To start living your best life, you don't need to have vast amounts of capital, work extended hours, nor stay in a lackluster 9 to 5, while spending less time with friends and family. What's the secret? Well, central banking systems and full-time employers hope you never come across these 3 living your best life secrets, but take a look right here and now!

Secret #1: Money versus Currency

The big a-ha with this secret is the paper dollar you carry around in your wallet and checking account is not money. The dollar is just currency. Your paper money does not store value. The dollar is a medium of exchange for goods and services, only! So what is real money? Gold is a store of value, and it is also a medium of exchange for products and services. Gold is real money! The dollar is simply a byproduct of a tree.

And that means when you have an understanding of real money, the financial veil of inexperience is lifted.

Don't neglect this secret because when you understand what real money is, you can never be fooled again! You will start to see money in regards to acquiring assets! This is the number one secret of the wealthy!

Start acquiring real money, gold, on a weekly, bi-weekly or monthly basis.

Secret #2: Pay Yourself First

The core idea is once you start paying yourself first on a consistent basis, you're creating a mental, financial shift. You begin to put yourself first, not only in your finances but also in other areas of your life. Make yourself a priority!

Bottom Line: you are important! Your personal and business goals take priority over all outside entities. 

This is important because by paying yourself first, you're creating a foundation for yourself, your business and future generations. Trust me; your legacy will reap the benefits.

Now make a commitment and pay yourself first on a consistent basis. Start paying yourself first in real money, not just paper currency.

Secret #3: Never Stop Learning

Hear me clearly on this secret: be open and available to new people, new experiences and ultimately a new financial mentality. If a learning opportunity comes your way - take it!

As a business owner, this means you're taking steps to stay relevant in your current industry, all the while remaining knowledgeable of new age technology, trends, and financial news. As a student, you will never become stuck in a commercial or creative rut! Your life and business will progress with the times taking your wealth forward along for the ride.

Don't neglect this secret because knowledge is freedom! The more you know, the broader your pockets and intelligence grow! 

So the next logical step here is to register for the Gold and Bitcoin Boot Camp, to jump-start your finances, your business and your life!

This represents just a summary of the secrets business owners need when it comes to living your best life. With the consequences of ignoring this advice ranging from weeks of wasted effort to throwing tons of money out the window, take the time to educate yourself on the proper methods to start living your best life, while building a legacy of wealth.

Want even more? Well, if you want to start living your best life while building a legacy of wealth, this quick presentation lays it all out for you! Check it out here http://bit.ly/LearnandLiveNow

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Secret #2: http://bit.ly/Secret2PayYourselfFirst
Secret #3: http://bit.ly/Secret3NeverStopLearning
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Returning to Love

We need you like plants need the sun.

You give Us life.  Your rhythm calibrates Our equilibrium.

When I basking in your presence, We're better.

We have a history longer than the Nile.

Your spirit is what We need.

When the wind blows, We hear your struggles.

When it rains, We nurture each other.

We need you like plants need the sun.

When We left, were We forgotten?

During our separation, We both grew weak.

Searching for you was exhausting!

Finding you, vindicated us both!

As time matures, our bond grows more complete.

We need you like plants need the sun.

You give Us life. Your rhythm calibrates Our equilibrium.

Even in death We are never departed. Our Spirits are One! 

Now, our children will know just what to do.

Because now you are re-learning Us as We remember You. 

We are one in the same!

They are Us and We are You!

Loving each of other makes Us STRONG...

Return to Love - show this world what BLACK is all about! 

Rising of the Sun: Mothering a Brown Daughter

Living in this country has afforded me the hard truths of enduring many things.  Personally being of a lighter complexion, I never personally had to face the struggles of colorism. 

I've always heard stories from my friends, how lighter skin girls are concerned prettier.  Even some of my male friends have publicly spoken these same sentiments. I've never really thought about it because my family ranges from light-bright, caramel to smooth deep chocolate brown and even midnight black. I've never had a particular preference for what hue of Black was the best or the most desired. 

The madness of this idiocy didn't truly resonate with me until I had children. When I had my second daughter, I realized just how the minds of my fellow African-Americans had been twisted and tainted. 

My first daughter is my look-a-like.  When my second daughter was born, she had the smooth, caramelized-brown sugar color of her father, my at-the-time husband. My second daughter's complexion has an incandescent glow, meticulously placed high underneath her cheekbones.  

As she smiles, you can see the sunrise in her cheeks! 

Unfortunately, some of my close friends and even family were rudely only concerned with her complexion and not the complexity of God's creation. 

"Oh, the first one looks just like you! The other one doesn't even look like she's yours!" 

Some of the comments hit like covert jabs laced with passive-aggressive sarcasm. Thankfully, at the age of 25, I was still engulfed in living a life of "turn the other cheek politeness."  So I just smiled and responded, "Yes, she favors her father."  The harsh reality was most of these comments came from people who, I know for sure,  personally experienced colorism, had children who endured same treatment or had siblings of a darker complexion.  UMPH!  So do they feel this way about themselves and their family members? 

The psychosis runs deep! 

So now, my two daughters would have to deal with superficial comparisons of their complexion.  My first born enjoying the compliments but feeling sorry for her sister when she was overlooked.  My second daughter, living in a world where her people, pour their senseless house slave vs. field slave mentally into her subconsciousness continuously.

Being forcibly indoctrinated this cultural curse, my daughter learned how to shield herself from self-hate at an early age. One day, in preschool, a lighter student persuaded the other students to not play with my daughter, just because she was darker. Subsequently, I had already prepared my four-year-old daughter for this.  

Even though she was visibility hurt while she told me about her day, I sensed my daughter's pride.  My intelligent, illuminant daughter, with the sun rising in her cheeks told the ill-informed juvenile, "You must have bad parents because you're stupid! You may be lighter, but you're not smarter!"  

So it began.

With every passing year, with every new friend or foe, my daughter has had to protect her self-confidence!  Children telling her, "Your mother looks like the sun, and you look like midnight.", " Are you adopted?", "That must be your Aunt, not your mother."

I never buy my children European dolls.  Why I go out of my way, to introduce them to books and movies with children mirroring their exact beauty. Why I've never permed their hair! Why on every occasion possible, I rename them Beautiful and Pretty! 

I want them to become comfortable with themselves instead of trying to be someone else. 

While living in this country, I know my children will have to endure many things. I have to prepare them for injustices from people who don't look like them while supplying them with the weapons to combat the misguided sentiments of people who share their ancestry.   

My lovely daughter

Maybe one-day colorism will quickly fade, interchangeably as the sun continues to rise in my daughter's cheeks. 

Africa Before the African American

February is Black History in the United States. The shortest month of the year is the time for Americans to celebrate and give tribute to the legacy and achievements of the African American.  Far too often, the memorial and recollection of historical facts of the African American start with the Transatlantic Slave Trade and slavery. Black History does not begin with slavery.  Black History commenced on the continent of origin for the African American - Africa!

Africa is an enormously large continent, not a single country. Before slavery, Africans had a rich and varied history and culture. Africa has and always had an immense municipality of political arrangements including kingdoms, city-states, each with specific and individualized languages and philosophies.

Harpoon Point

The arts, education, and technology flourished in Africa.  The skilled Africans were masters  of medicine, mathematics, and astronomy. They also made luxury items in bronze, ivory, gold, and terracotta (clay-based glazed or non-glazed ceramic). These items were used in daily life and were traded internationally.

Here are five historical facts of Africa and the African before for Transatlantic Slave trade:

1.      Africans were the first to organize fishing expeditions 90,000 years ago. At Katanda, a region in the Zaire (now Congo), historians discovered a finely built series of harpoon points, all elaborately polished and barbed. 

2.     West Africans built in stone by 1100 B.C. In the Tichitt-Walata region of Mauritania, archaeologists found “large stone masonry villages” that date back to 1100 B.C. The villages consisted of roughly circular compounds connected by “well- defined streets”.

Kanem Borno Court, circa 1700 A.D.

3.      Ngazargamu, the capital city of Kanem-Borno, became one of the largest cities in the seventeenth-century world. By 1658 A.D., the metropolis, according to an architectural scholar housed “about a quarter of a million people". It had 660 streets. Many were broad and unbending, reflective of city planning of today.

4.     Ruins of a 300 B.C. astronomical observatory were found at Namoratunga in Kenya. Africans were mapping the movements of stars such as Triangulum, Aldebaran, Bellatrix, Central Orion, as well as the moon, to create a 354-day lunar calendar.

Pillars are aligned with sevev star systems: Triangulum, Pleiades, Bellatrix, Aldebaran, Central Orion, Saiph, and Sirius

5.      Africans were the first to engage in mining 43,000 years ago. In 1964, a hematite mine was  found in Swaziland at Bonvu Ridge in the Ngwenya mountain range. Ultimately, 3,000 artifacts were recovered including thousands of stone-made mining tools. Adrian Boshier, one of the archaeologists on the site dated the mine to be a staggering 43,200 years old.

The history of the African American starts in Africa, not with slavery. The African continent was and still is a rising global economic oasis with endless possibilities.

When we begin to learn our history, no one can influence the importance or relevance of our existence. 

“History is a clock people use to tell their historical culture and political time of the day. It’s a compass that people use to find themselves on the map of human geography. The history tells them where they have been, where they are and what they are. But most importantly history tells a people where they still must go and what they still must be." 

– Dr. John Henrik Clarke

Please comment below and share your thoughts on Africa Before the African American. 

Research: Browder, Anthony Y. Nile Valley Contributions to Civilization Washington, DC: Institute of Karmic Guidance, 1992. Bennett, Lerone. Before the Mayflower: A History of Black America Harmondsworth: 1962 Jackson, John G. Introduction To African Civilizations Foreword by Runoko Rashidi. Introduction by John Henrik Clarke. New York: Citadel, 2001.

Leaves in the Wind, Part II

My oldest daughter was celebrating her 16th year of life, while my youngest is trying to understand the significance of being 5 and entering kindergarten.  Please, I can't forget to mention, my 14-year-old is evolving in her incubation chamber (her room) watching old Michael Jackson videos. 

Each is growing a year older, yet all are experiencing very different phenomenons of life.  

In indigenous African culture, there are different initiation rites to lead individuals through the transformation processes of life.  These ceremonies or rituals are done to ensure each person understands their responsibilities and acquires all the knowledge needed to be successful while encountering new life experiences.  

There are five initiation rites in indigenous African culture:

1. Birth

2. Adulthood

3. Marriage

4. Eldership

5. Ancestorship

Birth - During this rite, the welcomed infant will complete a naming ceremony. Culturally Africans believe each person is born with a specific purpose and a message to share with the world. During the naming ceremony, the infant received his or her name, and it is now the responsibility if the infant's family and community to help the infant remember their purpose. 

Adulthood - Around the ages of puberty, pre-teens are taken through various rites and ceremonies to teach them how to become productive members of society. These lessons are often done away from their families and conducted by respected elders.  During these rites, society rules and restrictions are reinforced, while participants receive a deeper appreciation of their life's missions.  

Marriage - This rite is an essential component of all successful  culture. This ceremony not only joins two families, but also joins two life missions. Marriage in indigenous African societies was communal and not based on external lusts of the flesh and fleeting emotions of attraction. Marriages were respected institutions to assist the young man and women on the journey of completion of their life's missions. Spousal unions were key factors of building thriving communities; the emphasis was the community, not the individuals. When a marriage was successful, the community thrived.

Eldership - There is a significant discrepancy between being an older person and being an elder. An older person has just lived longer, but an elder is a man or women who has earned admiration and respect in their families and communities.  Elders are the keepers of traditional and providers of cherished wisdom. Becoming an elder in an African population is the highest compliment. Elders and infants are a prized possession of all African communities. These two groups, elders and infants, are said to be the to God

and the spiritual world.  Infants have just left the spiritual world and elders are closer to returning. 

Ancestorship -  When a respected elder passes, then the final rite of Ancestorship is initiated. Ancestors are the respected deceased of the community. The esteemed ancestors are called on behalf of their families and communities to solidify certain matters in the physical world. Indigenous African traditions believe staying in continuous communication with their respected ancestors after they have passed, is a source of increased power, balance and divine reciprocity.

Like leaves blowing in the wind, many of us are still mentally between birth and adulthood.  

We have no direction and indeed no clue of our life's purposes and missions. We're tumbling continuously in hopes of finally landing in a safe place. Letting the life and traditions of others toss us beyond all comprehensible control.  It's time we learn who we are and stop allowing other people determine our velocity and bearings.  

By traditional African standards, we're all behind and living outside of our life's purposes. We could learn something for the rites if of indigenous African cultures. When we know better, we can do better!  No more leaves blowing in the wind, but immortal spirits motivated by ancestral excellence, rooted in divine purpose. 

I'm here to be a mother, so welcome to my motherly advice or as I like to call it Motherly Love!