"I touched the fire and it freezes me..."

Choosing an avi name, to me, should be some kind of representation of who one is (or whatever character they are portraying). I wanted Phoenix, but of course that was taken, so I tried the different spelling, Fenix. The numbers at the end don't really bother me. Three is my life number, so I guess it was a crazy case of kismet that those numbers once added, can be divided by three.

As a kid, I was heavily into cartoons and X-Men the animated series was one of my favorites. I'm not a comic geek by any stretch of the imagination, so that show introduced me to the X-Men and my favorite mutant, Jean Grey. The Dark Phoenix saga are my favorite episodes. I didn't understand then why those episodes grabbed my attention the way the did. It wouldn't be until decades later when I was blessed with the teachings of Kendall St Charles about the shadow self of human nature that a light bulb would go off in my mind and I actually got it. Like, it just clicked and I was like, OH!

Doing self work is a hard, painful process. If one is really serious about getting to the root of the the shit that hurts and harms them, WHY you do the things you do, you have to be brutally honest with yourself. Most people aren't built for that because there is comfort in self lies. The shadow side is no joke and most times it is a nasty ugly thing that makes up part of your being. I had to ask myself "Why?" a lot, and I have to keep asking "Why?" because getting to the roots of my issues and problems isn't a one-time thing. The why's make you wise. Embracing my shadows is still a hard progress; transmuting all that pain, anger, and frustration into something more productive and positive is always the goal.

What does that have to do with anything? Boiled down, the Dark Phoenix saga can be seen, in my opinion, as what happens when those shadows don't have an outlet. They destroy and consume, bringing you to your lowest point. You don't get more goody two shoes than early Jean Grey. She always, whether on her own or because of someone else, did the right thing even if that meant suppressing her own wants and desires. When the Phoenix came along and merged with Jean, it was able to experience everything she did. It was also able to sense Jean's hidden wants and desires and tapped into that, ergo Dark Phoenix. That shit fascinated me. I totally understand that aspect; suppressed wants and desires for the greater good and all that. Sooner or later though, they don't stay suppressed for long. They either leak out in passive-aggressive ways or implode as full on self destruction. Knowing why I need, want, desire xyz gets me to the root of the problem.

So here I am, Fenix381. No need to add "Dark" because I'm a dark-skinned Black woman, so that should be implied lol.