Momma's Monday: A Revolutionary Act of Love

A Revolutionary Act of Love

Welcome and welcome back. Today is Monday, February 12, 2024 (2.12.24). Happy Monday. It's another amazing day in paradise. Thank you so much for being here. 

Do you know we are only ONE day away from (what I feel is) the most underrated nationally recognized holiday there is? It is a day I wait for with epic anticipation and this year I'm finally doing something to officially celebrate it. I hope you'll join me.

The holiday I'm talking about is Black Love Day! It's celebrated on February 13. Have you heard of it? Congrats if you have. That's OK if you haven't. I'm here to change that. 

I'm going to give you a little history but you can also click on Black Love Day to be taken to the website that tells you all about it by the person responsible for creating it, Mama Ayo Handy-Kendi, the Breath Sekou.

Black Love Day 

Black Love Day has been around for 31 years, officially commencing in 1993. From the African American Holidays website we learn:

• Black Love Day (BLD) is the 4th nationally-commemorated African American Holiday ('wholyday').
• It is an observance of atonement, reconciliation, celebration, and 24-hour demonstration of Black Love through 5 tenets (Loving Acts),
• The 5 tenets of BLD are 1. Love for The Creator, 2. Love for Self, 3. Love for the Black Family, 4. Love for the Black Community, and 5. Love for the Black Race. 
• BLD also encourages Whites in the 24-hour period to "show love in action" towards Blacks, by working on their own racial attitudes and behaviors.
• The goals of this day are to: 1, increase peace and stop violence, 2. end Black self-hatred and white supremacy/racism, and 3. to offer a spiritual, African-centered alternative to the commercialized, and sometimes violent, Valentine's Day.
• The greeting for Black Love Day is Nya Akoma which means "have a heart, be patient". It is represented by the Akoma, an adinkra symbol. It is the shape of a heart, "a symbol of love, goodwill, patience, faithfulness, fondness, endurance, and consistency".

Can you tell why I honor and appreciate this day? It is all about Love and I'm all about L.U.V.! It's like it was made just for me. If you're curious about how I'm going to celebrate, let's keep going. This year I'm producing "A Revolutionary Act of Love". 

A Revolutionary Act of Love

The revolutionary act of Love I'm speaking on is to participate in a gratitude journal challenge starting on Black Love Day. The guidelines are:

• Write 5 things daily you are grateful for.
• Do not repeat any item for 10 days.
• Do not repeat any item more than twice in six weeks.
• Submit or share at least one item from your list daily.

These guidelines are from the gratitude journal challenge God instructed me to create during me and Wisdom's journey of being without stable housing. I was even given a printer to print it out en masse. The name of it is It's Time to L.U.V.! It is a journal to 6 week gratitude journal challenge.

If you are familiar with my business, you already know L.U.V. means "learn ur value". Hence the complete title of the journal is "it's time to learn ur value", because that's what a gratitude journal does. It helps you learn your value. It helps you Love yourself and then more fully Love others. 

I'm sure you're thinking... "That's cool! But how is that a revolutionary act of Love?" I'm so glad you asked.

You see the revolutionary part is I'm asking people to do it with me. I'm asking that we do it collectively, en masse, starting on Black Love Day (yes, tomorrow). This is my chance to seek an increase in Black Love, community Love and self Love. 

Black Love

Black Love Day is February 13th almost in the middle of Black History Monday. Mama Ayo is seeking to expand Black Love Day into Black Love Movement Month. 

Please note: I just found this out as I was pulling up links to share. I had to say something because it's like confirmation that God is at work on multiple levels in multiple places with multiple people and I get to be a part of that. A Revolutionary Act of Love is a part of that Black Love Movement. I'm so honored and grateful.

In keeping a gratitude journal there is a focus on all things bright and beautiful. Does that mean that things are not going to be challenging or even downright hard for some? Absolutely not. Keeping a gratitude journal isn't about changing the situations you're in. It's about changing your mindset about the situations you are in.

Most people don't know we are born with a "worst case scenario" mindset, for lack of a better way of saying it. Our brains and our nervous systems are naturally wired to protect us from danger, as though we are all living a hunter-gatherer lifestyle. From the moment we are born our brains and nervous systems are looking for signs that we are safe. And when we are not, they develop the mechanisms to keep us safe. 

These mechanisms no longer are similar for everyone because we live such vastly different lifestyles. So those mechanisms might not look pretty, especially when they are coming from an insecurely attached child. Many of those same things don't look any better coming from an adult. 

There's not much we can do about how we developed. We have not evolved with technology (that's a good thing). But we can change our brains to do something different. This is true for EVERYONE!!

Keeping a gratitude journal is an ideal first step. The practice of expressing gratitude on a daily basis is a gift that can train our brains to look for the good in the world. While this invitation is for all people, my concern is for Black people. This is our month!

I invite us to focus on the good in our lives starting with being grateful for every aspect of ourselves. Then we can extend to our partners, our children, our families, friends, acquaintances, colleagues, churches, etc. This shouldn't end with people though. 

This should include situations, especially those trials that seem insurmountable. Express gratitude for them. This could include expressing gratitude for things that haven't happened yet. Praise them into being, if they are in line with your greater purpose. 

All of these ways the Black Community can focus on gratitude will naturally increase Black Love in the giving and the receiving, internally and externally. Anyone else want to join in as we celebrate Black History and the power of Black Love will magnify Black Love exponentially.

Community Love

With those who are and are not Black, coming together to express appreciation and celebrate themselves and one another, this is community. This challenge is about doing it in community, in communion with others. This is a powerful gift! 

We spend so much time coming together to fight and complain. What would happen if we came together, outside of one day in November, to express our appreciation for one another? For ourselves? For our trials? For our triumphs? 

What if we spent many days doing that in communion with one another? Moms and dads. Moms and moms. Dads and dads. Parents and children. Brothers and Sisters. Sisters and Brothers. Brothers and brothers. Sisters and sisters. Siblings and cousins. Family and church family. Church family and colleagues. Colleagues and friends. Friends and neighbors. Neighbors and strangers. Quoting a poster, "BIPOC, Femmes and Thems".

What would happen if hundreds of people, thousands of people, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, millions, billions came together to express appreciation? I'll tell you. Energy will change! 

The stagnant energy we are all staggering under the weight of will change. And we will begin to taste liberation. We will begin to taste the sweet, savory, umani flavor of freedom and Love. And "the greatest Love of all" that will be released is our Love of self.

Self Love

There is no greater Love than to Love yourself. I will even endeavor to say there is no greater relationship to nurture than the relationship with yourself. I'm sure plenty of people will disagree stating that our relationship with God is the most important. And I'll respond that, for me, they are one and the same.

To the extent I Love myself, I will Love God. To the extent I Love God, I will Love myself. And to the extent that I Love me and God, I will Love my neighbor.

Jesus teaches that when He talks about The Great Commandments. When asked, "'Master, which is the great commandment in the law?" Jesus said unto him, "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.'" (Matthew 22:35-39)

Did you catch it? It's such an intriguing twist. Jesus said the first commandment is to Love God and that the second is "like unto it", which basically means it's the same. Then continues by saying you should Love your neighbor like you Love yourself, using my language. So the way you Love your neighbor is a reflection of how you Love yourself.

The part that still fascinates me about this is, this is a commandment AND it's actually what happens. We Love God, ourselves and our neighbors all the same. 

We think they are different. People put themselves out for others all the time saying they always serve others. Serving someone and the motivation for doing it are two totally different things. 

To serve with pure Love is such a deep concept. The only people I imagine who have served like that are Jesus and Mother Theresa. I'm sure there are others, so many others. I'm just saying those are the only ones I know.

I wish I could say that I am one of those people. I can honestly, at times, say, "YES! Of course that's me today, right now, in this moment". But on other occasions? Not so much! Nope! Not at all!!

I do desire to be that kind of person. I do desire to serve with my heart and not have it ego centered because I need to feel good about myself. I want to serve to serve, not because I need it. Simply because the service is needed and I Love people purely. I know keeping a gratitude journal will get me there. 

It's Time to L.U.V.!

Wanna join me? Do you want to participate in a revolutionary act of Love with me? It's only 6 weeks of your precious, sacred time that you get to invest in you. YOU! You are the focus and you deserve to invest this time in YOU!!!

Now... if I can plug using the journal God gave me the honor of creating, I'm going to say use "It's Time to L.U.V.", 6 week gratitude challenge journal to get started. You can register for the challenge (if you want to) and get a copy of the entire journal or just the instructions via my digital business card.

The registration form is under "A Revolutionary Act of Love ~ Gratitude Journal Challenge". On the registration form you will find a link that will take you to a Google folder where there are 3 documents:

• The journal cover
• The journal in its entirety, 
• Please note: the journal and cover will need to be printed out, double sided (short side - for the machines that ask). Then it just needs to be folded in half to use. I use a long-reach stapler to secure it in the middle. There are no page numbers so you definitely have to be careful not to drop it.
• The intro, instructions and inspiration only doc

Everything is free. 

If you would like to provide a financial contribution to this initiative, please know that the funds will help me to eliminate homelessness, poverty and the next generation of prisoners. If you are a business owner, please check out my YouTube playlist called Businesses x PLE to find out how businesses are the key to eliminating homelessness. Please let me know if you'd like to get involved. 

Thank you again for being here. Thank you in advance for how you'll use the information you find here. Please share as you feel impressed. Continued success. Enjoy the amazing day you're creating. Peace...