Now Playing: How SZA’s Debut Album 'Ctrl' Led Me On My Path Towards Womanhood
By Chika Ojukwu
Almost 2 years after the release of SZA’s debut album, Ctrl, I was sitting in front of my therapist for the first time. We were in her office; warm red walls wrapped around, with a smattering of deep brown furniture that made it feel more like a living room, existing only in some imaginary house of my own creation, far removed from the reality of life. As I sat on a too comfortable couch and stared at a bowl of complementary chocolates, I wondered what she would ask first.
Will she ask if I ever tried to hurt myself? If I took any drugs, or displayed any antisocial tendencies? Would she prescribe me a set of pills the instant she saw the bags under my eyes and noticed my general discontent with life? I expected to be labeled with some mental disorder and sent on my way.
I shuffled my feet. The room was silent.
My therapist had a sip of her drink and took a breath. She opened her mouth and asked, “What do you like to do for fun?” I looked up from the reflective dark wrapper of a Hershey’s bar and did a double take. My hackles raised. I asked myself, “Was she messing with me? Is that really all she wants to know?”
Her thin lips formed a slight smile. She looked at me and tilted her head, beckoning me to answer. I glanced at her eyes. There was no cruelty, no malice. Only curiosity and a warmness I had no idea what to do with. She just wanted to know.
I answered her, saying, “Have you ever heard of the album ‘Ctrl’ by SZA?” She shook her head. “No, I haven’t. You like it?” she asked. I nodded, uncrossed my arms, and for the first time in a while, told someone how I truly felt. “It’s the only thing that gets me through the day.”
Last Played: Supermodel
That is my greatest fear
That if, if I lost control
Or did not have control, things would just, you know
I would be...fatal
I put on a facade of having control, and of having this bearing and untreatable wall to others, but I’m soft. I’m gooey. I cry during the final kiss in a rom-com. I feel lonely, cry easily, and often feel inferior to others.
In Ctrl, SZA spoke of the intricacies of self-worth: of knowing oneself and loving yourself in the process; of falling apart and putting yourself together afterwards; of growing from your hurt. The female identity is not black and white. Being a woman is paved with the complex layers of being female and existing in this world.
Up Next: Normal Girl
This time next year I’ll be livin’ so good
Won’t remember your name, I swear
Livin’ so good, livin’ so good, livin’ so good
When you stare in the mirror, what do you see? Someone to be desired? To be loved? Or the complete opposite?
The thing is ... I’m not thin. I’m not smooth lines and soft edges. I have a buzz cut. My face isn’t quick to smile or laugh, and I possess what some would call a “resting bitch face.” My body doesn’t resemble curvy, hourglass models’. My voice is rumbles, low and reverberating.
On many occasions, I’ve felt uncomfortable because of this. I’ve felt out of place among people who are comfortable in their skin, and have the freedom to move around in it. I’ve poked and prodded myself as much as I can, in order to change who I am.
SZA told me the story of a girl similar to myself — a girl who wants to become more palatable for people to consume, but dulled her own shine in the process. I realize that those who want you to become someone else do not deserve to be in the same league with you. Don't change. Can’t change. Won’t change. I have to wait on myself and embrace myself wherever I go.
In Queue: Broken Clocks
Better day than yesterday
I just take it day by day
Never hearing what they say
I just do it my way
In the beginning of 2019, I was diagnosed with depression. I sat on my therapist’s couch wondering where it all went wrong.
Maybe it was the nights that I couldn’t sleep, and found myself haunted by words that couldn’t get out of my mind. Maybe it was all those weeks of walking through the halls of my school, just feeling so empty, devoid of any feeling. Maybe it was the day I skipped school without anyone knowing — the time I hid under my bed, in an attempt to block out the world. Either way, there I was.
And there I went, week after week, trying to get better.
“Broken Clocks” repeats the phrase “day by day” throughout the song. When struggling with depression, it truly is about taking things day by day by day. Some days will be better than others. Others will be worse.
SZA told me that it is hard — that I’m sad, but I will survive. “Hold on to what you have.” I repeat those words — over and over, day after day — like a mantra. With these broken clocks, I have no time to waste. I have to keep on going. I have to keep on pushing. I have to keep on writing. It’s all I have.
So, I fill journals upon journals with my words to keep myself bound. Today is another day, and I’m holding on. With my pen, my hand, and my heart beating with life, I’ll know I’ll be okay.
Now Playing: 20 Something
And if it’s an illusion, I don’t want to wake up
I’m gonna hang onto it
Because the alternative is an abyss, is just a hole, a darkness, a nothingness
Who wants that? You know?
So that’s what I think about control
And that’s my story, and I’m stickin’ to it
A global pandemic made me grow up way too fast, and way too quickly. I fought through the end of my senior year of high school, and what do I have to show for it? I’m here, still in the same place, but mentally and emotionally older. My mind wanders onto the next question.
A split second passed. I blink, and I’m 18 years old now. Only two years until I’m 20 years old. Seven years until I’m 25. Twelve years until I’m 30. How did time go by so fast? Where do we go from here? What’s next? What does this all mean? Why am I all alone? Where has everyone gone? It’s so easy to lose touch with others.
I have a fear of being lost. I’m scared of not being grounded in my 20s, of being without a steady job, of a perpetually scattered mental state, and of not knowing who I am after all this time. I have a fear of not having control.
But the thing is, I don’t have control. What I’ve come to realize from listening to SZA’s music — the words of a twenty-something who was also lost — is that not all things are known. My twenty-somethings are unknown and will come as all things do: with no instructions.