Thursday, December 4, 2014

Tobacco, Sugar and other Killers

I have been crying at my desk today. Since 2001 I have been searching for ways to change mindsets. In college it was Black Out days and emails sent from Ghana during September 11th telling my peers never to forget that our country has waged so many wars on so many defenseless. It was writing articles for The Argus about my fear of white men and organizing reparations panels. Out of college, it was rolling through the United States with Youth4Reparations, working to educate young people in high schools and colleges about the issues and working to build our own 100 year plan. In my young adult life it looked like teaching 8-year-olds everything in the 3rd grade curriculum via project-based learning, all through the lense of the African Diaspora (listening to Bob Marley and Nas' "I Can," studying Egypt then visiting the Brooklyn Museum and hearing Tyriek ask the tour guide: "If all of this stuff is here, what's left in Egypt," having them build a Museum in our class of African and African-American scientists and inventors). After that, I sent friends and family to complete the Curriculum for Living at Landmark Education so that we could complete our relationship to the past and create futures that call us powerfully into audacious moments of Now. And today, that looks like living the life of a Social Architect and Chief Dream Director - generating experiences for people to "get their lives." And yet, today, I feel like my work is just beginning. What a time to live in.