There are so many layers of absurdity and meaning to Boots Riley’s latest film, I Love Boosters, that it’s hard to know what to focus on. I was crying laughing at so many moments and I hope more of you go to see it. I Love Boosters features great comedic performances from stars Keke Palmer, Naomi Ackie, Taylour Paige, Poppy Liu, Eiza González, LaKeith Stanfield and Demi Moore. It’s about a group of thieves who steal from Demi Moore’s fashion line, but more than that it’s about the global economic system and the ways it subjugates workers and consumers. It’s about a way forward from the ensh-ttification and commoditization of our lives that seems idealistic but achievable. Plus it’s a visual and intellectual feast. Riley makes highly entertaining and bonkers films with the underlying theme of capitalism’s abuses. I also recommend his Amazon series I’m a Virgo and his first film, Sorry to Bother You.

I wanted to talk about Keke Palmer’s Ted Talk, where she describes helping lift her family out of poverty through her career as a child actress. She’s mentioned this before, and it sounds like she’s processed her childhood and is ready to share what she’s learned. As a fellow perfectionist and Type A personality, I came away with some advice I’m going to take to heart. Here’s some of what she said, and you can watch the video below:

Her introduction
But today, I’m going to share my story with you. Not as a survivor soliloquy, but to expose a pattern, because survival can be so effective, you don’t realize when it’s no longer serving you.

She was able to lift her family out of poverty through her career
Then I got a self-titled Disney Channel pilot, and I starred in my own movie. Suddenly, we had access to a life that didn’t require constant vigilance. Each opportunity gave way to a world we never knew was possible. We no longer shared rooms, we had a car that worked, my parents weren’t stressed about bills or their ability to get the best education for me and my three siblings.

It got to the point where my career became the center of our orbit, and not because we chased success, but because it bought us freedom. That’s when performing stopped being something I did for fun and something we relied on.

She learned from her son how to rest and understood why her mother didn’t give that to her
By every external measure, I made the system work for me. And then I had a son. His name is Leodis, and every year, my son and I do these elaborate Halloween costumes…

He knows how to perform — they’ve become full-on productions, and it’s a cool way to share what I do with him.

But this past year after it was over, I noticed something. He was exhausted. And not the kind where you just fall asleep — the kind where you keep running and running and yelling and screaming.

I thought once we got into the car he’d fall asleep, but he didn’t. He couldn’t, and that scared me. So I pulled over, took him out of his seat and held him real tight. And he was fighting me. I kept saying, “It’s OK to rest, you can rest. I’ve got you.”

After one last slap to my face, he fell asleep.

When we got home, I still had work to do, but I had one hour free. So I laid down, closed my eyes, and before I knew it, the hour was gone. I hadn’t slept one bit. My mind kept running.

Then my mom walks in saying it’s time to go, and I get angry with her. She has no clue what’s going on — now I’m crying, feeling this delayed sense of grief,
realizing I’m acting like my son and expecting my mother to do what she never could.

Not because she didn’t love me, but because survival taught her to value propulsion. Moving forward mattered more than being healed.

[Transcript via YouTube, headers added]

It’s so true that we get stuck in these patterns of survival that no longer serve us. A therapist once told me that it’s like a well-trodden road the neurons in your brain go down over and over. You have to retrain them to go a different way that’s less comfortable and familiar.

Having a child also helped me process trauma. When you see how vulnerable they are, you realize how blameless and impressionable you were at that age. It helped me understand how much I had internalized things I could not control. Keke is definitely reminding me to take a break and rest. And to question a lot of things that no longer serve me.

Here’s the trailer for I Love Boosters. It’s so worth seeing in the theater!

Photos credit: IMAGO/RW/Avalon, Mediapunch/Backgrid, Xavier Collin/Image Press Agency/Avalon