This Black History month, I would like to feature Toni Morrison, for her literary excellence. Toni Morrison is a Nobel Prize Winner, a Pulitzer Prize winner, and awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Morrison is an American writer noted for her examination of Black experience (particularly Black female experience) within the Black community. Let's take a moment to honor this literary genius this, black history month.
Toni Morrison, original name Chloe Anthony Wofford, (born February 18, 1931, Lorain, Ohio, U.S.—died August 5, 2019, Bronx, New York), American writer noted for her examination of Black experience (particularly Black female experience) within the Black community. She received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1993.
Morrison grew up in the American Midwest in a family that possessed an intense love of and appreciation for, Black culture. Storytelling, songs, and folktales were a deeply formative part of her childhood. She attended Howard University (B.A., 1953) and Cornell University (M.A., 1955). In 1965 Morrison became a fiction editor at Random House, where she worked for a number of years.
Morrison’s first book, The Bluest Eye (1970), is a novel of initiation concerning a victimized adolescent Black girl who is obsessed by white standards of beauty and longs to have blue eyes. This book was my introduction to Toni Morrison. I loved this book. I loved the character, how Morrison showed a poor black girl struggling not only with her looks but with becoming a young lady, and wanting to be beautiful like her white blue eye dolls. At the time when I read this book a lot of black women were putting in blue contact lenses including my daughter. This book really brought it home and allowed black women to start loving our skin, eyes, hair and black features.
In 1973 a second novel, Sula, was published; it examines (among other issues) the dynamics of friendship and the expectations for conformity within the Black community.
Song of Solomon (1977) is told by a male narrator in search of his identity; its publication brought Morrison to national attention. Tar Baby (1981), set on a Caribbean island, explores conflicts of race, class, and sex.
Toni Morrison became mainstream with her critically acclaimed book called Beloved (1987), which won a Pulitzer Prize for fiction, is based on the true story of a runaway slave who, at the point of recapture, kills her infant daughter in order to spare her a life of slavery. A film adaptation of the novel was released in 1998 and starred Oprah Winfrey. The again was powerful for me. The character of Beloved was played to perfection by Thandiwe Newton and showcases how Sethe’s guilt, played by Oprah Winfrey can reincarnate and haunt us in this life.
In 1992 Morrison released Jazz, a story of violence and passion set in New York City’s Harlem during the 1920s. Subsequent novels were Paradise (1998), a richly detailed portrait of a Black utopian community in Oklahoma, and Love (2003), an intricate family story that reveals the myriad facets of love and its ostensible opposite. A Mercy (2008) deals with slavery in 17th-century America. In the redemptive Home (2012), a traumatized Korean War veteran encounters racism after returning home and later overcomes apathy to rescue his sister. In God Help the Child(2015), Morrison chronicled the ramifications of child abuse and neglect through the tale of Bride, a Black girl with dark skin who is born to light-skinned parents.
It is great to showcase Toni Morrison's work for, Black History month, because The central theme of Morrison’s novels is the, Black American experience; in an unjust society, her characters struggle to find themselves and their cultural identity. Her use of fantasy, her sinuous poetic style, and her rich interweaving of the mythic gave her stories great strength and texture. In 2010 Morrison was made an officer of the French Legion of Honour. Two years later she was awarded the U.S. Presidential Medal of Freedom. Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am (2019) is a documentary about her life and career.
So What is, self- confidence? How do we define, self- confidence, and what does it look like?
Self-confidence, comes from building your confidence muscle. It increases with positive input from your parents, peers, loved ones and from your personal victories.
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In Today's #podcast Arifah and I are talking on the topic of How to build, Self-confidence, we want to shed some light on one of the top struggles of , African American women, self-confidence,
In the co-host chair today is registered, social worker and mental health counselor, Ms Arifah Yusuf.
What is Self-Confidence?
The most important thing to remember about, self- confidence, is that we were born with it. It is our natural state.
How many of you remember your play days as kids? As a child I was always the doctor or teacher.
Boys have no fear. They would climb to the tallest point in their home, put on a cape and jump! They were Superman!
So I would define, self- confidence, as certainty. Confident and certain that you are able to handle your job, your family, social events and personal relationships.
Self-confidence, comes from building your confidence muscle. It increases with positive input from your parents, peers, loved ones and from your personal victories.
But a large percentage of, African American women, and men suffer from a lack of, self-confidence, because of negative input from parents, peers, and loved ones.
Usually centered on their intellect, the color of their skin, their hair, their lips, their butt, the section of town they live, their lack of designer clothing, and the list goes on.
It is important to note that lack of, self-confidence, always comes from negative comments that you believe. If you don't let these negative comments in, they will never take root and grow.
Here is a story showcasing how a lack of, self-confidence, usually starts.
A surgeon opened his office one day and found a tall black man in the waiting room. He was six feet four inches tall and towered over the surgeon. He complained about his lip. You see his underlip protruded out from his top lip. His girlfriend told him she was ashamed to be seen in public with him because of his ugly lip; so he came to the surgeon to get it fixed.
The surgeon told him there was nothing wrong with his lip, it was just a minor protrusion. The black man insisted on getting it fixed; so the surgeon gave him an outrageous price of $1200 hoping he would go away.
He did, he said that he didn't have that kind of money. But lo and behold, he came back the next day with a little black bag in his hand. He dumped the contents on the table. Bills poured out, his life savings; $1200 worth!
The doctor was shocked. He didn't want to deprive the man of his life savings so he made him an offer. He agreed to do the surgery for a smaller fee on the condition that he tell his lady love that he paid $1200 for the surgery.
The operation was simple enough and one week later all the bandages came off and the man had a smaller lip he was proud of. All the surgery was done inside the lip so he had no visible scars except for a small scar inside the lip. The man was happy, he strode from the doctor’s office full of, self-confidence, A commanding figure. Tall, black and proud.
However a few weeks later he was back in the surgeon’s office. His body seemed to have shrunk, his hands lost their strength, his voice squeaked. The doctor asked him what happened to him.
He said “the African Bug, sir. It got me and it's killing me”
He told the doctor after he removed the bandages he went to see his lady love. She loved his lip and asked him how much he paid for the surgery. When he told her $1200, she became enraged and cursed him saying she could have used that $1200 and accused him of hiding the money from her. She cursed him and told him he would die.
Deeply troubled and hurt, the man laid in his bed for 4 days worrying about this curse that was going to kill him. Then running his tongue around, he discovered the horrible thing inside his mouth. He went to see a medical doctor who checked his mouth and confirmed that “the slimy African bug was stuck inside his mouth and it was indeed killing him.
The surgeon looked at this diminished and fearful man and asked him “Is it really in your mouth?”
“Yes sir,” the man said “the doctor tried to help get rid of it with liquids, pastes and potions – but nothing worked. The curse is too strong”. It’s burned inside my lip.
“Your lip?”
“Yes sir” the man said
“You didn't say lip before”
The doctor ran his finger at the back of the man's lip and told the disbelieving man that “the bug” was no more than scar tissue from his surgery.
The disbelieving man looked up in wonder and asked “then there is no African bug?”
The man stood up. Instantly he seemed to have regained his full height and strength. A rich smile spread over his face and his voice boomed out again. His, self-confidence, had returned.
The moral of this story is that you can’t get your, self-confidence, from other people. You have to take inventory of your strengths and weaknesses and deal with them on your own terms.
Let's bring Arifah into this, self-confidence, conversation. Arifah is a, registered social worker, specializing in, mental health issues. She is the founder and program director of Lifted by Purpose.
Lifted by Purpose Provides a diverse range of services including training, workshops with the intent to engage youth in conversations about mental health and learn practical strategies to cope with life stressors.
Arifah I am sure that a large population of your clients suffer from a lack of, self-confidence, Why do you think that is?
I think there are many reasons young people lack, self-confidence, I often work with young people who experienced unhappy childhoods or maybe their parents neglected them in some way or they weren't involved much in their lives.
Also I'd say lack of, self -confidence, sometimes comes from negative input from teachers or authority figures in their lives. Sometimes teachers have a way of saying things that discourage young people. Making them feel inadequate made and like they couldn't be successful. That kind of influenced how they feel about themselves and their, self-confidence, I'd also say young people who have experienced trauma or bullying from their peers can obviously influence their, self-confidence,
I believe that when young people don't value themselves and sometimes that comes from people not validating them, they often lack, self-confidence,
How to Build Your Self-Confidence through Courageous acts
As a, life coach, I believe that Courage is a byproduct of, self confidence,
It takes courage to walk up on stage and speak to an audience large or small.
It takes courage to call that guy you like and ask him out.
It takes courage to go into that interview even though you have no idea what you are going to say.
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So how do you make yourself, Face the Fear, but do it anyway?
Tell yourself that it is not going to kill you.
My grandmother used to say “What doesn't kill you makes you stronger”
And that's exactly what, Feeling the fear but doing it anyway does for you. It makes you stronger, it builds your, self-confidence, muscle because even if you bombed you got practice and practice also makes perfect!
Here are my steps to build your, self-confidence, muscle on public speaking or doing a presentation at work.
You can start by writing out your speech word for word and just read it
Then as you get more, self- confidence, and your brain recorded that you did not die, you weren't booed off the stage, nobody laughed at you.
So the next step is to write out the headlines and speak from the heart on your headlines
Sooner or later you will have, self- confidence, muscles like Arnold Schwarzenegger or Tony Robbins and command the attention of the audience.
Arifah What are your steps to building the, self-confidence, muscle?
I find that it wasn't only their, self-confidence muscle, that needed to be built up, it was their self-worth, it was a whole bunch of things there was all built into the one thing. If we were to put a label on it, it would be that we're not enough.
You would not believe how many people feel that they are not enough; even the most successful
people like, Michelle Obama, in her book “Becoming Michelle Obama” felt that she wasn't good enough. Why did she feel that way? Because she was black and from the south side of Chicago!
As, African American women, we have got a lot of things that we have to deal with, we just have to believe that we are all born with purpose and with the love of God.
I have seven steps that I use to help my clients gain, self-confidence:
Self-reflection – every time I meet with them, I allow them to self-reflect on their day self-reflect on things that were happening in their lives with gratitude.
Acknowledgement and self-acceptance – what makes them unique because everybody is unique.
Positive reinforcement – praising their effort and not obsessing over mistakes.
Mastering a skill – I had the girls work on a project. They created their own YouTube video. Everyone mastered a skill in the production of the video.
Communication skills – I do a lot of exercises around different forms of communication. Assertiveness, passive, passive aggressive etc.
Positive self-talk and affirmations – paying attention to their internal dialogue
Pay it forward – giving back helps build, self-confidence,
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