In adversity she manages to grow! Under her concrete shell her roots expand. She is vibrant, colorful, and thrives in a place lacking beauty.
Mom
Our nurturing spirit allows us to mold and protect our babies. We find ourselves parenting generations present and those that follow. It is our responsibility to love and endure pain that our children places upon us intentional or not. We are Mother’s working to maintain households, dwellings of others, support systems and rulers! We yearn for our offspring to be better and we are our children’s first call in time of need. Our job is 24hrs a day nonstop 7 days a week! No one can ever replace MOM!
The Power of Old School
There’s this mentality in corporate America!
Managers actions communicates that “We as superiors shouldn’t have to help people! People should have the ability to develop theirselves”
I remember when:
——–The commanders job would be to train and mentor their subordinates because success solely depended on the accomplishments of others.
Turnover is oh so bitter sweet!
Employees find themselves on unemployment before their coached about their mistakes.
Only she KNOWS
Will ones inner desire to be loved, cherished, respected, and kept remain to eat at her soul?
Single City Slicksters
“In life you’ll…
“In life you’ll meet people who will accept you, reject you, challenge, or love you. Let me be the person who will INSPIRE you.”
Delighted to Support Desmond Tutu’s Forgiveness Challenge
Anyone struggling with forgiveness should definitely complete this challenge!
We’re humbled to bring you this interview with Nobel Peace Laureate Desmond Tutu and his daughter Mpho Tutu about their new Global Forgiveness Challenge as well as HumanJourney.com, a platform for transformational ideas that Archbishop Tutu is co-founding with book and media creator Doug Abrams. WordPress.com is delighted to be a partner in this initiative.
Archbishop Desmond Tutu and his daughter, Mpho Tutu are trying to change the world with the Forgiveness Challenge. Get involved!
What is the Tutu Global Forgiveness Challenge?
The Forgiveness Challenge is a free 30-day online program developed to help people learn the practical steps to forgiveness so they can live with greater love and joy in their life.
How does the Forgiveness Challenge work?
Each day, participants receive an email from us that directs them to a new post on the website that presents an important insight into forgiveness and that offers them…
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ME
My mother said she was under the influence of marijuana and could not feel any pain when my 5lb 6oz self entered into the world. It was almost as if I was not meant to fit in anywhere during childhood, finding myself in and out of physical disputes in both middle and my high school years.
“Every time I turn around I have to re-admit your black ass back in school”
My mothers voice echoed off my bedroom walls. I stared, saying to myself “I’m on punishment again. Sofia in ‘The Color Purple’ says it just as I feel…..
“All my life I had to fight”
I fought with my brother and sister, as the oldest of three for respect, especially since dad left our home the day of my eighth grade graduation from Tilden Middle School. Why not? I am the oldest, and I demanded it. I fought with our neighbors children, two or three, at a time and for what I still cannot answer. I fought my way through Bartram High School for grades I did not deserve, expressing with tears dripping down my face as I explained to the guidance counselor how important it was for me to graduate on time. I told her college was something I’ll never get to experience.
Summer of 92′ I needed to work. Finding a job was the answer, so when I finally got my first job at McDonald’s the fight continued. I fought for every promotion, even as a restaurant manager, because I earned it, yet my female coworkers same race and gender as I thought I was a show off. They did not know I needed the extra money to help my mother get the get the electric and water turned back on (grateful for the neighbors who allowed us to run extension cords through the back alley way). I fought with my mom mostly because I never understood her reasoning for quitting every job she had.
“I ain’t working for no damn body” she said every time!
Why was the refrigerator full only around the first of the month? Why did she leave us home alone 3-4 days a week to take care of ourselves?
I got old enough to move out at seventeen. “Yea right” I stopped asking questions. I stopped fighting at least than and moved away from home. I was tired of fighting. I even fought my grandfather who was caught in my locked bedroom, searching for something to sell for a quick fix. Little did I know the fight would continue. My internal fight! I fought with myself every time I made a decision, right or wrong, I fought an internal fight. I constantly asked myself when and where will I fit in.
I’m outgoing…….. people see me as a threat
I work hard………. people see me as an ass kisser, brown nose
I love hard………… even after history repeated itself, as I am now the single parent, raising a young child
I’m vocal………… labeled as aggressive and unapproachable
I’m black African American…….. stereotyped as poor, uneducated, and ghetto
I’m beautiful……… oh, her fat ass needs to loose weight
I’m opinionated………. here comes Miss know it all
The one person I wish I could fight right now, is the woman who hit me upside my head with a cast iron cooking pot. On the other hand, because of her I was able to sit in a jail cell for over eighteen hours, THINKING, and I though hard. Assumed guilty on all those beefed up charges, $7000.00 and a NOT GUILTY later, for the first time I realized life for me was not really that bad. Don’t believe me? Visit the roundhouse and see for yourself. I was loving my enemies. See I was fighting the wrong battles. I played the victim “Woe is me” and instead of wondering why people were treating “poor me” so bad, I started asking myself what was it about me that people could not understand.
Eventually I made it into college. From fighting so much, I became tired. Tired of competing with coworkers to prove I was fit for a job. in a male dominated industry who cares about the black woman with over eleven years of managerial experience. I was tired of competing with other women over men. Not to say that a college degree will help me find my husband but I clearly have a hell of a screening process, after earning an Associates Degree in Behavioral Studies. Yes, I’m tired of struggling, not saying these student loans will keep me from filing bankruptcy. I am realizing now after all the fighting and draining days my continued struggle was God’s way of developing me into the woman I am today.
Realizing this my walk changed, holding my head high, no longer ashamed of my upbringing or the sinful behaviors I’ve demonstrated in the past. I’m fortunate because my life’s story is a blessing to young women who has their mind set on getting an abortion out of fear of becoming a single mother. I’m fortunate financially because every once in a while I’m able to give my local panhandler a dollar or two, and today he just might get a meal. I am fortunate because God knows my heart and he will bless me with the ability to help my sister with her needs, as well as the needs of her six remaining children. R.I.P to my niece Royale Harris, gone at the young age of 13, the same age of my daughter today.
See my self centered self needed every experience and life lesson. My mother till this day does not know how much I really appreciate my upbringing. Growing up in poverty allows me now to be more, do more, love more, and I can forgive. I forgave her because I now understand she had to fight as well. Mom never hid a thing from me because this was her way of teaching ME about life. Straight from my mother’s mouth before every lecture, she would say……..
“Walking, riding, or in difference don’t do as I’ve done, do better, be better.”
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