“Growing up, I hated to be different. Born a Christian, I attended kindergarten dressed in regular clothes. By the time I entered first grade, my mom converted to Islam, and that meant I had to wear Muslim clothing, i.e., long dresses and head coverings. Thereafter, I was teased a lot, being the only practicing Muslim in my elementary school.
As my mom’s religious fervor grew exponentially with her association with this particular Islamic group, there was also a hardship created for her family. She then moved us into separate and insular living community of this group, believing it would facilitate her new religious way of life. Only later to find out, the hard way, it was a cult.
During my time in the cult, we were groomed to be religious and blindly follow its leader. Through his diabolical teachings and control, we were conditioned to feel a false sense of protection— that when the world was destroyed, we, as the chosen ones, would survive and prepare for the second coming of Jesus. So, although we endured many forms of abuse and traumas within the confines of this community, we were protected from the purported greater harms of the outside world…”
Whole story available in the book Postcards to the Universe or follow the live readings on IG or Tiktok.
“What’s Your Elephant” ~ Niki