Final Exams: A Uplifting Way to Procrastinate

Hey folks,

these are three blogs I just found that are completely worth taking the time to "productively procrastinate" and sneak a glance at...

Sassy Women is a really cool blog for women of color in their early twenties-thirties... check it out... its fun, serious and inspiring

The Change Blog... this blog is great if you are having a hard time getting/staying motivated and/or inspired. It is full of great tips... including... how to motivate yourself to wake up early everyday, being more productive and staying organized, living a healthier lifestyle, decreasing stress, and living more consciously... take a look, I promise you will love it.

Motivation Mama.... having a hard time getting started in the morning? Check out this blog!

good luck all, and don't stress to much...

peace.

What I learned about being a good scholar in 2008

I originally wrote this just to post in my own house... but I figured that since it was useful to me, maybe it would be useful to you as well...

• Brilliance isn’t something that just happens, it is cultivated.
- Presentations and workshops stimulate your intellect, creative thought doesn’t just happen in an isolated vacuum. Make time and go!
- You must read and you must write notes about what you read. Read for papers, read for exams, read for classes and when you don’t have any of that to do, read what you know others in your field have read and are reading. You are more than capable of engaging those around you when you come to the table with the proper tools.

• There is a lot of value in being theoretically AND empirically strong. Don’t allow one to become stronger than the other. The scholars you admire most are able to study whatever they want, because they have the skills to do so.

• Your presence matters. Show up, speak up and engage your department.

• Living fearfully is not living.

• Your sanity, happiness and health are just as necessary for brilliant scholarship as your academic work. Never neglect yourself.

• Continue to build relationships. The people you meet now will be your colleagues for the rest of your life.

• A plan for the day/week/month/year/career are critical to achieving your goals. Everyday should be structured, everyday should be composed of a series of tasks so at the end of the day, you can feel that you’ve made some progress.

• Failure is an imposter. Things not going to plan just means there is an opportunity about to happen that you failed to anticipate.

• When you go to campus you are going to work, always dress the part!

• You are blessed to be where you are.

• Everyone doubts themselves sometimes, even those you admire the most.

• Sometimes you have to be able to respect the work, even if you don’t respect the person.

• Stay creative! Creative thought is what matters at the end of the day! ☺

peace.

Why Are We Being So Ridiculous About the Obamas?

I haven't had much time to blog lately, mostly due to the large workload that never fails to sneak up on you at the end of the quarter...

So... I'm going to do another quick post...

Can I just make one thing clear?

Michelle and Barack Obama are not anybodies Messiah... they are not indicative of the Second Coming... they are not God's gift to the world... and they do not represent the defeat of racism against African Americans, sexism and misogyny against black woman and every other kind of oppression present in the world...

... they just don't...

I'm frustrated because I feel like black people are being totally unrealistic on this one...

Every girl friend I have has had a facebook status talking about how shes looking for "her Barack" at least once... and a significant number of my male friends have had status msg's about how they are lusting after Michelle...

Whats worse... are the articles like the one recently printed in Newsweek that goes so far as to argue that it is Michelle Obama's responsibility to represent all black women everywhere and to fight every negative stereotype thats ever existed about them.

I hate to disapoint everyone... but it's really not...

Now don't get me confused, like most of my friends I am a bigger fan of Michelle, than I am of Barack. And I continue to get excited about the presence of all those black women in the White House... living and not serving... I love the thought of soul food cooking in the White House kitchens and hot combs and pink hair oil in the bathroom...

But at the end of the day, our communities compulsive need to find a new "messiah" to represent us, in the way we fantasize Malcolm and Martin once did, is ultimately what cripples our journey toward social justice in this country. We point to the Obama family as the answer to harmful stereotypes about our families, our women and our men.

We argue, like the Newsweek article did, that if there are just enough "good examples," then suddenly racial and gender injustice will just suddenly stop being present in our lives.

When the reality is... at the end of the day... it just really isn't that simple...

And I would think the larger presence of articles about Michelle Obama's ass... than articles about what she brings to the White House as First Lady... would be indicative of that...

a la higher learning....

WAKE UP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

peace...

"I Will Be Your President To..."

I don't know how most people felt about last night's speech, but I was truly moved. I was probably more moved or at least just as moved, as I was during his speech after winning Iowa in January 2008.

I'm going to keep this short, but I want to point out one part of this speech that I found particularly poignant.

President Obama told those Americans who did not support him that, "he would be their president to." On the most basic level he was letting those Americans know that he would listen to their concerns and that he will do his to best to address them in a way that makes them feel like they have a place in his... our... new America.

But it seemed to me, that on a deeper level, he was also saying something more aggressive and commanding. By saying "I will be your president to," he was telling those nay sayers who used everything from his race, to his age, to his "community organizing" in a attempt to discredit him, that he was now their president. That picturing him as a monkey, or putting his picture on food stamps, or claiming the White House for "whites only" would no longer be acceptable. Because he is their "president to." And as such, as Americans, as citizens, they MUST, leave their racism at the door and get behind him.

President Obama made it very clear in his instruction to us to "summon a new spirit of patriotism." The racial demons that McCain and Palin tried to resurrect from the American burial grounds of slavery and Jim Crow are not welcome here, and those who attempt to haunt our future with them, will be defeated.

peace.

Obamercial

Barack Obama Infomericial

(Comic from The New York Times)

What did you think about the 30 minute spot the Obama campaign ran today on NBC, CBS and Univison?

The cost was approximately five million dollars and it featured no commercials...

I'm interested in hearing your thoughts...

I thought it was really well done... although having already voted, it just reaffirmed what I already knew and felt about his candidacy...

What struck me the most was how profoundly different his campaign is from McCain's... the entire 30 minutes focused on Obama, his plan and his vision... from what I saw, McCain was not even mentioned once...

This is compared to McCain's campaign over the last month... where every rally, speech and interview is about cultivating fear of Obama and an Obama presidency... when was the last time you heard McCain talk about substantive policy?

The question many pundits are asking is if this infomercial is overkill... what do you think?

I would argue... that for a black man running for president of the United States... there is no such thing as overkill...

peace.

The Black Womans Toolkit for Graduate School

What every black woman needs to stay sane in graduate school:

1. a great therapist: if your one of those black women that believes that black women don't need to address the mental stress of their daily lives... get over it... i firmly believe that no one can get through graduate school without directly addressing the anxiety, stress, fears and insecurity that graduate school inflicts on you with no mercy...

2. great mentors: academic, spiritual and personal...

3. good relationships: family, friends and lovers... all need to be able to remind you of who you are and why you are where you are... positive energy is key...

4. enough ego to believe that your brilliant enough to be there and that your ideas are important enough to warrant years, even decades of energy and time...

5. enough humility to respect those that came before you and the brilliance of your peers and those that come after you...

6. awareness of the mental and spiritual costs of being apart of academia...

peace.