Moments in Time with BLisB (B.lack L.ife is S.imply B.eautiful)

Kwanzaa is an African-American cultural celebration that is based around the Nguzo Saba (The Seven Principles) This story is about the 5th Nguzo Saba NIA (purpose)

It was next to impossible for me to understand the African-American mindset...too many of them hated the exact things that they should love, I thought. Consequently, they loved the things that should be hated. It didn’t seem to matter whether they were educated or uneducated; street cats or PhD’s, rich or poor, or stuffed in between rich and poor. They all seemed to be comfortable with sex, yet fe...

You might not want to hear it, but I’ll tell you anyway. I learned to play my position. I’m not the top guy and I know it. But I’m good right here where I’m standing. You gotta get comfortable letting the top guys run the top. If not, you gotta find another arena to dominate in~Coach Vega

...a groundbreaking exploration of humanity’s oldest documented faith practice; African Spirituality...the author explores the topic across millennia from the times of the Ancient Black Egyptians to contemporary practices on the continent and in the Diaspora....as such, African Spirituality is shown to be an apt umbrella term for the various expressions the world over...

It doesn’t matter what you say. It only matters what you do when it comes to manhood. As long as you’re dependent, you will be considered a boy without options. You will be ruled and loved, but not respected. Our parents respect us when we begin to put into action all of the lessons they took the time to teach us, and when what we put into action brings about real results. ~Midnight

In a girl’s heart there is a desire for adventure. If she doesn’t get it, she creates it. But of course there is a difference between adventure and mischief. Bored girls create mischief...because they are not experiencing adventure, and they don’t know how to get it started. Some of the most evil, most jealous, and rudest girls in Tokyo were the bored ones. Those girls loved chaos, just sat around...

I just needed to distinguish the lions from the tigers, the wolves from the hyenas, the hippos from the elephants and the rats from the snakes. And I needed to do it quick...~Midnight

Aunt Tasha was a foxy owl for sure. But I think her belief that she could read people would end up as her weakness...

The “angry hood chicks” each looked different, with varying degrees of attractiveness. However, on the inside they were mostly all the same. They talked rough, some of them even looked rough, but if the right or even if the wrong man showed them an ounce of attention or affection, he could get whatever he wanted real fast...

Renaming myself took effort. Even though it would not be my real name, I did not want the name of a fool, a clown or a sucker...I’m just one young man up against some hefty circumstances and some dirty players, but I’m still pushing, working, fighting, and most of all believing solidly that I can win...~Midnight

I was thinking about my father, and how he used to challenge me, just like how I was being challenged right then by this man. In both cases they were men who were much older than me, placing me in an unreasonable situation and challenging me to work my way through it and come out clean...I accept the challenge from him, same as I accepted the challenges handed down by my father. In both cases they...

I was born into wealth, and even though I got separated from my wealth and had to start back at the beginning , wealth is not something I think is not within my reach. For me, becoming wealthy is expected, even though it’s not automatic. ~Midnight

This was a business that would earn for me quietly, hardly ever required my presence, and didn’t lock me into a mandatory schedule or location.

My silence so far had drawn out the demons that live in men. Each of them, the cops and the detectives, started off treating me with a certain stance and composure. The more silent I was, the less able they were to wear the masks they were wearing. In minutes for most, and even seconds for others, it became clear what kind of beasts they really were...

We handle the cannon same as we handle the sword. Like Sensei taught us, Don’t pull it out unless you’re ready to use it....What you gonna do next time you see ‘em and you ain’t got it?... That’s why you don’t flash it. Once they know you holding, they gon’ go and get strapped and come looking for you. Then what?

Honor is honesty in action, fairness in action, and integrity in action. Integrity meaning a man has a set of guiding principles or beliefs that he bases his movements, decisions , and actions on. He doesn’t trade those beliefs for anything. If he sees one man or a thousand men doing something that he does not believe in, he doesn’t join them, isn’t swayed by popularity but guided- by principle or...

If a woman loves her man...and the woman knows something that her man does not know, but that he needs to know, but she also knows that if she tells him what he doesn’t know, she’ll probably lose him.... if she doesn’t tell him, it’s betrayal...I already know that’s what it is...~Chiasa

Water going over my head and face, and water in my palms, naturally moves my mind to making prayer. However, I was bloody in an unclean space...with the filth of men impossible to ignore. It was not a praying place. Still, I washed myself as much as I could.

But sometimes, you have to throw cool away for a little while and do what’s best to survive. ~Chiasa

I believe all men are created, period. And each man makes choices and takes action one way or another. What a man chooses to do or not to do is the only way to measure his worth. A man who chooses to love is not equal to a man who chooses not to love. A man who builds is not equal to a man who destroys. A man who protects is not equal to a man who offends and assaults women, children, and defensel...

Sideways, he was the sidewinder type, a poisonous viper that usually sneaks around rapidly sliding sideways across the desert effortlessly.

Sudana would have to chill and learn that she couldn’t love me by force or keep a scorecard somehow declaring herself as the winner.

“Stress, misery and hatred, anger, frustration, and fear were no way for a man to live, and none of it had anything to do with love or family. At least, it shouldn’t. If it does, a man has to make moves, big moves, wise moves. A man has to grind until he sets it right. A man has to set things right in the right setting with the right community. It has to be a community that is working with him, no...

“It’s a powerful thing, this love. It can make your whole world shift.”~Chiasa

This is Jeong you are seeing and hopefully also feeling right now...our people have been attacked, colonized , ruled by dictators. Our families have been under pressure...Even though we are separated by space and time , we are still loving that person, and waiting or fighting or praying for their return. Whenever we are reunited our love is as though they never left. They are welcomed back into th...