This year for myself, I added to my vision board reading 1 book a month by black authors. It has been off to a GREAT start so far. I want to share my reviews of these books so that others can reap the benefits of my readings and I can simply share my opinions. January - "Blackbirds" by Eric Jerome Dickey So, I purchased this book 2 years ago for a friend who was in the hospital. She gave it back, it sat on my shelf for a year. Eric Jerome Dickey and I have a long standing relationship. I fell in love with his writings in 2005. Books I had no business reading as a teenager, but he talked about things I had no knowledge of such as sex, love and weird family dynamics. I can honestly say he taught me a lot. From "Milk in My Coffee" to "Cheaters" and even "Between Lovers" I could imagine or even see myself in his characters. I spent plenty of summer days curled up on the couch at Cedar Valley College reading his work. So reading this book w
As I sit here in DFW international airport reading "Don't Settle For Safe" by Sarah Jakes Roberts, I am compelled to write on the importance of setting boundaries. Boundaries keep us safe. Safety is a primary foundational component of Maslow's hierarchy of needs. Basically, we need boundaries at our core in order to survive. Relationships are one of the hardest areas of our lives to create and maintain boundaries. Why is this? Our need for acceptance tugs at our inner being to disregard the natural boundaries that our conscience created for us. Whatever it may be- friends, significant others, parents or siblings we want to be accepted. But at what cost do we pursue acceptance? As I have grown and matured in all things called life, I realized that I had created boundaries that were too loose as well as disregarded others all together. I had to realign myself to think in terms of boundaries when approaching any situation. Here are a few of the questions I asked myse