Alexis

“Buying flowers is not just a way to bring home beauty. It's an expression of confidence that better days are coming. It's a defiant finger in the face of those naysayers who would have you believe your fortunes will never improve.”
― Pearl Cleage, Some Things I Never Thought I'd Do

“It is so important to be conscious even when it makes you realize how much negative stuff you have enjoyed all your life until you realized it was all anti you.”
― Pearl Cleage, Things I Should Have Told My Daughter: Lies, Lessons, & Love Affairs

“The slaves who were ourselves had known terror intimately, confused sunrise with pain, & accepted indifference as kindness.”
― Ntozake Shange, Sassafrass, Cypress & Indigo

“All of this suggests that one of the best things each of us can do—not only for ourselves, but also for our children and grandchildren—is to metabolize our pain and heal our trauma. When we heal and make more room for growth in our nervous systems, we have a better chance of spreading our emotional health to our descendants, via healthy DNA expression. In contrast, when we don’t address our trauma, we may pass it on to future generations, along with some of our fear, constriction, and dirty pain.”
― Resmaa Menakem, My Grandmother's Hands: Racialized Trauma and the Mending of Our Bodies and Hearts