THE GIRL'S SELF ESTEEM AND SWAZI CULTURE

I constantly think about issues of self esteem and wonder how they can be introduced to the Swaziland personal text of girls. I have thought about this for years. I have come to a few conclusions. I have thought that we need to unpack some of the definitions of the Swaziland girl's personality. A few things seem to be misunderstood. Among these is what we call "similo." Sometimes we speak and say "simo sakhe vele, unjalo." I think some of these contribute to an inflexible personality that results in the inculcation of a rigid way of looking at oneself. We could begin to emphasize a role-oriented persona that changes.

There are many ways of talking about life that I could add to this. We say, "ubotithulela wena." This is so repeated that people end up thinking that there is a rigid way in which to view oneself, whereas in today's world the roles require a personality that is dynamic, one that changes with place and people and still retails self-love. On this one we could emphasize the opposite, "ubotikhulumela wena." that you can speak up without being annoying or making people feel annoyed.

I think we need to emphasize the lovely side of speaking out and letting people know how you feel. There is something good about telling the truth all the time in talking about your feelings. It really establishes who you are. I keep thinking about our culture and domestic duties of girls and the personalities that are created when people are taken in as "sidzandzane." The meer use of the word has never been positive. It does not even have an opposite. Even when a young man is taken into the family as "umfana wetinkhomo," the type of life that he lives is not similar. It is very much an outdoor life compared to that of the young maiden.

Some people will think that I am musing about something that is not important. I think it is important for our girl children to learn self-love at home. It creates the base on which to build one's self esteem. I am asking people to think aloud on this topic. Some topics I handle in short stories in siSwati, but others I struggle with and then end up just thinking of ways in which to create a discussion on an open type of media such as this one. I would like young girls to be taught the truth about themselves. Our culture emphasizes outside beauty, sometimes at the expense of the strong inner-person.

I am thinking of ways to engage this topic with young people. I wish that young people would make it a goal to be more focussed on the type of person they would like to be and then build that person. I know that the environment does not do much to create a strong inside. I grew up in a Swazi home. I have many examples on how the girl's life is different. What aches me most is that girls always face the unknown because the parents always see them as people who will go away somewhere. This is not what I wanto to discuss here. It is a topic for another blog.

However, about the "similo lesihle issue," there is a lot we can do, especially now that the family is under tremendous stress with other people looking after other people's children. There can be a lot of abuse of these girls who are taken from other families.

Girls can be taught to be strong. They can use as role-models strong women around them. I have found personalities such as the late Make Mary Mdziniso good role models. They were out-spoken, but not loud and noisy.

Girls can be taught about feelings; that is alright to feel and talk about your feelings. We can speak our feelings all the time and always know that it is good to say what you mean without hurting anyone. Give yourself a bbig pat on the shoulders for everytime you stand up for yourself. This habit has to be one that you cultivate all the time. It is important to know that very few people care about your success. Most people have a low self-esteem, actually all people. It is the way life is. They are more eager to criticize and back-stab. Beeing seen pulling down somebody else is more important than helping others do well in situations. In these cases the self-esteem keeps going down.

However, one can build a self esteem by first faking it and then always doing good to those around one. Eventually the self gets to love its own actions and then developts a way of seeing the world that is about one person who is in everybody's life in a positive way. While some people are back stabbing and trying to get ahead through evil means, you will be building a person who can stand for him or herself in future. Do not think it will be easy to all of a sudden change. If you make a mistake, make sure that next time you get and opportunity you correct the mistake. Sooner your inner spirit will know that you are a person who is about doing the best in serving and living with others in a positive way. This is the Swazi way. If you keep quiet and fester inside, eventually you will be unable to do the positive expression of life. Your Swazi way will be a negative way, and therefore very unsSwazi. For you life will become and accummulation of "let me try to be better than so and so," Eventually you become better than nobody because you have not cultivated a personal strength in anything.

The positive expression of life is the Swazi way, I repeat. It is about speaking out, doing good to the next person and repeatedly building a personality of the positive actions. That way you grow a strong sense of who you are. This is for you Swazi girls out there. Eventually, you will hear people talk about your "buntfu." You will by then have done a lot of good things that are of service to others. Start now by talking about this issue to other young girls. Don't forget, go to www.girleffect.org