Lived Experiences

A few years ago, I had the life-changing pleasure of visiting Cuba. I was first introduced to African Traditional Religions (ATRs) in Atlanta, Georgia, and delved into them deeper after moving to South Florida. That spiritual path is what ultimately led me on this trek to offer assistance to the people there. Actually, they ended up helping me.

What I found was totally unexpected. The Cuban people took me straight back in time to my ancestry. Somehow, isolated from the hyper-commodification of the West, they had preserved the Yoruban language as well as the liturgical terms of Bakongo traditional religions (Palo). More than that, they had preserved a deep sense of community, and they understood what maturity really is.

On the streets, old cars I wasn’t even familiar with drove by quietly. Many women walked to their destinations, while others piled onto the backs of flatbed trucks acting as municipal transportation. In Cuba, you almost have to be a mechanic with your own personal gas supply just to keep a vehicle running.

Numerous garlic and onion vendors lined the streets, a stark contrast to the massive Western supermarkets; here, there are no pantries overflowing with imported spices. Yet, the atmosphere was profoundly quiet and peaceful.

I watched a group of men—who appeared to be prisoners—working together to cut grass with machetes. Yes, machetes. Oil and gasoline were far too precious to waste on lawnmowers, but the grass looked as if it had been manicured by an expensive machine. I stared at the borders of the lawns, marvelling at how they got the edges to look so perfectly trimmed without a single weed eater in sight.

That evening, I was given my portion of hot water to bathe. The water was poured into a single bucket, and I proceeded to get into a bathtub lined with beautiful royal blue tile to clean myself. I was warned explicitly to be careful not to drink the tap water. I turned on the shower nozzle just to check — only a trickle of water so the bucket I used. Outside, clothing hung on lines at every single residence, catching the island breeze to dry. The Cuban people are are incredibly clean.

The next morning, the rhythm of the neighborhood began early. Everyone hosed down their front porches. Old-style, heavy plastic telephones—the exact kind my grandma used to have—rang inside the houses as neighbors and family checked on one another. I was offered a small cup of Cuban coffee poured from a standard thermos, the kind most Americans fill up to drink entirely by themselves on the way to work. This thermos, however, was meant for at least twelve adults to share.

Taking a walk, I marveled at the vibrant, wild hibiscus blooming against the cracked concrete. I listened to the hum of people chatting over strong coffee and Cuban cheese sandwiches. The sandwiches didn’t have a speck of meat in them, but somehow, they tasted incredibly rich, as if they did. I walked past an old school that looked completely abandoned and boarded up from the outside. Yet, people were quietly filing in and out, carrying bags they had brought from home to collect their rations of rice and beans. (There was so much beer and rice offered to me that first day that I couldn’t even finish dinner; I was completely full, though the food was very good and served with love and hospitality.)

An attractive black woman was walking home in the blazing sun—spotless, content, carrying her portion of food. Her husband waited for her at the front of their home, which was secured by fencing, as so many properties were. Many of the yards had small Chihuahuas standing guard, and you could hear the low, quiet murmur of family conversations floating through the air. The lack of abundant meat meant the local diet was heavy on starches, which unfortunately bred high rates of diabetes, though the constant walking and physical exercise clearly helped stave off the worst effects of the high glucose levels.

Looking closely at the men, I noticed an intense, quiet seriousness about each of them. Looking into their eyes, I knew instantly: this is a man who is prepared to die for his family.

The next day, we held a spiritual celebration, and the entire community gathered. Despite my many questions, they let me know subtly that they did not want to mention Fidel Castro’s name, but it wasn’t out of simple disdain; it was something far more complex, a heavy acknowledgment of their history. They talked openly about the desperate need for healthier foods, and a few mentioned wanting to go to other places, but most possessed a grounded, sober knowledge that they would never leave this mountainous island. I was shocked by the sheer density of Black people there. It quickly became clear that they, of all Cubans, were the least likely to be approved for legal expatriation. Yet, despite the material scarcity, the people rejoiced. They were of a completely different quality, a different mind—possessing an admirable, hard-won maturity.

Upon returning to the United States, with its sprawling big-box stores, gas-hogging SUVs, and endless gas stations, I sat down and cried. I cried because, in my opinion, the people of America have become soft and fat, like the spoiled children of a mafia boss—competing endlessly on social media and laughing mindlessly in amusement parks.

In later years, I visited a small, remote island in the Bahamas and found a different version of the same systemic scar. I couldn’t even find a basic fingernail file in the local stores. The southern part of that island was rife with luxury resorts and exclusive gated communities built for wealthy Americans. Meanwhile, I looked at the locals and wondered what would happen to the natives if a crisis hit—they didn’t even have a functioning fire truck to put out a house fire. What had happened to completely stifle and cripple these Caribbean nations?

The Historical Blueprint of Subversion: Over 80 Systemic Displacements

Some say, “why can’t these people fix their own countries?” The stagnation, infrastructure deficiencies, and enforced material deprivation observed across the Caribbean and the global south are not accidental structural failures; they are the direct outcomes of a systematic, centuries-long foreign policy playbook. Over its roughly 250-year history, the United States government has actively interfered with, destabilized, or orchestrated regime changes in between 72 and over 80 sovereign nations globally. This institutionalized strategy relies on a wide array of methods—from covert intelligence operations and the funding of domestic insurrections to crippling economic embargoes, trade isolations, and direct military interventions. By actively dismantling the political and economic sovereignty of these nations to assert global dominance, this policy has penalized societies for attempting to govern themselves independent of Washington’s financial and corporate sphere, trapping regional populations in artificial scarcity.

The table below documents the instances in history where the U.S. government bypassed proxy warfare to execute the direct capture, arrest, forced removal, or immediate political displacement of a foreign head of state or sovereign leader:

Name	Country	Date	Summary Reasoning
Queen Liliʻuokalani	Hawaii	January 1893	Displaced under immediate duress by landing U.S. Marines to protect American corporate and sugar monopolies.
President Francisco I. Madero	Mexico	February 1913	Arrested inside the National Palace via a coup conspiracy explicitly coordinated by the U.S. Ambassador.
General Manuel Noriega	Panama	December 1989	Extracted via full-scale military invasion and flown to Florida to face federal drug trafficking charges.
President Saddam Hussein	Iraq	December 2003	Tracked to an underground hideout by U.S. special operations forces and held in military custody following the 2003 invasion.
President Jean-Bertrand Aristide	Haiti	February 2004	Forcibly removed from his residence by armed U.S. security personnel and flown into foreign exile.
President Nicolás Maduro	Venezuela	January 2026	Seized from his quarters in Caracas during a direct U.S. military raid and extracted to face federal charges in New York.

The Reality of the Internal Sanctuary

When the macro-environment feels like a playground of immaturity, a distinct, deliberate strategy emerges: the choice to stay and turn entirely inward. Throughout history, global thinkers, writers, and philosophers outside the Western mainstream have documented this exact phenomenon, proving that choosing not to expatriate is an active, strategic reclamation of sovereignty within the walls of your own home.

1. Insilio: The Latin American Strategy of Internal Exile

In Latin American history, particularly during eras of intense political decay and societal instability, intellectuals developed a vital distinction between exilio (fleeing the country) and insilio (internal exile). The renowned Uruguayan essayist and poet Mario Benedetti wrote extensively about this psychological boundary. When a person cannot or will not leave their homeland because the foreign alternatives present their own structural or discriminatory hurdles, they practice insilio. Benedetti noted that internal exile is a fierce, deliberate act of cultural and spiritual preservation. You refuse to let the outside society alter your standards of dignity. Instead, you build an unyielding psychological border at your front door, maintaining your values, intellect, and peace completely out of reach of the public square.

2. L’arrière-boutique: The French “Back Shop” Philosophy

During the 16th century, France was fractured by brutal religious conflicts and massive social breakdown. In response to this chaotic environment, the philosopher Michel de Montaigne conceptualized the ultimate home sanctuary. He argued that a mature individual must maintain a dual existence, coining the term l’arrière-boutique (the room behind the shop):

“We must reserve a back shop all our own, entirely free, in which to establish our true liberty and principal retreat and solitude.”

In this European tradition, navigating an immature or frustrating society requires treating the outside world as a mere transaction. You step onto the “playground” only to manage the mechanics of daily survival—running the business, paying the bills, interacting as necessity demands. But you reserve your true soul, your highest intellect, and your deep peace strictly for the back room, where the dominant culture has absolutely no jurisdiction.

3. Spatial Reclamation: Reclaiming Control in Post-Colonial Theory

When analyzing the modern exhaustion of navigating societies deeply impacted by colonialism and global power plays, contemporary spatial and post-colonial theorists highlight the profound political act of domestic reclamation. When the state, the economy, or the dominant public culture fails to offer a mature, dignified environment, individuals stop looking to the macro-system for fulfillment. Instead, they transform their immediate households into an unassailable fortress of survival. Within these fiercely guarded sanctuaries, the rules, values, and psychological noise of a hostile or broken system are completely suspended, allowing alternative, deeply personal standards of ancestral maturity and individual peace to thrive.

4. The Realism of “Más vale malo conocido…”

The decision to stay put is often guided by a cross-cultural piece of wisdom used daily across Spain and Latin America:

“Más vale malo conocido que bueno por conocer.”

(Better the bad that is known than the good yet to be known.)

Sociological frameworks tracking global migration patterns—such as studies out of the University of Salamanca—demonstrate that this maxim is a profound tool for psychological calculations. Choosing to deal with the “devil you know” is an acknowledgment of global realities. For many, navigating the domestic frustrations of a flawed system is a far more calculated, sustainable choice than exposing one’s peace to the chaotic, unknown dangers, economic isolation, and systemic discrimination of an unfamiliar foreign landscape.

Conclusion: An Indictment of Immaturity

This perspective is an unapologetic indictment against my own country’s leadership, born not out of a desire for its destruction, but from a profound exhaustion with its moral decay. Yet the U.S. has not banked on the resiliency of the foreigners affected by their regime.

Leadership has a direct impact on citizens. Many adults in America have become deeply immature, selfish, and coddled; they still throw volatile temper tantrums the moment they do not get their way. Fathers abandon their households and walk away from their biological children every single day—contrasting sharply with the men of oppressed nations who routinely risk their lives crossing treacherous oceans just to afford their families a future. In America more than half of all children will experience father absence at some point before the age 18.

I cannot fail to mention the systematic oppression and over-policing of people of color in America. According to the most recent comprehensive data from the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS), people of color make up approximately 69% of the total sentenced prison population in state and federal facilities and it is not because white people don’t commit crimes. It is because the judicial system is more lenient on them.

Adulthood is fundamentally stunted in this country, and that widespread psychological regression is precisely why the government is as fractured and toxic as it is. True change must happen, but until the macro-culture grows up, the only victory lies in mastering the fortress of your own home.