VBB 338 Koya Bakare: When Beauty Finds Its Voice!

Intro [00:00:01]:

Virgin Beauty Podcast: Inspiring women to overcome social stereotypes and share unique life experiences without fear of being defiantly different. Your hosts, Christopher and Heather. Let's talk, shall we?

Christopher [00:00:20]:

For some people, the most important thing in the world is having a voice. But for many of us, the most difficult thing in life is finding our voice. I know at least one person who would say amen to that, and it's 2024 - 25 National Beauty pageant winner, the Elite Miss US United, Koya Bakare. Welcome, Koya, to Virgin Beauty Bitch.

Koya Bakare [00:00:49]:

Thank you, Christopher. Thank you. Thank you for that. Thank you, Heather, for having me.

Christopher [00:00:55]:

Now, Koya, since Beauty is the middle name of our podcast, we will definitely be covering your experience as a beauty queen. But to begin, we would love to explore your journey in finding your voice in the world. A journey that began with the trauma of being robbed of your innocence first.

Koya Bakare [00:01:16]:

I never thought of myself as victorious. For many years, I would always preface my journey as one being of a victim. I'm no longer in that space. What happened to me as a child is that I was sexually assaulted. I did not know how to verbalize that. I wasn't really fluent in how to articulate the trauma. Trauma shows up in so many different ways.

Koya Bakare [00:01:46]:

But when it occurred, it silenced me in a sense that I learned to compartmentalize. We now use the word masking, right? And so I learned how to mask my trauma with trauma. With that being said, so dealing with the onset of the sexual assault, I then became bulimic. And I thought that gave me control over my life. I was taunted; I was bullied. You know, we hear a lot of different stories, and though they may have similarities, all of our journals are very unique. But jumping forward, the common thread that I now realize in our humanity is that we have an ability to obtain hope and to stand in it and to be victorious. Going back, sexual assault, then birth me being bulimic, then birthed mr dealing with the onset of all this trauma, where I became depressed and attempted suicide twice. The second time that I attempted suicide. The term now here is to “unalive myself.” I was an undergrad in school, and I remember awakening, thinking I couldn't even get this right. But the turning point for me was, I had a professor. It was a couple of turning points. I had a professor. And I may cry.

Koya Bakare [00:03:26]:

I'm not very free with my tears. And it was not out of woefulness. It's a celebration of reflecting back on where I was and where I am now. I remember a professor saying to me, I was being chatty in class one day, and she asked me to come to her office. I had no idea why. And she said to me, why are you allowing the attention you're receiving to impact your academics? What I processed was, someone thought I was pretty. And it floored me because the abuse, the trauma, did not correlate to Beauty. It correlated to someone who didn't have value, who didn't have worth.

Koya Bakare [00:04:17]:

It was, in that moment, that I realized that I had a lot, well, one of the moments that pretty much were starting to stack in a positive way, that I was allowing the trauma to define the chapters of my life. I didn't realize that I had authorship over who I am and what I can walk into, despite what had happened. So I remember going to my room. I wish I had a great story to say that was in this great, wonderful space. I had a D on a paper. I had never. What I knew was, I was academic. I'd never seen a D. What did that mean? Oh, God.

Koya Bakare [00:04:50]:

But what it started me doing to having these very pointed conversations with myself. And I remember calling my mother. Well, since passed. But she definitely was just an angel in my life. I didn't realize everyone didn't have a mother like mine. And I was speaking to her about these things that I was going through.

Koya Bakare [00:05:13]:

Fast forward. I'm now graduated from undergrad and grad school, still struggling with bulimia. And a friend of mine who was a model, he used to model for Calvin Klein. So he saw, saw something different in me. And it wasn't something of light. He identified the struggles with bulimia.

Koya Bakare [00:05:34]:

And I remember I was going to the bathroom, and he didn't walk all the way in. He was a gentleman. But he waited. He peeped in. He waited at the door. And he said to me, if you do it again, I'm going to tell your father. Now, granted, here's the caveat. He didn't know my dad, but he knew I had so much reverence for my father.

Koya Bakare [00:05:55]:

In my mind's process, my secret is out. And I begged him not to say anything because it really wasn't about the bulimia. So I thought it was about someone else was taking something from me that I held, it's that thing that I had control over. And so I begged him like, no, I'm going to get it together. He was like, you need a therapist. I said, no, I'm fine because I know how to mask. Well, I really thought I was, I thought it was something that, oh, it's a one of, I Can deal with it. I could not. I went home that day, and I said to myself this will be the last time. It wasn't, but the key turning point was I heard a quote from Les Brown, a motivational speaker who happened to be on the television at the time. You couldn't tell me he wasn't speaking to me, but he said, 'If there is no enemy within, the enemy outside would do me no harm.'

Koya Bakare [00:06:59]:

It was then everything started to come together. I had a lot, I had become not my greatest advocate or cheerleader. I became my worst enemy because I used the toxicity, the toxicity that everyone had put into me, those actions that had happened to me, to define my pathway. I felt no different than my abusers because I had then become the abuser. So I called my mother.

Koya Bakare [00:07:28]:

We got into therapy, and it was an uphill battle, but it's the thing that saved my life. So now, during that process, I found my voice. I was able to literally stand when all I could do was crawl. And now I use this platform to say there is hope on the other side. I am a living example. I celebrate life. I rejoice by water.

Koya Bakare [00:07:56]:

And I say that often because I feel the tears coming. Because I remember a time. Darling Christopher, I said I wasn't going to cry.

Christopher [00:08:02]:

But we are your cup. Keep crying. Cry all you want.

Koya Bakare [00:08:05]:

Thank you. And I'm very free with it. But I remember I would think about water as a way to unalive myself. Now, I can't wait to be beside it. I can't wait to hear the birds chirping. There's a, there's a beauty in life that I missed for so long.

Koya Bakare [00:08:31]:

And I use that word purposefully. It doesn't mean that I understand now that I may not, that I'll always have days full of glee. I'm human. There'll be days that may not feel as stellar as I would desire them to, but overall, there's a beauty I celebrate, and I rejoice to be here. So I hope I answered your question. But if I can offer anything at the time, and we're sharing, it's to just inform everyone that there's another side. You just have to, there's a journey that you take, but there's another side, and it's absolutely beautiful.

Heather [00:09:06]:

Thank you. Thank you so much for sharing that. Because there's, I think, what really kind of like hit me in what you were saying is when you were talking about that inner voice that says, I can't even get this right. And there's, you know, that's something that I've heard so frequently from so many different women and, you know, feeling like we're so alone that, like, we just can't seem to get our shit together. So we look to different avenues that we feel we have control, so that it is something in our lives that we can look at to say, this is mine, I own it, and I can control it. And I really, I'm a huge advocate for therapy because I think everyone can benefit from having another perspective and have somebody walk with you as you unpack your life, your trauma, your feelings, and kind of make a roadmap for what lay ahead.

Heather [00:10:03]:

But could you share with our listeners, like, in that journey that you were talking about, or maybe something that was like, to a tool that you found that during your therapy or in your own walk that kind of helped turn the page from where you were to where you are and where you're going?

Koya Bakare [00:10:23]:

Absolutely. Thank you for asking. And I'm gonna use something that's actually current. When I came back into the industry, the pageant industry, I connected with my pageant coach, my now pageant coach, and I thought that I was okay. And not that I was able to coast, but my platform is self-love and power to ignite. And she asked me why this was my platform, what it was? And I went into depth about my life, and she told me she would not work with me unless I went back into active therapy. I was shocked because I thought I was okay. And she said to me, you may think you're okay, and I'm pausing because I feel.

Christopher [00:11:15]:

Go right ahead.

Koya Bakare [00:11:16]:

She, she. She was able to see. I want to be able to articulate. So that's why I'm trying to say, because I'll just talk about, she was able to see that I was masking. You know, I didn't even realize it. So I'm very grateful for her. Of course, she's my.

Koya Bakare [00:11:44]:

She's stuck with me now. I'm like, you're gonna be my man, my manager forever. But what she said to me, and it took six months before she would start to work with me again. I consider myself in active therapy because I would do therapy maybe twice a month. She said, no, you need to go at least once a week, she said, because you have to be able to speak about your trauma and speak to the point of the resiliency while identifying that you've taken yourself out of that circumstance. Again, I thought I was okay. And what she was referencing was that she asked me, where is little Koya? And in referencing that, she was speaking to where the abuse happened. Which was in the home, the basement of the home.

Koya Bakare [00:12:29]:

And I say this to her, she's still in the basement. And she said to me, why haven't you taken her out? That was the turning point for me. I thought again, because I can compartmentalize very well, I can mask it, that having her there in my mind, she was okay. She said, she's not okay until you pull her out and she identifies she's no longer in that space. So, I went back into active therapy, and I was able, after some months, because that was very challenging to me. I had to go back, I had to feel it, I had to see it. I had to open up those caverns of my mind that even knew that I had locked it and threw the key away.

Koya Bakare [00:13:05]:

And so, when I pulled her out, that was the true turning point for me. And if I can surmise that it's identifying those layers that you need to pull back. The work was identifying that they even existed. And then going back, confronting that pain, and then making it whole. It was then that I was able to find this voice. I would not have been able to speak as passionately as endearing. Of course, Lanka said, you would never know. I can say 100%, because I allowed my younger stuff to still stay in that space. Now we've now connected the younger to the older, to the more mature, the more seasoned, if you will.

Koya Bakare [00:13:57]:

And so that was the turning point when I was able to go back in my mind to find out what elements of myself still needed to be healed, to be nourished, to have that green grass to flourish, then breathe. I was suffocating. When I went back mentally, of course, to that space, I was balled up, still in that fetal position, waiting for someone to bring me out. And though it's more of a mental psychological exercise, I felt every step down the stairs. I heard the creak. I smelled the basement. I heard the TV turned up, so no one, so it used to muffle out my screams.

Koya Bakare [00:14:47]:

I saw it all, and I gently pulled her out. Yes, without question, that was the turning point. And my therapist asked me, my name is to belong. As I shared a part of my name is Kenjulae, and it means the treasure. In that therapy, my therapist asked me, why do I reference Koya, the younger self, only as akenjulae and my older self as akenjula? And I said, because they're two separate people. And she said, your healing begins when you can merge them together. And that was part of me still allowing little Koya to be in that basement now. Oh, they have, they are a dynamic duo and everything.

Koya Bakare [00:15:31]:

But to answer your question, it was. The turning point was to be able to go back and to identify those pieces that were still bound with pain. It was anguish, but to no longer, I became comfortable being uncomfortable, if that makes sense. And I no longer wanted to surrender myself consciously yet unconsciously to being a victim of my own mind. I hope that answers your question.

Heather [00:16:03]:

That was honestly very powerful, and I commend you for the work that you've done to go down and get your younger self out of the basement. Some of the most powerful work I've done as well has been going into a visualization of past trauma and realizing that your parent self, you as your older self, can pull your younger self out of the basement. It's, it's incredibly healing work. It's challenging, but to say the least. But I really appreciate hearing your personal story because when we get into the, like, the details of what helped, like, that's where I feel that other people find the courage to go and do that for their own inner child.

Christopher [00:16:58]:

Yeah. I believe that we think that there's some sort of magic pill or magic enchantment that will deliver us from our pain and suffering. However, I also wanted to point out that there's something within you that others saw, even in your suffering. Others saw a light. The man who came to the bathroom, your manager, they saw something in you that was possible. You just had to believe in it eventually. And that's where you've come to.

Koya Bakare [00:17:42]:

Yes. Thank God. Thank God. And though I laugh, I'm so grateful, and I do concur. I'm so grateful to have had my own angels, as I term them, here with me. This journey definitely would not have been possible without others being observant and taking an interest in my own healing and living. Not even knowing what my pathway had been, but they saw a progression from where I was.

Koya Bakare [00:18:23]:

So it's become my life's work. I've been blessed to have amazing opportunities. I've done the Vogues, the Essence. I've done all those. But this is my life's work. It is definitely. I'm very clear as to what my purpose is. And I believe it's the same purpose that others saw in me.

Koya Bakare [00:18:43]:

To be a light, to be of hope. And yeah, yeah, I, I get, I give thanks for them. They literally saved my life. I don't know if they knew it. Now you know it.

Christopher [00:18:59]:

Hopefully, they will hear this. However, give us a picture of what you do now and how you have laid a foundation for others in your position where you were to pull themselves into the light as well.

Koya Bakare [00:19:16]:

Thank you. And so I can talk about the different things, the different titles, MC, facilitator, workshops, and things like that, but the crux of what I do is to speak to the importance of living, to understand that the capacity of your heart is how it vibrates in the rhythm of it, as authored by you. A lot of times I feel, as human beings, the world says that we can give, and we can. We can give unto others, and we can help to be our brother's keeper. Yes, we can. But there's a piece that's missing. I believe, at least I didn't always hear it, that you also need to give that same grace and that amount of love and hope and adoration unto yourself. You should be that first partaker.

Koya Bakare [00:20:02]:

I know for me, I allowed a lot of people to write that story, and I wasn't really clear how to offer that until myself. So that's pretty much what I do, whether it's through workshops, as a keynote speaker, whether on different platforms such as yours, or I'm walking down the street and I see a human being who I just want to offer a hug. People thought I was crazy doing it when this thing called Covid hit the world, but I thought, you know, what better time to allow someone to know that they're cared for, even if you don't know me. But that's what I seek to do, is to offer light and care unto another, just as it was offered to me. I've had a wonderful opportunity to do so many, so many things, not just with this title, which is in my life's journey.

Koya Bakare [00:20:59]:

And I'm blown away, to be very honest. Sometimes I have a talk, not sometimes, oftentimes with my younger self, to say, hey, look at you. Look at you. The piano is my special place. I was trained as a classical pianist, and that same love that I have for music is what I want to. I feel safe; I feel protected when those keys are being tickled. I want to give that same level of love and care when I hug someone.

Koya Bakare [00:21:39]:

The piano is very dear to me. I cherish it. In a sense, they help to save me, too, because I would isolate myself. And I can go on and on on my chatterbox. But I love to speak about just the thread that we all have as human beings. I think sometimes we forget that others need to be reminded that they are important. And that they are cherished. And that they are valued. And that they have a unique position in this world that's purpose just for them. And so that's what I do. I hope to be a beacon of light to remind others that you, too, shine so radiantly and brilliantly. And I get excited every time I meet a new person.

Koya Bakare [00:22:22]:

I hope that answers your question.

Heather [00:22:24]:

Absolutely. I want to kind of hone in on a question that we love to ask our guests because, you know, you've rocked runways, headshots, and crowns, but your definition of Beauty goes much deeper. And we love to ask our guests, you know, what does, you know, one of the names in our show mean to you? So I ask you if there's one of the three Virgin Beauty or Bitch that you want to dive deeper. We'd love to hear your thoughts on that.

Koya Bakare [00:22:56]:

Thank you for asking. Yes, and let me preface it by saying what I don't believe Beauty is. I do not believe that Beauty means that you will be out, that you will be without going, navigating a space that may be uncomfortable. But I do believe that Beauty is being able to be, to become, to exist as that person, the essence of you that has pulled away those layers from what someone else has tried to place upon you. It's being still and residing in your stillness, even though you may be enduring woefulness, even though you may be enduring a place of being uncomfortable. Beauty, to me, the crux of it is generally knowing who you are as defined by you on your own terms.

Koya Bakare [00:24:00]:

That in itself, to me, is work. And I've been thinking more and more about that over this last year because it has such a varied, a myriad of definitions, but it also becomes very personal to me. It's not defined by someone else's authorship. It truly is you being the essence of who you are and being able to be still and resilient in that. And that, excuse me, requires work, too, to identify who actually are you when you take away the titles, and as a partner, as daughter, lover, friend, who are you? And when you get to the crux of that, that, to me, is true Beauty and being able to navigate spaces.

Christopher [00:24:56]:

As that, we cannot express how much we love that answer.

Koya Bakare [00:25:01]:

Thank you.

Christopher [00:25:03]:

That is just profound for us. When Heather and I started this podcast, Beauty was just a word. Over the years that we've been doing this and having these conversations, it is such. It is infinite. The way that you can look at just that one word and every individual person and how they define it, it is infinite. So we truly, from our hearts, appreciate your perspective, especially in contrast to your position, the profession of Beauty as it has been laid out in the world, which a lot of people believe is just trivial, but your message proves that it is beyond trivial. It's absolutely profound. So, thank you so much for expressing that.

Koya Bakare [00:26:09]:

Thank you. Y' all have a good thing going here. I love the energy. I. And it's a salient conversation. I was thinking over your title and just how, as women, there, I say, even human beings, how we wrestle with so many different words, so many connotations that have been applied onto us, and we can be selective in how we want to define that. But I thought of myself, how I now define it for myself, and it goes back to.

Koya Bakare [00:26:46]:

But when I didn't realize that I had that ability, that I could give myself permission to decide to find it for my own life. So your platform is powerful, allowing people to identify that, yes, you can be the author of your own book, your own love story.

Christopher [00:27:05]:

That is the whole point.

Koya Bakare [00:27:06]:

The greatest love story. Your own. I love that.

Christopher [00:27:08]:

That is the whole point.

Heather [00:27:10]:

The greatest love story. I am here for that.

Koya Bakare [00:27:17]:

I love it.

Christopher [00:27:19]:

I cannot thank you enough for opening your heart, sharing your experiences, cracking open your vulnerability, and watering us with your tears, because we grow from that. Thank you so, so much, Koya.

Koya Bakare [00:27:40]:

You're welcome. Thank you for having this. Such a divine and secret space. You're stuck with me now. Thank you all so, so much. This is. This has been so good. I appreciate it.

Christopher [00:27:57]:

Thank you. And you have been listening to the.

Heather [00:28:01]:

Virgin, the Beauty, and the Bitch.

Christopher [00:28:04]:

Find us. Like us. Share us. Please let us know how this touches you. We would love to get your feedback on what it is our guests bring to the table because we find it bountiful and beautiful. So please let us know. To become a partner in the VBB community. We invite you to find.

Christopher [00:28:28]:

Find us @virginbeautybitch.com. Like us on Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn, and share us with people who are defiantly different, like you! Until next time, thanks for listening.