Divine vessel, Patriots Blood: An African daughters path & alchemy of grief (Zambia & Zimbabwe)
5.5.5 Ethiopian Patriot Day : We do not have independence day, as Ethiopia is the oldest ancient country in the world that has never been colonised or controlled.
The human heart navigates grief along its own unique and deeply personal course. For me, my father's passing—he was the patriarch, the anchor of our community—compelled me to be fully present during his final days. He was my compass, the proving ground where I learned so much. I was privileged to care for him in Seattle, a way to honor his profound influence on my life. Subsequently, destiny offered me two years in Ethiopia, a precious window to bid him farewell, a significant grace given the geographical distance that had grown between us.
Human intentions often remain veiled, driven by the primal need for survival, revealing themselves most clearly in the pursuit of control & power. I witnessed painful realities during grief, change & awakening. In my highest global success, I consciously chose a path guided by a higher purpose, embracing self-forgiveness & discovering detachment in stillness, to serve God. In sacred remembrance & legacy of my father's unwavering integrity, choosing to seek, explore, heal & live an impactful & sustainable lifestyle, choosing peace than power. My father & I had challenged eachother to finally negotiate advisor role than dictator by my 16th birthday. I celebrated his life through my personal transformation, success, sharing moments of joy in the global world, and cherishing his indomitable spirit at my epic MBA Graduation celebration I threw in a Pan-African restaurant in PNW.
In my focus, discipline, hard work, & going into my next phase in my career & personal life in my 20s, I chose the Pacific Northwest. I felt embraced, soothed, safe, surrounded by nature & felt the native Americans spirit embraced me. It is a place of healing & Growing, becoming successful with $100 in my pocket, alone in my feminine divinity. I chose PNW, away from my family, as a new adventure & begining, to test & challenge my being into a new phase of adulthood. In my success, having traveling around the US, Europe, & walked the bible, I felt ready to serve the family, community, society & humanity where I am needed.
My solo overland journey through more than ten African countries began in Alexandria, Egypt, and eventually carried me all the way to South Africa, exhausted, but unbroken. This was more than travel. It was a pilgrimage through history, memory, and mourning, to seek what was seeking me, to explore, inner engineer & serve.
I climbed the 3,000 steps of Mount Sinai, tracing the path Moses walked to receive God’s laws. I stood breathless at sunrise, cradled by sacred silence. In Afar—the cradle of humankind—I slept under open skies, beside an active volcano, humbled by nature's ancient fury. I traveled by plane, by road, and on foot across savannahs, deserts, and mountains. I went on safaris in every form: from game drives to trekking through the bush. I white-water rafted through Rapid Five on the mighty Zambezi, and journeyed along the Nile, from its start in Bahir Dar hopping across islands until it reached the Mediterranean Sea in Alexandria, Egypt, via a five-day cruise. I went whale shark diving, & snorkeling on coral reef as well as sunset cruises on daws. In South Africa, I stepped inside Mandela’s prison cell. I stood still in museums where the past screamed in whispers—the brutality of apartheid, colonial racism, and economic injustice laid bare. Every place held its own wounds. Each nation pulsed with a rhythm shaped by struggle, strength, & resilience. I felt alive, interconnected & multidimensional.
Along the way, I filled five journals with reflections raw truths, fleeting insights, and hard-won revelations in solitude. This was not an easy journey as a Solo black woman. It was marked by hardship, solitude, and the kind of spiritual reckoning that only the road can bring. To experience Africa as a well-educated, spiritual Black woman, transitioning from my safe career in banking, to being a digital nomad with an Entrepreneurship spirit, in mourning was to walk with both memory and vision. My Ethiopian genetics & ancestors instilled my sense of worth, my Ethiopian orthodox Christian faith gave me Gods laws, rituals, behaviour & spiritual living, the West educated & trained me in the facts of life, my ego and instilled a sense of global ambition. Africa stripped me down and rebuilt me as a spiritual warrior—rooted, reverent, and awake. In quiet moments, I could hear the past breathing through the trees, feel the ancestors stirring in the dust. This continent does not just speak. It sings, it aches, it teaches. I was the only black woman on almost all my travels in Africa, as I felt worthy just being my authentic self in integrity. Which shocked my naive ignorance, & made those around me feel threatened, & uncomfortable.
By my 15th country in Africa, in Djibouti, I traced my ancient spirit in consciousness & awareness. I went whale shark diving, fearless, alone & interconnected in the Red Sea. Djibouti is where I saw foreigners, Afars, Ethiopians, the red sea, Indian ocean & a new sea being formed to separate from Africa, just like India, Yemen, Middle East, Europe, Americas & Madagascar.
As a focused, disciplined, & visionary woman, being at the right place & time, being head hunted & serving in Africa, as a successful, wealthy, healthy, spiritually lead & free spirit, was often met with incomprehension, almost challenged by most, & skeptical of my intentions. As my position of power traveling solo, living a spiritual purpose as a digital nomad, choosing Africa specifically Ethiopia was clearly unexpected for all, as I stood out in my free spirit & serving God. Within my two years test period, this immersive experience yielded invaluable data and insights, on how to serve. Despite the barriers to entry, threats, my blindside, resistance, weakness, fear, doubt & rejections I was met by, in prayer, meditation, lent & fasting, I had my confirmation, strength, courage, vision, opportunity & calling that lead me. Making my first venture into my ancestors land successful.
In my evolution as a woman, after a once in a lifetime epic adventure through Africa, I finally dedicated my business Deldeyoch(meaning bridges in Amharic), in my fathers legacy, when he passed away. I chose a path less travelled, only equipped with faith, remembrance & love. This is my story.
I observed that many people globally were armoured, in survival, figuring it out & broke their covenant with God, to belong, to avoid confronting the present moment, desperate, for control, power, to compete. Most of us afraid to feel our deepest fears, as well as doubting our worth, & masked in hiding to live in outdated institutions that is an illusion. Most travelers are seekers, and looking to belong, be valued, seen & heard, realising the enslavement of the collective egoic minded false state identity that we inherited.
I faced resistance with my egoic identity false self attached to my mother, family, partners, the society itself, as well as humanity, when I chose my own path. I was determined to remain free & choose my own path. Living in a socially ancient culture, matrarchy, patriarchy & religious country that is complex in its social structure, as well as religious, I was challenged, tested & my tolerance was beyond my limited mind, in my conviction of my truth & spiritual purpose.By the age of 30 in PNW, having taking care of myself half my life, I had witnessed more than the average human, and become my feminine divinity in solitude, interconnected. I experienced a spiritual awakening and embraced a lean life dedicated to service, following ancient faith-based spiritual practices daily to cultivate presence and discipline my mind to resonate at a higher frequency. With spiritual practices, prayer, meditation, fasting & eating healthy to lead me to Success, transformed into a quiet inner strength.
Self-sufficient in the Pacific Northwest, influenced solely by God, in my success, I became acutely aware of the envy and toxic individuals drawn to my energy, including insecure partners from every continent, as men are hunters, but they find out quickly that my kindness does not make me pry, because I am a sharp equally yoked spiritual partner that forgives myself to learn, grow & move on. Grateful for the spiritual lifestyle I was raised in, had cultivated in love, & light in PNW, and chose to honor my father's spirit by becoming a digital nomad globally as such.
Despite my success, & ignorance, I chose to grieve, seek, serve & explore with an overland journey through Africa Solo—a true pilgrimage of remembrance, as deep within me resided my authentic feminine divinity warrior, that felt stifled & that I wanted to honour.
Why the African brain drain? What can I do to be part of the change I seeked? So many around me in their 30s were trapped by fear, distrustful, lost, living in repetitive survival mode, often vengeful, power hungry, mistaking toxic systems for wisdom, clinging to labels assigned by human beings that held little true meaning, and operating behind masks of competition, control, force, and manipulation in a desperate grab for false power. All to belong, be validated, to be seen & valued.
My being deeply yearned for ancestral soil, to align to Gods universe. I sought a deeper understanding of how to use my gifts, blessings & inner wisdom. By 35, I had began to question my purpose, keenly observing the fallibility of others. I found most partners I met that I felt safe, secure & protected with were not equally yoked spiritually, as most had chosen atheism, agnostic & become non believers to disassociate from their childhood trauma. I accepted, acknowledged & embraced Gods choice for my spirit, that marriage, children & family was a long term process. You cannot imagine how free I felt once God revealed the insight that I can venture in life without the institute of marriage, & choose not to bring innocent children in this sinful world unless I was consciousness.My faith, vision & calling became my sole anchor. My spirit felt constrained within a Western system & an ancient religious practice, as well as having reached an awakening. Masked, hiding & labelled by global success, groomed by western education, wealthy, healthy, & ignorant as well as naive of the truth underneath it all. I confronted my egoic minded false state in grief. Something within me needed a Spiritual awakening. I prayed for clarity regarding my purpose, there was a contradiction of ideologies as I felt at home in all. My ultimate go to at a crossroads, is to choosing to travel where I am most uncomfortable, to challenge my senses. This time is was overland across Africa to gain a profound understanding of how to live a spiritual purpose life as a woman in the 21st-century, whether in Africa or PNW.
This journey into serving & overlanding through Africa, despite my mental resistance & inner battle, spiritually ignited my awakening after two years in what felt like a stifling environment. An inner whisper urged me to confront deep-seated fears and relentlessly seek truth. Many around me mistook my heightened awareness for fear, or my kindness for weakness, attempting to manipulate me, but would soon learn I do not take projects without an exit strategy if I feel unethical practices. I continued to evolve, aligning myself with God in isolation, surrendering only to His guidance.
Once a young banker, I held the position of the youngest COO in Ethiopia, and Assistant VP in commercial lending in the Pacific Northwest in the most competitive Financial sector globally, all while honoring my father's enduring spirit. As the first CEO of Entrepreneurship Development center in Ethiopia, my focus, discipline & hard work baffled the UNDP head called me an enigma amidst a web of conspiracies between stakeholders, even withholding my salary to take sides. Despite their internal conflict, I inaugurated the Entrepreneur center from nothing, and delivered a well run center, structured & with regional network. When I resigned shortly after, stating clearly that God, not him, had entrusted me with the vision for the project.
On my overland through Africa, My spirit felt unconfined, yet so many readily labeled me "American." The Western curriculum I had absorbed couldn't fully contain the breadth of my being. It seemed the world, as a collective ego, exploited fear as a tool for control. After a decade, a sense of disconnect persisted. Returning solely to the familiar felt like a stifling of my spirit's true expression. True liberation, I realized, embraces the unknown. I knew that my authenticity and freedom would likely be met with envy, manifesting as attacks often masked by religious rhetoric.
As someone that embodies the essence of working hard to achieve my visions, at times loosing friends, family & partners, having achieved significant milestones privately, I consciously chose a different journey—an inward exploration through the heart of Africa, seeking my true essence, standing at a crossroads between a secure life and the uncharted territory of selfless service in Africa. I needed a Spiritual Awakening, the abundance of gifts I had received called for reciprocity. I departed, guided by a profound sense of divine purpose, recognizing my deep & intrinsic connection to the land.
This phase of my life was going to be career & social suicide as I will start from scratch, to go against everything I built, to understand what is needed from the source, and building policies, solutions & doing my advisory work based on projects that can heal the earth, my being, and the society, community & universe I serve. Which meant I had to get out of my comfortable, secure & resume life I was preped for as a woman, & seek what was seeking me, and flow with life, to be in my masculine & feminine power, aligned to God's universe.
By Dutchess @deldeyoch
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