to Purpose (Where it Started)

16:00 Trusting Your Intuition and Inner Voice?

26:30 “Identity Politics” or Real Knowledge? Who Gets Dismissed

39:10 The Inspiration Behind “A Dying Star”

42:54 Why Are Black Women Expected to Be the Sun for Everyone Else?

Why do we feel spiritually stuck… even when life is going well?

In this episode, I open up about something I didn’t expect to be encountering post-PhD: feeling spiritually understimulated.

No books or reading, just a check-in on what happens when stillness can lead to feeling disconnected, unfocused, and even bored sometimes.

Things I am thinking about…

1. Why do we associate spiritual growth with struggle and suffering?
2. How can routines be a means of reconnecting?
3. Why boredom and stillness might actually be necessary for growth?

Chapters

00:00 Grounding Question: Why Do We Think Spiritual Growth Has to Be Stressful?

00:30 Opening

01:11 Feeling Spiritually Understimulated

“Why ‘Start With Yourself’ Is a Myth”

What if the idea that success and wealth “start with yourself” is actually a myth?

This week, I'm bringing a religious studies lens to the self-help industry and break down the buzz and backlash around Emma Grede’s Start With Yourself. I use it as a case study to think about how myths work and how the American Dream continues to sell individual success as the solution to structural problems.

I argue that Grede’s message reflects a gendered and racialized version of success often marketed to Black women and women of color, what I think of as the millennial-coded myth of the pick-me.

From there, I turn to Black thought and the Black Nationalist Movement, specifically the Republic of New Afrika, to explore alternative visions of success beyond capitalism and self-making. I close by thinking at the intersections of the spiritual and the intellectual as I try to define what success looks like in this new career chapter I am presently in.

Chapters

00:00 Opening

00:40 Grounding in My Own Version of Success

02:30 How Myth Functions

06:28 Emma Grede & the Myth of the Pick Me

15:06 A Vision of Success Beyond Capitalism

References

Kees W. Bolle, “Myth: An Overview,” Encyclopedia of Religion (2005)

Imari Obadele, Foundations of the Black Nation (1975)