BEING A HERO IS EASIER THAN YOU THINK

Or how about being someone’s hero? We all enjoy movies and television shows about superheroes like Iron Man, the Avengers, Blade, the Fantastic Four, Catwoman, Wonder Woman, Storm, Superman, and Supergirl. Kids of my generation grew up wanting to be Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles or Power Rangers. (If any Hollywood producers are reading this, I’m available to be the Pink Ranger! #DEADASSTHO.)

We all have magic. You and I have the power to change the lives of those around us for the better, what’s more heroic than that?

Do you want to save the world? Start next door and work your way up. We can teach a child to read. We can drive an elderly person to the doctor or to church. You can go up to that shy little girl next door and tell her she’s beautiful. I can visit hospitals and nursing homes and perform for people who haven’t had anything to smile about in a while.

I mentioned earlier that I am empathetic to a fault. It’s almost like telepathy, my superpower! I can’t walk by a sad-looking child or adult without trying to lift them up or noticing that there is something they are hiding. I have fairy-godmother syndrome. I want to wave my wand and make everything better for everyone I meet.

For the rest of my life I will remember that Will Smith, Rihanna, Asha, Brandy, Ludacris and his manager, Chaka, and Queen Latifah were among those who reached out and touched me with their kindness. I want to be remembered by others for doing the same thing. Don’t you?

What is more heroic than reminding someone they have value? Well, helping them add to that value might be even more heroic. Teaching someone to swim, dance, sing, ride a bike, drive a car, or use the Internet are all powerful gifts and heroic deeds.

So the next time you think to yourself, I could use a little help right now, I suggest that instead of waiting for it to come, you reach out and help someone else and see what happens. Maybe, just maybe, you’ll get the help you want by helping another human in need. And even if it’s nothing to you, you never know who will think of you as that hero!

Whenever I’ve lost my bearings and am focused on other people’s ideas of success, it gave me anxiety and made me depressed. Yet when my focus was sharing my gifts with those who were willing to receive them, I always felt happiness and peace.

It wasn’t until this past year that I realized what I had been searching for was finally here. I was afraid before, but that fear only kept me further away from myself. Now that I’d become exalted in my own personal truth I was able to see clearly how it wasn’t and is not scary to spread your jewels across the world. Not only that, but how NECESSARY it is, because when you release yourself from suffering, you can not only help those around you but you can also remove your ancestors’ pain that you carry. All of humanity’s ancestors, not just our ancestors that we base off of color or origin. I finally saw my purpose. I accepted my struggles as part of the journey. There is no need to take on the suffering of our ancestors.

I’ve learned to be grateful for the gifts I’ve been given. I’ve learned that when I get anxious and scared, I can breathe in and breathe out and keep moving forward. I remind myself that anything that happens, good or bad, will make you better eventually. Peace comes from within, so know that everything will be all right. And know that happiness and fulfillment come in using your gifts and your passions for God’s will (spreading LOVE!!).

KINDNESS AND ACCEPTANCE ARE GIFTS WE CAN ALL SHARE

When we suffer, we can find release and joy on this earth by accepting ourselves and accepting others. Most of all, we should be kind to each other. Kindness is such a simple concept. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. It’s the Golden Rule! Jesus said it himself during the Sermon on the Mount. He also said, “Love thy neighbor as thyself.” If you are not consciously working to live in that positive space, how can you expect to see positivity in the world around you?

No matter what shade of black, brown, or white our flesh may be, we are all part of HUMANITY. African Americans, Hispanics, Caucasians, Asians, Native Americans . . . our ancestors all struggled and suffered. We are here because some of them persevered and survived. We owe them our respect. We should honor their suffering by ending it wherever and whenever we can in ourselves and in others. By acknowledging it and lamenting it instead of holding on to it and unconsciously handing it down to generations to come.

We are all in this together, part of a collective culture. We are all connected and we all need to look out for one another.

When one of us is hurt, we all hurt.

When one of us is kind, all of our lives are given the opportunity to be elevated.

KNOW BETTER AND DO BETTER

My experience as a black person definitely helps me relate personally to people of all races and colors who’ve faced prejudice, discrimination, and injustice (which is ultimately everyone, in their own way). I hurt for those who have suffered, but I also respect and honor those who survived and thrived. Through the struggle, we emerge stronger and more resilient.

We were put on this earth to experience life together, and if we give each other support and love, we will all benefit. That serves the common good. Sometimes we forget that we are all family. That’s the dark side of human nature rising up, but hatred, jealousy, and cruelty serve no good at all. Personalizing your experience cuts you off from other people and the shared human experience of pain, happiness, joy, and perseverance that we can all relate to though we come from different backgrounds.

I believe in my generation and know that we can pick up where our ancestors left off. Look around and you see young people of all races, sexual ties, and colors hanging out together, dating, marrying, and raising families together.

That gives me hope that we are on the right path. We still have many things to overcome, of course, and it isn’t about immediate results. We need to fight for greater access to higher education, for decent wages, more workplace opportunities, and other societal problems we have inherited from previous generations. We can change them for our future children even if we do not see the changes for young adult lives.

What kind of world could we create if we all decided to show our parents that we could do better and be better? I credit my parents’ generation for doing some great things. What if we picked it up and advanced it? What if we eliminated war, poverty, and racial hatred entirely?

When they were my age, people of my parents’ generation talked a lot about bringing more peace, love, and understanding to the world. Many of them worked hard to promote those important goals. Now it’s our turn.

Part of growing up is learning that the world is bigger than you. Life is not just making yourself happy. It’s about facing individual and collective pain and thinking universally. We are universal. My pain is your pain and my story is your story.

Maybe you aren’t a black girl named Keke, but I know you have your own story. The purpose of a human life is to improve yourself so that those small seeds planted play a part in changing the world at large. The journey is getting over ourselves enough to honor the gifts that our spirit brings so we can use them to heal the world.

We are not out here alone, to be separate from each other, or to make money and be rich. We were put here together to experience life in the fullest, including its ups and downs. We must learn to look to each other for the love and support we need. At some point, we forgot that we are a family. We can get so caught up in pleasing our flesh and our desires.

We don’t leave this earth with our money or our cars or even our bodies. The only thing that lives on after we are gone is the way we made people feel, the things we’ve given them that are eternal and can never be diminished.

So, I ask you, what’s your magic? What is your tool? What pain have you discovered from your own personal story that you can use to heal humanity?