My work systems went down, half hour before my shift. I tried everything. So much so my supervisor told me they would clock out for me.

I clocked out.

It was an extremely rewarding/satisfying shift. Before work, I prayed to God and asked the universe, to allow me to be a shoulder, a heart, arms, an ear to encourage someone.

As soon as I was able to boot up my system, one of my supervisors asked if I would like to spend the day helping newly trained agents.

I had a blast.

I encouraged.

I laughed.

I sang.

I was fully ME.

Ah.

Aha!

Then, I started working on a piece called ‘I am not alone: Who walks for me?’

???

!!!

The question reverberated.

To, my heart.

Within, my soul.

To the depths of all that made me, me.

The world grew silent.

I grew silent.

Still.

Wondering.

Wondering.

Wondering.

“Who walks for me?”

I did not do as I normally would have.

I did not:

Crawl, onto The Father’s Lap.

Talk, with Jesus about it.

Write, about it.

Turn the television on, to be distracted, from it.

Ask myself, about it.

My wombie called to check on my chicklets. I shared with her, just a bit, about it.

Then, I did the hard thing:

I turned off the phone.

I sat with it.

To see what it would do/say.

At first, her voice was super quiet.

“Who walks for me?”

The silence, grew defeaning. This angered, the universe, who also chimed in…

“Who walks for me?”

This saddened, The Father, who lovingly, chimed in…

“Who walks for me?”

This caused, a clap of ⚡ thunder, as Jesus, with His 👑 Crown in His Nail-Scarred Hand, chimed in

“Who walks for me?”

This caused my big sis, who ALWAYS has my back and walks with me, two begins style, to chime in…

“Who walks for me?”

This galvanized, my wombie, who staunchly chimed in…

“Who walks for me?”

This made my big brothers act all big brotherly, who chimed in…

“Who walks for me?”

This made my heart, Candace, lovingly stand beside me, chime in…

“Who walks for me?”

“WHO walks for me?”

“Who WALKS for me?”

“Who walks FOR me?”

“Who walks for ME?”

“WHO WALKS FOR ME?!”

The sounds, of my heart/mind/soul/spirit, shook the very foundations, of heaven.

“I, WILL! I, DO!”

“I, WILL! I, DO!”

“I, WILL! I, DO!”

“I, WILL! I, DO!”

“I, WILL! I, DO!”

In one voice, as one chorus, they all encamped around, my heart. Rest, they said, in unison. We shall walk for you.

Ah.

Aha!

I rest.

sitting with it still,

Cassandra

#YourLifeMattersToMe

ttnette37@yahoo.com

Note: I think I am ready, beloveds, to finish my piece. Perhaps the piece is still writing me. I shall sit with her, my heart, with this question, to see what they shall say. I listen. Quietly. Reverently. Respectfully. Joyfully. Hopefully. Lovingly. Without, distraction. Here. Present. Patiently.

One step.

One step.

One step.

If you are strong, I walked for YOU, today.

See, folk don’t walk for us, eh, strong you? They don’t know. We are strong, ONLY because we have to be.

We are:

Leaned, on.

Counted, on.

Relied, upon.

Yet, who do WE, lean on?

Who can WE, count on?

Who can WE, rely on?

As I put on my new kicks, I kicked myself into gear.

Time, to walk, for the strong.

Lean, upon me, strong one.

Rest your head, just a bit, upon my shoulder.

I got you.

God and Life has me.

Then, once you have caught your breath, perhaps I can lean upon you, just a tad, eh?

For, I tire, also.

Today, I walked for all the strong. They need a moment, just a few moments, to be weak.

In their weakness, they shall find strength. In, faith. In, Life. Hopefully, in/with God.

Be encouraged, strong one. I shall not tell your secret, okay?

What secret?

Ah.

Aha!

walking for the tired, er, strong today,

Cassandra

#YourLifeMattersToMe

ttnette37@yahoo.com

Note: Be encouraged. My heart won’t be quiet. Folk are hurting. That I could relieve EVERY burden. I can’t. I know Who can. He waits…

• 🎬 MAYBE THEY WEREN’T “TOO BLACK.” MAYBE I WAS STILL HOLDING THE RULER. 🪑🔑Beloveds,Yesterday I told you something uncomfortable.I told you that while watching Black romance movies, I caught myself thinking some of the characters were:Too loud.Too boisterous.Too…Black.😳And I told you that the conviction of the Holy Spirit made me look at what was happening inside me.Well.Pull up your chair.🪑Because then I watched Deliver Us from Eva.And this movie made me look again.Not only at Eva.At everybody.The women.The men.The relationships.The families.The careers.The foolishness.The love.The control.The tenderness.The Blackness.And especially the measuring stick I had sometimes been holding while watching people who looked like me.👀Let’s start with Eva.Eva is strong.Opinionated.Professional.Beautiful.Protective.Intelligent.Controlling.Loving.Bossy.Loyal.Interfering.Complicated.Notice what I just did?I let her be more than one thing.🔑She does not have to become either:The Angry Black Woman Who Needs TamingorThe Strong Black Woman Whose Every Choice Must Be Defended.Eva needs correction.And Eva deserves dignity.Both.She took on enormous responsibility for her sisters after their parents died.Care became part of her identity.Protection became responsibility.And somewhere along the way, protection sometimes became control.That happens.A survival skill can save us in one season and need adjustment in another.⛓️ If I don’t take care of everybody, everything will fall apart.🔑 I can love grown people without controlling grown people.But Eva isn’t the only person who needs a key.Her sisters do too.Because you cannot continually hand somebody the clipboard to your life and then be shocked that she keeps writing on it.🤣At some point:Eva has to stop managing.And:her sisters have to start owning.🪑🪑That’s relationship.That’s adulthood.That’s boundaries.That’s love without possession.And then there are the men.Oh, yes.ALL OF THEM.👀🤣Because I’m not giving the women full humanity and turning the Black men into props.Pull up some more chairs.🪑🪑🪑🪑Ray.Mike.Tim.Darrell.Come on in.🤣Let’s start with Ray.Ray enters Eva’s life because the men have concocted an absolutely ridiculous plan to get Eva out of theirs.Sir.🤣The plan involves deception.And deception matters.Eva believes she is encountering somebody genuinely interested in her.Ray knows information she does not.That is not equal agency.⛓️ Deception steals informed choice.But then something inconvenient happens to Ray’s little plan.Eva becomes a person.Not “the problem.”Not “that difficult woman.”Not the assignment.Eva.And Ray develops real feelings.That matters because stereotypes are easiest to maintain from a distance.Encounter complicates caricature.🔑 Sometimes knowing somebody destroys the story we were telling ourselves about them.But Ray deserves examination beyond Eva too.He’s a Black man.Working.Trying.Saving.Dreaming.Flawed.Funny.Romantic.Capable of deception.Capable of tenderness.Capable of changing.He doesn’t have to become a CEO before the movie lets him be desirable.👀There’s our ten-times-better rule again.Black excellence is beautiful.But ordinary Black life is beautiful too.A Black man’s worth is not his résumé.Neither is a Black woman’s.Then there’s Mike.Mike has a legitimate frustration.Eva’s involvement creates real strain.But listen carefully:A legitimate grievance does not automatically make every remedy legitimate.🔑Mike’s problem is real.His solution?Sir.Take a seat.🪑🤣He participates in manipulation instead of dealing honestly with the relationships involved.And that is something we can do in real life.We identify a genuine problem.Then because our hurt is legitimate, we assume whatever we do next must also be legitimate.Nope.Pain deserves acknowledgment.Choices still deserve examination.Then Tim.Tim made me think about another measuring stick:What is a Black man supposed to look like?Strong?Dominant?Always in charge?Never uncertain?Never conflict-avoidant?Never soft?Never overwhelmed by stronger personalities?Why?👀A quieter man does not need to become a caricature of dominance to become a man.Tim doesn’t need more masculinity.He needs more voice.🔑And there is a difference.Just as the loud Black woman shouldn’t have to shrink, the quieter Black man shouldn’t have to perform loudness to prove himself.Both get chairs.🪑🪑And Darrell.🤣Beloveds, some people are brilliant.Some people are sophisticated.Some people are intellectual heavyweights.And some people are…Darrell.🤣❤️And guess what?HE GETS A CHAIR TOO.Because intelligence is not the admission price for dignity.Sophistication is not the admission price for love.Black people do not have to become exceptional specimens before they are allowed to be funny, ordinary, goofy, imperfect and loved.And THAT hit me.Because maybe part of the hidden burden of “ten times better” is that we start becoming nervous when Black people on screen aren’t representing us “well enough.”👀Read that again.We worry:What will THEY think?Does this reinforce a stereotype?Why are they acting like that?Why are they so loud?Why couldn’t the character be more educated?More polished?More professional?More respectable?More—acceptable?And suddenly we’re not watching a movie anymore.We’re conducting a performance review of Blackness.😳Beloveds…that is exhausting.Because white characters are often permitted to be:Brilliant.Stupid.Rich.Poor.Heroic.Ridiculous.Criminal.Professional.Messy.Romantic.Awkward.Loud.Quiet.Good.Terrible.Ordinary.And nobody necessarily asks one white character to represent the moral worth of an entire race.But Black characters?Sometimes we watch them carrying everybody.And sometimes—without realizing it—we help load the backpack.⛓️That was part of the Holy Spirit’s conviction for me.God was showing me:Cassandra, look at the ruler.Not merely:Look at those people.Look at what you are using to measure them.👀Who gave you that?When did you learn it?Why are you still carrying it?And Beloveds…I think I know part of the answer.Ten times better.That lesson came from people trying to prepare me for a world they knew could be unfair.There was love inside the warning.There was survival inside it.There was history inside it.But there was also a chain hiding nearby.Because “You may have to be ten times better to receive the opportunity” can quietly become:“Black people SHOULD be ten times better.”No.❤️‍🩹I reject that.We should pursue excellence because excellence can be beautiful.We should develop our gifts.Learn.Grow.Work.Create.Build.But our humanity cannot depend upon outperforming somebody else.And our Blackness does not become more respectable because we make ourselves less Black.🔑Eva gets to be loud.And Eva needs boundaries.Ray gets to be masculine and tender.And Ray needs honesty.Mike gets to be frustrated.And Mike needs accountability.Tim gets to be quieter.And Tim needs his voice.Darrell gets to be goofy.And Darrell gets dignity.The sisters get to love Eva.And they need agency.Everybody gets correction.Everybody gets complexity.Everybody gets humanity.EVERYBODY GETS A CHAIR.🪑🪑🪑🪑🪑🪑🪑That’s what I want now.Not a world where nobody gets judged because nobody ever does anything wrong.That’s not discernment.I want a world where we can say:That behavior needs changingwithout saying:That person needs to become less themselves to deserve belonging.WHEW.❤️‍🔥And this is where the conviction of the Holy Spirit becomes beautiful to me.Because God didn’t merely show me what was wrong.He started changing what I enjoyed.🥰I kept watching.I relaxed.I laughed.🤣I fell in love with seeing Black people simply BE.Not representing.Not auditioning.Not proving.Being.And somewhere along the way, I think God was freeing me too.Because if they don’t have to perform acceptable Blackness—neither do I.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿I can be educated.And silly.Faithful.And questioning.Strong.And tired.Professional.And LOUD.🤣A wheelchair user.A woman whose speech changed.A writer.A believer.A Black woman.A work in progress.ME.And I don’t need to become ten times more human than anybody else.I already belong to the human family.And more importantly to me:I belong to God.🙏🏿❤️‍🔥So maybe the question isn’t:Are they too Black?Maybe the Holy Spirit was asking me:Cassandra, why are you still holding the ruler?😳And maybe my answer now is:I’m not.I’m learning to put it down.🔑Beloveds, maybe you have one too.Maybe yours doesn’t measure Blackness.Maybe it measures education.Body size.Disability.Age.Money.Accent.Gender.Religion.Politics.Neighborhood.Clothes.Mental illness.Addiction.Sexuality.Or somebody whose life simply looks nothing like yours.I’m not asking you to perform an answer for me.Be honest with you.For, HIM.🙏🏿What ruler are you carrying?Who handed it to you?Who have you measured with it?Have you measured yourself with it too?And if the Holy Spirit is showing it to you—maybe He isn’t showing you the ruler so you can beat yourself with it.Maybe He’s saying:Child. You don’t need that anymore.Put it down.🔑❤️‍🩹Pull up your chair.🪑And let somebody else pull up theirs.Because maybe freedom looks like finally letting people be fully human in front of us.And maybe—just maybe—that includes letting ourselves be fully human too.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿❤️‍🔥🌎Asking for A Friend,Cassandra#YourLifeMattersToMeNote: One step. One step. One step. You are loved. You are NOT alone. Keep on being…YOU!Unapologetically His.Unapologetically yours.
• 📫 ❤️‍🩹 BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME.Beloveds,Ow.That is probably the best way for me to begin this.Ow.For the past few years, the Holy Spirit has been convicting my heart.Not condemning me.Convicting me.There is a difference.Condemnation tells me to hide.The conviction of the Holy Spirit calls me into the light.And sometimes?That light hits something in me that makes me say:OW!😳🥺❤️‍🩹I love living in my Black skin.I love Black joy.I love Black laughter.I love Black music.I love Black creativity.I love Black excellence.I love the beauty of us.The resilience of us.The tenderness of us.The absolute foolishness of us sometimes.🤣I love everybody.But I especially love my bros and sis.Which is exactly why what the Holy Spirit showed me hurt so much.Just before my stroke, I discovered a ton of Black romance movies.Beloveds…I LOVED THEM.🥰😍Seeing Black people in love was breathtaking to me.People who looked like me were falling in love.Being pursued.Being cherished.Building families.Laughing.Arguing.Reconciling.Getting married.Living.And many of these movies showed something else I loved seeing:Black affluence.Black professionals.Black entrepreneurs.Beautiful Black families in beautiful homes.Black men and women succeeding.Black excellence.I loved seeing us.But then something happened.And this is where I cry.😭Permit me to digress.Growing up, Black folk pounded something into my head:You have to be ten times better than everybody else just to earn a hint of a whiff of a chance at a decent job. At a decent life.So I worked.Hard.HARD.I learned.I became good at what I did.I loved Customer Service.You could hear that love in my voice.I trained people.And I watched many of the white people I trained receive the raise.The promotion.The opportunity.Over me.I offered my skills.I knew I was capable.Still…I was seldom selected.Not chosen.Again.Sigh.❤️‍🩹Now come back to those movies with me.Because one day I caught something happening inside myself.I was watching Black people on the screen.And somewhere in my thoughts I heard:They’re too loud.Too boisterous.Too…Black.😳🥺🥹😦😩😢😭OW.I am a Black woman.I love Black people.And there it was.Inside me.A measuring stick.A judgment.A standard about what kind of Blackness was acceptable.And the Holy Spirit would not let me look away from it.That is important.Because I could have defended myself.I could have said:I’m Black!I love Black people!Look at everything I’ve written!Look at who I am!I could have produced evidence for my own defense.But God wasn’t putting me on trial.He was showing me something because He loves me enough to show me what still needs healing.❤️‍🩹I had learned that Black people are watched.Evaluated.Measured.Judged.How we speak.How we dress.How we wear our hair.How loudly we laugh.How angry we are allowed to become.How professional we appear.Whether we are “articulate.”Whether we make somebody uncomfortable.Whether we are respectable enough.Somewhere along the way, the watcher got inside.⛓️Society didn’t have to sit beside me watching the movie saying:That’s too Black.Some of those old lessons had learned how to speak from inside me.And the Holy Spirit said:Look.👀Not:Hate yourself.Not:You are terrible.Not:You don’t love your people.Look.See it.Tell the truth about it.Let Me deal with it.And Beloveds?I did something important.I forgave ME.❤️‍🩹Not because bias doesn’t matter.Not because judgment doesn’t hurt people.Not because I wanted an excuse.I forgave myself because shame was not going to heal what God was revealing.I forgave the Black girl who learned she was being watched.I forgave the Black woman who learned she needed to work ten times harder.I forgave the professional who watched people she trained receive opportunities she wasn’t given.I forgave the woman who learned that being excellent, controlled, polished and respectable might make the road a little safer.And then I let the Holy Spirit teach that woman something new.🔑Over these last few weeks, I started watching those movies again.🥰Then:😍Then:😅Then:🤣😂And something began changing.I stopped grading everybody’s Blackness.Loud?Okay.Quiet?Okay.Boisterous?Okay.Reserved?Okay.Professional?Okay.Country?Okay.Hood?Okay.Affluent?Okay.Working class?Okay.Harvard?Okay.Grandma’s kitchen table and the school of hard knocks?Okay.🤣❤️Black people do not owe me one acceptable performance of Blackness.And neither do I.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿Because here’s another little piece of God’s sense of humor:After all those years learning how not to be “too loud”…Look at the name of my blog.WHY CAN’T I BE LOUD?!🤣🤣🤣Won’t He do it?!But this revelation went deeper.Because I realized something about Black excellence too.I LOVE Black excellence.I celebrate it.But Black excellence cannot become another chain.⛓️We cannot spend generations being told we must be ten times better and then accidentally turn around and require exceptional achievement from one another before we feel comfortable celebrating Black life.The CEO matters.The doctor matters.The professor matters.The entrepreneur matters.And so does the cashier.The janitor.The unemployed brother trying again.The sister working two jobs.The person without the degree.The person with the accent.The person whose grammar somebody wants to correct.The quiet Black man.The loud Black man.The quiet Black woman.And yes—the LOUD Black woman.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿❤️‍🔥Our dignity cannot depend upon our excellence.And that revelation made me ask an even harder question:What other measuring sticks am I carrying?Not just about Black people.About people.Period.What have I absorbed about disability?Poverty?Weight?Age?Education?Accents?Religion?Gender?Mental illness?Addiction?Homelessness?People who vote differently?People who worship differently?People who don’t believe what I believe?People whose lives I don’t understand?👀What if some of the chains I want broken in the world are also hiding somewhere inside me?⛓️Then I need a key too.🔑That is why I’m telling you this.Because the Holy Spirit convicted me.And the instruction in my spirit was:BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME.For ME.Him.God.🙏🏿Tell them.Don’t polish yourself first.Don’t pretend you arrived.Don’t make yourself the teacher standing above everybody else.Tell them what I showed you.So I am.I judged.God showed me.It hurt.I listened.I forgave myself.I kept watching.I started seeing differently.And I’m still learning.That is conviction.That is grace.That is growth.That is another chain hitting the floor.⛓️💥And now, Beloveds, I turn the question toward you—not from above you.From my chair.🪑Be honest with you.For, HIM.What hidden bias are you struggling to deal with?What measuring stick did somebody put in your hand so early that you forgot somebody gave it to you?And what might happen if you finally put it down?Don’t answer for me.Don’t answer for Facebook.Don’t answer for church.Don’t answer because somebody is watching.Ask God.Be honest with you.For, Him.Because He already knows what is there.And if the Holy Spirit turns the light on?👀Look.Listen.Repent where repentance is needed.Forgive yourself.Learn.Unlearn.Heal.Choose differently.And keep walking.One step.One step.One step.🔑❤️‍🩹God did not show me the chain so I could decorate it with shame.He showed me the chain because chains can be broken.And THAT?That will preach.❤️‍🔥🙏🏿Asking for A Friend,Cassandra#YourLifeMattersToMeNote: One step. One step. One step. You are loved. You are NOT alone. Keep on being…YOU!Unapologetically His.Unapologetically yours.
• 📫 BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME. ❤️‍🩹Beloveds,Ow.For the past few years, the Holy Spirit has been convicting my heart.Not condemning me.Convicting me.And this one hurt.I love living in my Black skin. I love Black joy, Black love, Black laughter and Black excellence. I love everybody, but especially my bros and sis.Which is why this revelation made me cry.Before my stroke, I discovered Black romance movies.🥰😍Seeing people who looked like me falling in love was breathtaking. I loved seeing Black professionals, beautiful homes, successful families and Black people simply enjoying life.But one day I caught myself thinking:They’re too loud.Too boisterous.Too…Black.😳🥺😭OW.There it was.Inside me.And the Holy Spirit said:Look.👀Growing up, Black folk pounded something into my head:You have to be ten times better just to get a hint of a whiff of the same opportunity.So I worked.Hard.I became good at what I did. I loved Customer Service. You could hear it in my voice.I even trained white people who later received raises and promotions over me.Still…I was seldom selected.Sigh.❤️‍🩹I learned early that Black people were being watched.How we talked.How loudly we laughed.How professional we appeared.Whether we were “articulate.”Whether we made somebody uncomfortable.And somewhere along the way—the watcher got inside me.⛓️Nobody had to sit beside me saying, They’re too Black.The old measuring stick had learned how to speak from inside.And THAT is what the Holy Spirit convicted me about.God wasn’t telling me to hate myself.He was showing me something He wanted to heal.So I forgave ME.❤️‍🩹I forgave the Black girl who learned she was being watched.I forgave the woman who learned she had to work ten times harder.I forgave the professional who watched people she trained receive opportunities she wasn’t given.And then I let the Holy Spirit teach that woman something different.🔑I kept watching those movies.🥰😍😅🤣😂And I stopped grading everybody’s Blackness.Loud?Okay.Quiet?Okay.Country?Okay.Hood?Okay.Affluent?Okay.Working class?Okay.Harvard?Okay.Grandma’s kitchen table?Okay.Black people do not owe me one acceptable performance of Blackness.Neither do I.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿And would you LOOK at God’s sense of humor?After learning all those years not to be “too loud,” I now have a blog called:WHY CAN’T I BE LOUD?!🤣❤️‍🔥Won’t He do it?!I love Black excellence.But the Holy Spirit showed me something else:Black excellence cannot become another chain.⛓️The CEO matters.The doctor matters.And so do the cashier, janitor, unemployed brother trying again, sister working two jobs, person without the degree, quiet Black man, loud Black man, quiet Black woman and—YES—LOUD BLACK WOMAN.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿❤️‍🔥Our dignity cannot depend upon being exceptional.And now I’m asking myself:What other measuring sticks am I carrying?About disability?Poverty?Age?Weight?Education?Religion?Accents?Mental illness?Homelessness?People who don’t believe what I believe?What if some of the chains I want broken in the world are hiding inside me?Then I need a key too.🔑And THAT is why I’m telling you.Because the instruction in my spirit was:BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME.ME = HIM.God.🙏🏿Tell them what I showed you.So I am.I judged.The Holy Spirit convicted me.It hurt.I listened.I forgave myself.I’m learning.And I’m choosing differently.⛓️💥🔑Now, Beloveds:Be honest with you. For, HIM.What hidden bias are you struggling with?What measuring stick did somebody put into your hand so early that you forgot it was handed to you?And if the Holy Spirit turns the light on?Look.Listen.Repent.Learn.Unlearn.Heal.Choose differently.❤️‍🩹🔑God didn’t show me the chain so I could decorate it with shame.He showed me the chain because chains can be broken.❤️‍🔥🙏🏿Asking for A Friend,Cassandra#YourLifeMattersToMeNote: One step. One step. One step. You are loved. You are NOT alone. Keep on being…YOU!Unapologetically His.Unapologetically yours.
• 📫 BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME. ❤️‍🩹Beloveds,Ow.That is probably the best way for me to begin this.Ow.For the past few years, the Holy Spirit has been convicting my heart.Not condemning me.Convicting me.There is a difference.Condemnation tells me to hide.The conviction of the Holy Spirit calls me into the light.And sometimes?That light hits something in me that makes me say:OW!😳🥺❤️‍🩹I love living in my Black skin.I love Black joy.I love Black laughter.I love Black music.I love Black creativity.I love Black excellence.I love the beauty of us.The resilience of us.The tenderness of us.The absolute foolishness of us sometimes.🤣I love everybody.But I especially love my bros and sis.Which is exactly why what the Holy Spirit showed me hurt so much.Just before my stroke, I discovered a ton of Black romance movies.Beloveds…I LOVED THEM.🥰😍Seeing Black people in love was breathtaking to me.People who looked like me were falling in love.Being pursued.Being cherished.Building families.Laughing.Arguing.Reconciling.Getting married.Living.And many of these movies showed something else I loved seeing:Black affluence.Black professionals.Black entrepreneurs.Beautiful Black families in beautiful homes.Black men and women succeeding.Black excellence.I loved seeing us.But then something happened.And this is where I cry.😭Permit me to digress.Growing up, Black folk pounded something into my head:You have to be ten times better than everybody else just to earn a hint of a whiff of a chance at a decent job. At a decent life.So I worked.Hard.HARD.I learned.I became good at what I did.I loved Customer Service.You could hear that love in my voice.I trained people.And I watched many of the white people I trained receive the raise.The promotion.The opportunity.Over me.I offered my skills.I knew I was capable.Still…I was seldom selected.Not chosen.Again.Sigh.❤️‍🩹Now come back to those movies with me.Because one day I caught something happening inside myself.I was watching Black people on the screen.And somewhere in my thoughts I heard:They’re too loud.Too boisterous.Too…Black.😳🥺🥹😦😩😢😭OW.I am a Black woman.I love Black people.And there it was.Inside me.A measuring stick.A judgment.A standard about what kind of Blackness was acceptable.And the Holy Spirit would not let me look away from it.That is important.Because I could have defended myself.I could have said:I’m Black!I love Black people!Look at everything I’ve written!Look at who I am!I could have produced evidence for my own defense.But God wasn’t putting me on trial.He was showing me something because He loves me enough to show me what still needs healing.❤️‍🩹I had learned that Black people are watched.Evaluated.Measured.Judged.How we speak.How we dress.How we wear our hair.How loudly we laugh.How angry we are allowed to become.How professional we appear.Whether we are “articulate.”Whether we make somebody uncomfortable.Whether we are respectable enough.Somewhere along the way, the watcher got inside.⛓️Society didn’t have to sit beside me watching the movie saying:That’s too Black.Some of those old lessons had learned how to speak from inside me.And the Holy Spirit said:Look.👀Not:Hate yourself.Not:You are terrible.Not:You don’t love your people.Look.See it.Tell the truth about it.Let Me deal with it.And Beloveds?I did something important.I forgave ME.❤️‍🩹Not because bias doesn’t matter.Not because judgment doesn’t hurt people.Not because I wanted an excuse.I forgave myself because shame was not going to heal what God was revealing.I forgave the Black girl who learned she was being watched.I forgave the Black woman who learned she needed to work ten times harder.I forgave the professional who watched people she trained receive opportunities she wasn’t given.I forgave the woman who learned that being excellent, controlled, polished and respectable might make the road a little safer.And then I let the Holy Spirit teach that woman something new.🔑Over these last few weeks, I started watching those movies again.🥰Then:😍Then:😅Then:🤣😂And something began changing.I stopped grading everybody’s Blackness.Loud?Okay.Quiet?Okay.Boisterous?Okay.Reserved?Okay.Professional?Okay.Country?Okay.Hood?Okay.Affluent?Okay.Working class?Okay.Harvard?Okay.Grandma’s kitchen table and the school of hard knocks?Okay.🤣❤️Black people do not owe me one acceptable performance of Blackness.And neither do I.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿Because here’s another little piece of God’s sense of humor:After all those years learning how not to be “too loud”…Look at the name of my blog.WHY CAN’T I BE LOUD?!🤣🤣🤣Won’t He do it?!But this revelation went deeper.Because I realized something about Black excellence too.I LOVE Black excellence.I celebrate it.But Black excellence cannot become another chain.⛓️We cannot spend generations being told we must be ten times better and then accidentally turn around and require exceptional achievement from one another before we feel comfortable celebrating Black life.The CEO matters.The doctor matters.The professor matters.The entrepreneur matters.And so does the cashier.The janitor.The unemployed brother trying again.The sister working two jobs.The person without the degree.The person with the accent.The person whose grammar somebody wants to correct.The quiet Black man.The loud Black man.The quiet Black woman.And yes—the LOUD Black woman.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿❤️‍🔥Our dignity cannot depend upon our excellence.And that revelation made me ask an even harder question:What other measuring sticks am I carrying?Not just about Black people.About people.Period.What have I absorbed about disability?Poverty?Weight?Age?Education?Accents?Religion?Gender?Mental illness?Addiction?Homelessness?People who vote differently?People who worship differently?People who don’t believe what I believe?People whose lives I don’t understand?👀What if some of the chains I want broken in the world are also hiding somewhere inside me?⛓️Then I need a key too.🔑That is why I’m telling you this.Because the Holy Spirit convicted me.And the instruction in my spirit was:BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME.For ME.Him.God.🙏🏿Tell them.Don’t polish yourself first.Don’t pretend you arrived.Don’t make yourself the teacher standing above everybody else.Tell them what I showed you.So I am.I judged.God showed me.It hurt.I listened.I forgave myself.I kept watching.I started seeing differently.And I’m still learning.That is conviction.That is grace.That is growth.That is another chain hitting the floor.⛓️💥And now, Beloveds, I turn the question toward you—not from above you.From my chair.🪑Be honest with you.For, HIM.What hidden bias are you struggling to deal with?What measuring stick did somebody put in your hand so early that you forgot somebody gave it to you?And what might happen if you finally put it down?Don’t answer for me.Don’t answer for Facebook.Don’t answer for church.Don’t answer because somebody is watching.Ask God.Be honest with you.For, Him.Because He already knows what is there.And if the Holy Spirit turns the light on?👀Look.Listen.Repent where repentance is needed.Forgive yourself.Learn.Unlearn.Heal.Choose differently.And keep walking.One step.One step.One step.🔑❤️‍🩹God did not show me the chain so I could decorate it with shame.He showed me the chain because chains can be broken.And THAT?That will preach.❤️‍🔥🙏🏿Asking for A Friend,Cassandra#YourLifeMattersToMeNote: One step. One step. One step. You are loved. You are NOT alone. Keep on being…YOU!Unapologetically His.Unapologetically yours.
• 📫 BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME. ❤️‍🩹Beloveds,I have been thinking about honesty.Not the kind we demand from everybody else.The kind that requires us to sit with ourselves long enough to tell the truth about what is happening inside us.👀Because sometimes the hardest person to be honest with is yourself.Sometimes we know something hurts, but we keep calling it fine.Sometimes we know we are tired, but we keep calling ourselves lazy.Sometimes we know we need help, but we keep calling needing help weakness.Sometimes we know something has changed, but we keep trying to live as though nothing did.And sometimes we are so busy trying to make everybody else comfortable with our reality that we stop being honest about our own.❤️‍🩹I have had to learn this in ways I never wanted to learn it.My life changed.My body changed.My speech changed.My independence changed.The amount of effort required to do ordinary things changed.And there have been moments when I wanted so badly to be the Cassandra I remembered that I became impatient with the Cassandra who was actually here.But she deserves honesty too.She deserves tenderness too.She deserves patience too.She deserves to be loved without having to pretend that everything is easy.🪑So I am learning to tell the truth.I can be grateful and tired.I can have faith and still have questions.I can laugh and still hurt.I can celebrate progress and grieve what changed.I can be strong and need help.I can love people and still need boundaries.I can forgive somebody and still acknowledge what happened.I can believe God is with me without pretending every part of this journey feels good.Those truths do not cancel each other.They can sit in the same room.Sometimes they can even sit in the same chair.👀🪑And maybe somebody reading this needs permission to stop performing too.You do not have to tell everybody everything.Privacy is not dishonesty.Boundaries are not dishonesty.Taking time before you speak is not dishonesty.But beloved, please find somewhere you can tell the truth.Even if the first place is inside your own heart.Say:This hurt me.I miss what was.I am angry.I am afraid.I need help.I don’t know yet.I changed my mind.I need more time.I am proud of myself.I survived something difficult.I am learning.I am healing.I am still here.🔑Because honesty can be a key.A key that unlocks shame.A key that loosens the chain of pretending.A key that lets grief breathe.A key that allows joy to be real instead of performed.A key that makes room for healing.And sometimes the truth is not:”I have figured everything out.”Sometimes the truth is simply:”I am trying.”And beloved?Trying counts.❤️‍🩹I am learning not to require perfection from myself before I offer myself compassion.I am learning not to make recovery another place where I have to perform.I am learning that one difficult day does not erase every good day that came before it.I am learning that needing rest does not erase determination.I am learning that receiving help does not erase independence.And I am learning that being honest about what hurts does not mean I have stopped believing that healing is possible.It means I stopped requiring myself to lie on the way there.👀So be honest with them when honesty is safe.Be honest with the people who love you.Be honest with the people helping you.Be honest about what you need.Be honest about what you cannot do today.Be honest about what you are learning to do again.But before all of that—Be honest with you.For me.❤️‍🩹Because I want you here.Not the polished version.Not the pretending version.Not the version exhausted from convincing everybody that everything is fine.YOU.The learning you.The healing you.The laughing you.The crying you.The figuring-it-out-as-you-go you.There is room for that person here.🪑Pull up a chair.You don’t have to resolve everything before you belong.You don’t have to perform strength before you are loved.You don’t have to have all the answers before your life matters.Your life matters right now.Exactly here.One step.One step.One step.🔑❤️‍🩹🪑Asking for A Friend,Cassandra#YourLifeMattersToMeNote: One step. One step. One step. You are loved. You are NOT alone. Keep on being…YOU!

“Shut, up”

“What about YOUR part?”

“Where were YOU?”

“This is what he/she was going through, at the time…”

When Jesus, shows up, and advocates for someone, due to your carrying on about YOUR hurt/hard feelings, it has a way of making you tell your ‘up’ to shut it.

Meaning, shut up!

Yea, boy, when Jesus brings HIS Compassion, into a situation, well, it kinda makes you want to tell The Father, “my bad, I sowwy. I can see now why he/she/they did or said what they did. I understand, Father, why they did or did not do.”

No, it does not dismiss or diminish what has happened. But, it does help you bring empathy and compassion in order to bring healing and restoration, to the situation, to the circumstances, to the relationship, to the job, to the business, to the friendship, to the marriage, to the church, to the community.

Life is hard. Loving folk can be hard. It requires putting someone else’s need ahead of your own, at times.

Sometimes, you just have to tell your up to shut it. Meaning, shut your mouth and STOP making the situation worse. Yes, he/she/they did or said something not helpful. So, perhaps, did you.

Life is short. The relationship is much more important than your hurt pride, your hurt feelings, your this and your that.

I do my best now, to tell myself to shut up, whenever I feel the need to be right. I don’t want to be right. I want to keep my act right acting right.

Shut it, Cassandra.

I will.

I sowwy.

Life is short. Be willing to shut your mouth and open your heart and arms.

shutting it with you,

Cassandra

#YourLifeMattersToMe

ttnette37@yahoo.com

https://gofund.me/efbe8c13

• 🎬 MAYBE THEY WEREN’T “TOO BLACK.” MAYBE I WAS STILL HOLDING THE RULER. 🪑🔑Beloveds,Yesterday I told you something uncomfortable.I told you that while watching Black romance movies, I caught myself thinking some of the characters were:Too loud.Too boisterous.Too…Black.😳And I told you that the conviction of the Holy Spirit made me look at what was happening inside me.Well.Pull up your chair.🪑Because then I watched Deliver Us from Eva.And this movie made me look again.Not only at Eva.At everybody.The women.The men.The relationships.The families.The careers.The foolishness.The love.The control.The tenderness.The Blackness.And especially the measuring stick I had sometimes been holding while watching people who looked like me.👀Let’s start with Eva.Eva is strong.Opinionated.Professional.Beautiful.Protective.Intelligent.Controlling.Loving.Bossy.Loyal.Interfering.Complicated.Notice what I just did?I let her be more than one thing.🔑She does not have to become either:The Angry Black Woman Who Needs TamingorThe Strong Black Woman Whose Every Choice Must Be Defended.Eva needs correction.And Eva deserves dignity.Both.She took on enormous responsibility for her sisters after their parents died.Care became part of her identity.Protection became responsibility.And somewhere along the way, protection sometimes became control.That happens.A survival skill can save us in one season and need adjustment in another.⛓️ If I don’t take care of everybody, everything will fall apart.🔑 I can love grown people without controlling grown people.But Eva isn’t the only person who needs a key.Her sisters do too.Because you cannot continually hand somebody the clipboard to your life and then be shocked that she keeps writing on it.🤣At some point:Eva has to stop managing.And:her sisters have to start owning.🪑🪑That’s relationship.That’s adulthood.That’s boundaries.That’s love without possession.And then there are the men.Oh, yes.ALL OF THEM.👀🤣Because I’m not giving the women full humanity and turning the Black men into props.Pull up some more chairs.🪑🪑🪑🪑Ray.Mike.Tim.Darrell.Come on in.🤣Let’s start with Ray.Ray enters Eva’s life because the men have concocted an absolutely ridiculous plan to get Eva out of theirs.Sir.🤣The plan involves deception.And deception matters.Eva believes she is encountering somebody genuinely interested in her.Ray knows information she does not.That is not equal agency.⛓️ Deception steals informed choice.But then something inconvenient happens to Ray’s little plan.Eva becomes a person.Not “the problem.”Not “that difficult woman.”Not the assignment.Eva.And Ray develops real feelings.That matters because stereotypes are easiest to maintain from a distance.Encounter complicates caricature.🔑 Sometimes knowing somebody destroys the story we were telling ourselves about them.But Ray deserves examination beyond Eva too.He’s a Black man.Working.Trying.Saving.Dreaming.Flawed.Funny.Romantic.Capable of deception.Capable of tenderness.Capable of changing.He doesn’t have to become a CEO before the movie lets him be desirable.👀There’s our ten-times-better rule again.Black excellence is beautiful.But ordinary Black life is beautiful too.A Black man’s worth is not his résumé.Neither is a Black woman’s.Then there’s Mike.Mike has a legitimate frustration.Eva’s involvement creates real strain.But listen carefully:A legitimate grievance does not automatically make every remedy legitimate.🔑Mike’s problem is real.His solution?Sir.Take a seat.🪑🤣He participates in manipulation instead of dealing honestly with the relationships involved.And that is something we can do in real life.We identify a genuine problem.Then because our hurt is legitimate, we assume whatever we do next must also be legitimate.Nope.Pain deserves acknowledgment.Choices still deserve examination.Then Tim.Tim made me think about another measuring stick:What is a Black man supposed to look like?Strong?Dominant?Always in charge?Never uncertain?Never conflict-avoidant?Never soft?Never overwhelmed by stronger personalities?Why?👀A quieter man does not need to become a caricature of dominance to become a man.Tim doesn’t need more masculinity.He needs more voice.🔑And there is a difference.Just as the loud Black woman shouldn’t have to shrink, the quieter Black man shouldn’t have to perform loudness to prove himself.Both get chairs.🪑🪑And Darrell.🤣Beloveds, some people are brilliant.Some people are sophisticated.Some people are intellectual heavyweights.And some people are…Darrell.🤣❤️And guess what?HE GETS A CHAIR TOO.Because intelligence is not the admission price for dignity.Sophistication is not the admission price for love.Black people do not have to become exceptional specimens before they are allowed to be funny, ordinary, goofy, imperfect and loved.And THAT hit me.Because maybe part of the hidden burden of “ten times better” is that we start becoming nervous when Black people on screen aren’t representing us “well enough.”👀Read that again.We worry:What will THEY think?Does this reinforce a stereotype?Why are they acting like that?Why are they so loud?Why couldn’t the character be more educated?More polished?More professional?More respectable?More—acceptable?And suddenly we’re not watching a movie anymore.We’re conducting a performance review of Blackness.😳Beloveds…that is exhausting.Because white characters are often permitted to be:Brilliant.Stupid.Rich.Poor.Heroic.Ridiculous.Criminal.Professional.Messy.Romantic.Awkward.Loud.Quiet.Good.Terrible.Ordinary.And nobody necessarily asks one white character to represent the moral worth of an entire race.But Black characters?Sometimes we watch them carrying everybody.And sometimes—without realizing it—we help load the backpack.⛓️That was part of the Holy Spirit’s conviction for me.God was showing me:Cassandra, look at the ruler.Not merely:Look at those people.Look at what you are using to measure them.👀Who gave you that?When did you learn it?Why are you still carrying it?And Beloveds…I think I know part of the answer.Ten times better.That lesson came from people trying to prepare me for a world they knew could be unfair.There was love inside the warning.There was survival inside it.There was history inside it.But there was also a chain hiding nearby.Because “You may have to be ten times better to receive the opportunity” can quietly become:“Black people SHOULD be ten times better.”No.❤️‍🩹I reject that.We should pursue excellence because excellence can be beautiful.We should develop our gifts.Learn.Grow.Work.Create.Build.But our humanity cannot depend upon outperforming somebody else.And our Blackness does not become more respectable because we make ourselves less Black.🔑Eva gets to be loud.And Eva needs boundaries.Ray gets to be masculine and tender.And Ray needs honesty.Mike gets to be frustrated.And Mike needs accountability.Tim gets to be quieter.And Tim needs his voice.Darrell gets to be goofy.And Darrell gets dignity.The sisters get to love Eva.And they need agency.Everybody gets correction.Everybody gets complexity.Everybody gets humanity.EVERYBODY GETS A CHAIR.🪑🪑🪑🪑🪑🪑🪑That’s what I want now.Not a world where nobody gets judged because nobody ever does anything wrong.That’s not discernment.I want a world where we can say:That behavior needs changingwithout saying:That person needs to become less themselves to deserve belonging.WHEW.❤️‍🔥And this is where the conviction of the Holy Spirit becomes beautiful to me.Because God didn’t merely show me what was wrong.He started changing what I enjoyed.🥰I kept watching.I relaxed.I laughed.🤣I fell in love with seeing Black people simply BE.Not representing.Not auditioning.Not proving.Being.And somewhere along the way, I think God was freeing me too.Because if they don’t have to perform acceptable Blackness—neither do I.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿I can be educated.And silly.Faithful.And questioning.Strong.And tired.Professional.And LOUD.🤣A wheelchair user.A woman whose speech changed.A writer.A believer.A Black woman.A work in progress.ME.And I don’t need to become ten times more human than anybody else.I already belong to the human family.And more importantly to me:I belong to God.🙏🏿❤️‍🔥So maybe the question isn’t:Are they too Black?Maybe the Holy Spirit was asking me:Cassandra, why are you still holding the ruler?😳And maybe my answer now is:I’m not.I’m learning to put it down.🔑Beloveds, maybe you have one too.Maybe yours doesn’t measure Blackness.Maybe it measures education.Body size.Disability.Age.Money.Accent.Gender.Religion.Politics.Neighborhood.Clothes.Mental illness.Addiction.Sexuality.Or somebody whose life simply looks nothing like yours.I’m not asking you to perform an answer for me.Be honest with you.For, HIM.🙏🏿What ruler are you carrying?Who handed it to you?Who have you measured with it?Have you measured yourself with it too?And if the Holy Spirit is showing it to you—maybe He isn’t showing you the ruler so you can beat yourself with it.Maybe He’s saying:Child. You don’t need that anymore.Put it down.🔑❤️‍🩹Pull up your chair.🪑And let somebody else pull up theirs.Because maybe freedom looks like finally letting people be fully human in front of us.And maybe—just maybe—that includes letting ourselves be fully human too.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿❤️‍🔥🌎Asking for A Friend,Cassandra#YourLifeMattersToMeNote: One step. One step. One step. You are loved. You are NOT alone. Keep on being…YOU!Unapologetically His.Unapologetically yours.September 4, 2026
• 📫 ❤️‍🩹 BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME.Beloveds,Ow.That is probably the best way for me to begin this.Ow.For the past few years, the Holy Spirit has been convicting my heart.Not condemning me.Convicting me.There is a difference.Condemnation tells me to hide.The conviction of the Holy Spirit calls me into the light.And sometimes?That light hits something in me that makes me say:OW!😳🥺❤️‍🩹I love living in my Black skin.I love Black joy.I love Black laughter.I love Black music.I love Black creativity.I love Black excellence.I love the beauty of us.The resilience of us.The tenderness of us.The absolute foolishness of us sometimes.🤣I love everybody.But I especially love my bros and sis.Which is exactly why what the Holy Spirit showed me hurt so much.Just before my stroke, I discovered a ton of Black romance movies.Beloveds…I LOVED THEM.🥰😍Seeing Black people in love was breathtaking to me.People who looked like me were falling in love.Being pursued.Being cherished.Building families.Laughing.Arguing.Reconciling.Getting married.Living.And many of these movies showed something else I loved seeing:Black affluence.Black professionals.Black entrepreneurs.Beautiful Black families in beautiful homes.Black men and women succeeding.Black excellence.I loved seeing us.But then something happened.And this is where I cry.😭Permit me to digress.Growing up, Black folk pounded something into my head:You have to be ten times better than everybody else just to earn a hint of a whiff of a chance at a decent job. At a decent life.So I worked.Hard.HARD.I learned.I became good at what I did.I loved Customer Service.You could hear that love in my voice.I trained people.And I watched many of the white people I trained receive the raise.The promotion.The opportunity.Over me.I offered my skills.I knew I was capable.Still…I was seldom selected.Not chosen.Again.Sigh.❤️‍🩹Now come back to those movies with me.Because one day I caught something happening inside myself.I was watching Black people on the screen.And somewhere in my thoughts I heard:They’re too loud.Too boisterous.Too…Black.😳🥺🥹😦😩😢😭OW.I am a Black woman.I love Black people.And there it was.Inside me.A measuring stick.A judgment.A standard about what kind of Blackness was acceptable.And the Holy Spirit would not let me look away from it.That is important.Because I could have defended myself.I could have said:I’m Black!I love Black people!Look at everything I’ve written!Look at who I am!I could have produced evidence for my own defense.But God wasn’t putting me on trial.He was showing me something because He loves me enough to show me what still needs healing.❤️‍🩹I had learned that Black people are watched.Evaluated.Measured.Judged.How we speak.How we dress.How we wear our hair.How loudly we laugh.How angry we are allowed to become.How professional we appear.Whether we are “articulate.”Whether we make somebody uncomfortable.Whether we are respectable enough.Somewhere along the way, the watcher got inside.⛓️Society didn’t have to sit beside me watching the movie saying:That’s too Black.Some of those old lessons had learned how to speak from inside me.And the Holy Spirit said:Look.👀Not:Hate yourself.Not:You are terrible.Not:You don’t love your people.Look.See it.Tell the truth about it.Let Me deal with it.And Beloveds?I did something important.I forgave ME.❤️‍🩹Not because bias doesn’t matter.Not because judgment doesn’t hurt people.Not because I wanted an excuse.I forgave myself because shame was not going to heal what God was revealing.I forgave the Black girl who learned she was being watched.I forgave the Black woman who learned she needed to work ten times harder.I forgave the professional who watched people she trained receive opportunities she wasn’t given.I forgave the woman who learned that being excellent, controlled, polished and respectable might make the road a little safer.And then I let the Holy Spirit teach that woman something new.🔑Over these last few weeks, I started watching those movies again.🥰Then:😍Then:😅Then:🤣😂And something began changing.I stopped grading everybody’s Blackness.Loud?Okay.Quiet?Okay.Boisterous?Okay.Reserved?Okay.Professional?Okay.Country?Okay.Hood?Okay.Affluent?Okay.Working class?Okay.Harvard?Okay.Grandma’s kitchen table and the school of hard knocks?Okay.🤣❤️Black people do not owe me one acceptable performance of Blackness.And neither do I.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿Because here’s another little piece of God’s sense of humor:After all those years learning how not to be “too loud”…Look at the name of my blog.WHY CAN’T I BE LOUD?!🤣🤣🤣Won’t He do it?!But this revelation went deeper.Because I realized something about Black excellence too.I LOVE Black excellence.I celebrate it.But Black excellence cannot become another chain.⛓️We cannot spend generations being told we must be ten times better and then accidentally turn around and require exceptional achievement from one another before we feel comfortable celebrating Black life.The CEO matters.The doctor matters.The professor matters.The entrepreneur matters.And so does the cashier.The janitor.The unemployed brother trying again.The sister working two jobs.The person without the degree.The person with the accent.The person whose grammar somebody wants to correct.The quiet Black man.The loud Black man.The quiet Black woman.And yes—the LOUD Black woman.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿❤️‍🔥Our dignity cannot depend upon our excellence.And that revelation made me ask an even harder question:What other measuring sticks am I carrying?Not just about Black people.About people.Period.What have I absorbed about disability?Poverty?Weight?Age?Education?Accents?Religion?Gender?Mental illness?Addiction?Homelessness?People who vote differently?People who worship differently?People who don’t believe what I believe?People whose lives I don’t understand?👀What if some of the chains I want broken in the world are also hiding somewhere inside me?⛓️Then I need a key too.🔑That is why I’m telling you this.Because the Holy Spirit convicted me.And the instruction in my spirit was:BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME.For ME.Him.God.🙏🏿Tell them.Don’t polish yourself first.Don’t pretend you arrived.Don’t make yourself the teacher standing above everybody else.Tell them what I showed you.So I am.I judged.God showed me.It hurt.I listened.I forgave myself.I kept watching.I started seeing differently.And I’m still learning.That is conviction.That is grace.That is growth.That is another chain hitting the floor.⛓️💥And now, Beloveds, I turn the question toward you—not from above you.From my chair.🪑Be honest with you.For, HIM.What hidden bias are you struggling to deal with?What measuring stick did somebody put in your hand so early that you forgot somebody gave it to you?And what might happen if you finally put it down?Don’t answer for me.Don’t answer for Facebook.Don’t answer for church.Don’t answer because somebody is watching.Ask God.Be honest with you.For, Him.Because He already knows what is there.And if the Holy Spirit turns the light on?👀Look.Listen.Repent where repentance is needed.Forgive yourself.Learn.Unlearn.Heal.Choose differently.And keep walking.One step.One step.One step.🔑❤️‍🩹God did not show me the chain so I could decorate it with shame.He showed me the chain because chains can be broken.And THAT?That will preach.❤️‍🔥🙏🏿Asking for A Friend,Cassandra#YourLifeMattersToMeNote: One step. One step. One step. You are loved. You are NOT alone. Keep on being…YOU!Unapologetically His.Unapologetically yours.September 4, 2026
• 📫 BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME. ❤️‍🩹Beloveds,Ow.For the past few years, the Holy Spirit has been convicting my heart.Not condemning me.Convicting me.And this one hurt.I love living in my Black skin. I love Black joy, Black love, Black laughter and Black excellence. I love everybody, but especially my bros and sis.Which is why this revelation made me cry.Before my stroke, I discovered Black romance movies.🥰😍Seeing people who looked like me falling in love was breathtaking. I loved seeing Black professionals, beautiful homes, successful families and Black people simply enjoying life.But one day I caught myself thinking:They’re too loud.Too boisterous.Too…Black.😳🥺😭OW.There it was.Inside me.And the Holy Spirit said:Look.👀Growing up, Black folk pounded something into my head:You have to be ten times better just to get a hint of a whiff of the same opportunity.So I worked.Hard.I became good at what I did. I loved Customer Service. You could hear it in my voice.I even trained white people who later received raises and promotions over me.Still…I was seldom selected.Sigh.❤️‍🩹I learned early that Black people were being watched.How we talked.How loudly we laughed.How professional we appeared.Whether we were “articulate.”Whether we made somebody uncomfortable.And somewhere along the way—the watcher got inside me.⛓️Nobody had to sit beside me saying, They’re too Black.The old measuring stick had learned how to speak from inside.And THAT is what the Holy Spirit convicted me about.God wasn’t telling me to hate myself.He was showing me something He wanted to heal.So I forgave ME.❤️‍🩹I forgave the Black girl who learned she was being watched.I forgave the woman who learned she had to work ten times harder.I forgave the professional who watched people she trained receive opportunities she wasn’t given.And then I let the Holy Spirit teach that woman something different.🔑I kept watching those movies.🥰😍😅🤣😂And I stopped grading everybody’s Blackness.Loud?Okay.Quiet?Okay.Country?Okay.Hood?Okay.Affluent?Okay.Working class?Okay.Harvard?Okay.Grandma’s kitchen table?Okay.Black people do not owe me one acceptable performance of Blackness.Neither do I.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿And would you LOOK at God’s sense of humor?After learning all those years not to be “too loud,” I now have a blog called:WHY CAN’T I BE LOUD?!🤣❤️‍🔥Won’t He do it?!I love Black excellence.But the Holy Spirit showed me something else:Black excellence cannot become another chain.⛓️The CEO matters.The doctor matters.And so do the cashier, janitor, unemployed brother trying again, sister working two jobs, person without the degree, quiet Black man, loud Black man, quiet Black woman and—YES—LOUD BLACK WOMAN.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿❤️‍🔥Our dignity cannot depend upon being exceptional.And now I’m asking myself:What other measuring sticks am I carrying?About disability?Poverty?Age?Weight?Education?Religion?Accents?Mental illness?Homelessness?People who don’t believe what I believe?What if some of the chains I want broken in the world are hiding inside me?Then I need a key too.🔑And THAT is why I’m telling you.Because the instruction in my spirit was:BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME.ME = HIM.God.🙏🏿Tell them what I showed you.So I am.I judged.The Holy Spirit convicted me.It hurt.I listened.I forgave myself.I’m learning.And I’m choosing differently.⛓️💥🔑Now, Beloveds:Be honest with you. For, HIM.What hidden bias are you struggling with?What measuring stick did somebody put into your hand so early that you forgot it was handed to you?And if the Holy Spirit turns the light on?Look.Listen.Repent.Learn.Unlearn.Heal.Choose differently.❤️‍🩹🔑God didn’t show me the chain so I could decorate it with shame.He showed me the chain because chains can be broken.❤️‍🔥🙏🏿Asking for A Friend,Cassandra#YourLifeMattersToMeNote: One step. One step. One step. You are loved. You are NOT alone. Keep on being…YOU!Unapologetically His.Unapologetically yours.September 4, 2026
• 📫 BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME. ❤️‍🩹Beloveds,Ow.That is probably the best way for me to begin this.Ow.For the past few years, the Holy Spirit has been convicting my heart.Not condemning me.Convicting me.There is a difference.Condemnation tells me to hide.The conviction of the Holy Spirit calls me into the light.And sometimes?That light hits something in me that makes me say:OW!😳🥺❤️‍🩹I love living in my Black skin.I love Black joy.I love Black laughter.I love Black music.I love Black creativity.I love Black excellence.I love the beauty of us.The resilience of us.The tenderness of us.The absolute foolishness of us sometimes.🤣I love everybody.But I especially love my bros and sis.Which is exactly why what the Holy Spirit showed me hurt so much.Just before my stroke, I discovered a ton of Black romance movies.Beloveds…I LOVED THEM.🥰😍Seeing Black people in love was breathtaking to me.People who looked like me were falling in love.Being pursued.Being cherished.Building families.Laughing.Arguing.Reconciling.Getting married.Living.And many of these movies showed something else I loved seeing:Black affluence.Black professionals.Black entrepreneurs.Beautiful Black families in beautiful homes.Black men and women succeeding.Black excellence.I loved seeing us.But then something happened.And this is where I cry.😭Permit me to digress.Growing up, Black folk pounded something into my head:You have to be ten times better than everybody else just to earn a hint of a whiff of a chance at a decent job. At a decent life.So I worked.Hard.HARD.I learned.I became good at what I did.I loved Customer Service.You could hear that love in my voice.I trained people.And I watched many of the white people I trained receive the raise.The promotion.The opportunity.Over me.I offered my skills.I knew I was capable.Still…I was seldom selected.Not chosen.Again.Sigh.❤️‍🩹Now come back to those movies with me.Because one day I caught something happening inside myself.I was watching Black people on the screen.And somewhere in my thoughts I heard:They’re too loud.Too boisterous.Too…Black.😳🥺🥹😦😩😢😭OW.I am a Black woman.I love Black people.And there it was.Inside me.A measuring stick.A judgment.A standard about what kind of Blackness was acceptable.And the Holy Spirit would not let me look away from it.That is important.Because I could have defended myself.I could have said:I’m Black!I love Black people!Look at everything I’ve written!Look at who I am!I could have produced evidence for my own defense.But God wasn’t putting me on trial.He was showing me something because He loves me enough to show me what still needs healing.❤️‍🩹I had learned that Black people are watched.Evaluated.Measured.Judged.How we speak.How we dress.How we wear our hair.How loudly we laugh.How angry we are allowed to become.How professional we appear.Whether we are “articulate.”Whether we make somebody uncomfortable.Whether we are respectable enough.Somewhere along the way, the watcher got inside.⛓️Society didn’t have to sit beside me watching the movie saying:That’s too Black.Some of those old lessons had learned how to speak from inside me.And the Holy Spirit said:Look.👀Not:Hate yourself.Not:You are terrible.Not:You don’t love your people.Look.See it.Tell the truth about it.Let Me deal with it.And Beloveds?I did something important.I forgave ME.❤️‍🩹Not because bias doesn’t matter.Not because judgment doesn’t hurt people.Not because I wanted an excuse.I forgave myself because shame was not going to heal what God was revealing.I forgave the Black girl who learned she was being watched.I forgave the Black woman who learned she needed to work ten times harder.I forgave the professional who watched people she trained receive opportunities she wasn’t given.I forgave the woman who learned that being excellent, controlled, polished and respectable might make the road a little safer.And then I let the Holy Spirit teach that woman something new.🔑Over these last few weeks, I started watching those movies again.🥰Then:😍Then:😅Then:🤣😂And something began changing.I stopped grading everybody’s Blackness.Loud?Okay.Quiet?Okay.Boisterous?Okay.Reserved?Okay.Professional?Okay.Country?Okay.Hood?Okay.Affluent?Okay.Working class?Okay.Harvard?Okay.Grandma’s kitchen table and the school of hard knocks?Okay.🤣❤️Black people do not owe me one acceptable performance of Blackness.And neither do I.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿Because here’s another little piece of God’s sense of humor:After all those years learning how not to be “too loud”…Look at the name of my blog.WHY CAN’T I BE LOUD?!🤣🤣🤣Won’t He do it?!But this revelation went deeper.Because I realized something about Black excellence too.I LOVE Black excellence.I celebrate it.But Black excellence cannot become another chain.⛓️We cannot spend generations being told we must be ten times better and then accidentally turn around and require exceptional achievement from one another before we feel comfortable celebrating Black life.The CEO matters.The doctor matters.The professor matters.The entrepreneur matters.And so does the cashier.The janitor.The unemployed brother trying again.The sister working two jobs.The person without the degree.The person with the accent.The person whose grammar somebody wants to correct.The quiet Black man.The loud Black man.The quiet Black woman.And yes—the LOUD Black woman.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿❤️‍🔥Our dignity cannot depend upon our excellence.And that revelation made me ask an even harder question:What other measuring sticks am I carrying?Not just about Black people.About people.Period.What have I absorbed about disability?Poverty?Weight?Age?Education?Accents?Religion?Gender?Mental illness?Addiction?Homelessness?People who vote differently?People who worship differently?People who don’t believe what I believe?People whose lives I don’t understand?👀What if some of the chains I want broken in the world are also hiding somewhere inside me?⛓️Then I need a key too.🔑That is why I’m telling you this.Because the Holy Spirit convicted me.And the instruction in my spirit was:BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME.For ME.Him.God.🙏🏿Tell them.Don’t polish yourself first.Don’t pretend you arrived.Don’t make yourself the teacher standing above everybody else.Tell them what I showed you.So I am.I judged.God showed me.It hurt.I listened.I forgave myself.I kept watching.I started seeing differently.And I’m still learning.That is conviction.That is grace.That is growth.That is another chain hitting the floor.⛓️💥And now, Beloveds, I turn the question toward you—not from above you.From my chair.🪑Be honest with you.For, HIM.What hidden bias are you struggling to deal with?What measuring stick did somebody put in your hand so early that you forgot somebody gave it to you?And what might happen if you finally put it down?Don’t answer for me.Don’t answer for Facebook.Don’t answer for church.Don’t answer because somebody is watching.Ask God.Be honest with you.For, Him.Because He already knows what is there.And if the Holy Spirit turns the light on?👀Look.Listen.Repent where repentance is needed.Forgive yourself.Learn.Unlearn.Heal.Choose differently.And keep walking.One step.One step.One step.🔑❤️‍🩹God did not show me the chain so I could decorate it with shame.He showed me the chain because chains can be broken.And THAT?That will preach.❤️‍🔥🙏🏿Asking for A Friend,Cassandra#YourLifeMattersToMeNote: One step. One step. One step. You are loved. You are NOT alone. Keep on being…YOU!Unapologetically His.Unapologetically yours.September 4, 2026
• 📫 BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME. ❤️‍🩹Beloveds,I have been thinking about honesty.Not the kind we demand from everybody else.The kind that requires us to sit with ourselves long enough to tell the truth about what is happening inside us.👀Because sometimes the hardest person to be honest with is yourself.Sometimes we know something hurts, but we keep calling it fine.Sometimes we know we are tired, but we keep calling ourselves lazy.Sometimes we know we need help, but we keep calling needing help weakness.Sometimes we know something has changed, but we keep trying to live as though nothing did.And sometimes we are so busy trying to make everybody else comfortable with our reality that we stop being honest about our own.❤️‍🩹I have had to learn this in ways I never wanted to learn it.My life changed.My body changed.My speech changed.My independence changed.The amount of effort required to do ordinary things changed.And there have been moments when I wanted so badly to be the Cassandra I remembered that I became impatient with the Cassandra who was actually here.But she deserves honesty too.She deserves tenderness too.She deserves patience too.She deserves to be loved without having to pretend that everything is easy.🪑So I am learning to tell the truth.I can be grateful and tired.I can have faith and still have questions.I can laugh and still hurt.I can celebrate progress and grieve what changed.I can be strong and need help.I can love people and still need boundaries.I can forgive somebody and still acknowledge what happened.I can believe God is with me without pretending every part of this journey feels good.Those truths do not cancel each other.They can sit in the same room.Sometimes they can even sit in the same chair.👀🪑And maybe somebody reading this needs permission to stop performing too.You do not have to tell everybody everything.Privacy is not dishonesty.Boundaries are not dishonesty.Taking time before you speak is not dishonesty.But beloved, please find somewhere you can tell the truth.Even if the first place is inside your own heart.Say:This hurt me.I miss what was.I am angry.I am afraid.I need help.I don’t know yet.I changed my mind.I need more time.I am proud of myself.I survived something difficult.I am learning.I am healing.I am still here.🔑Because honesty can be a key.A key that unlocks shame.A key that loosens the chain of pretending.A key that lets grief breathe.A key that allows joy to be real instead of performed.A key that makes room for healing.And sometimes the truth is not:”I have figured everything out.”Sometimes the truth is simply:”I am trying.”And beloved?Trying counts.❤️‍🩹I am learning not to require perfection from myself before I offer myself compassion.I am learning not to make recovery another place where I have to perform.I am learning that one difficult day does not erase every good day that came before it.I am learning that needing rest does not erase determination.I am learning that receiving help does not erase independence.And I am learning that being honest about what hurts does not mean I have stopped believing that healing is possible.It means I stopped requiring myself to lie on the way there.👀So be honest with them when honesty is safe.Be honest with the people who love you.Be honest with the people helping you.Be honest about what you need.Be honest about what you cannot do today.Be honest about what you are learning to do again.But before all of that—Be honest with you.For me.❤️‍🩹Because I want you here.Not the polished version.Not the pretending version.Not the version exhausted from convincing everybody that everything is fine.YOU.The learning you.The healing you.The laughing you.The crying you.The figuring-it-out-as-you-go you.There is room for that person here.🪑Pull up a chair.You don’t have to resolve everything before you belong.You don’t have to perform strength before you are loved.You don’t have to have all the answers before your life matters.Your life matters right now.Exactly here.One step.One step.One step.🔑❤️‍🩹🪑Asking for A Friend,Cassandra#YourLifeMattersToMeNote: One step. One step. One step. You are loved. You are NOT alone. Keep on being…YOU!September 4, 2026
• THE CHAIR.September 3, 2026
  PRE-NOTE: I have been really sick but fighting to get this to you unscathed. Pain and 🤒 won’t let go Still, I fight on.  Hours late, but here. Will have to come back to add photos. Here goes nuttin… 📫 THE CHAIR STAYS. 🪑💜Beloveds, I need to tell you something about the chair.Not a chair. … Continue reading THE CHAIR. →
• WEDNESDAY 🌎September 3, 2026
  🤣🗺️🛣️🔑 WEDNESDAY NOON APPARENTLY, THIS IS THE PLAN. 🤣 Beloveds, I have reviewed the itinerary. I have examined the map. I have consulted the available evidence. And I have one question: WHO PLANNED THIS?! 😭🤣 Because I KNOW this cannot possibly be the route I selected. I distinctly remember requesting something smooth. Maybe a little … Continue reading WEDNESDAY 🌎 →
• WEDNESDAY 🌎September 2, 2026
  📫 YOU WERE NEVER UGLY. 💔🌎🥹🔑 Beloveds, Apparently somebody, somewhere, got appointed President of the International Committee of Who Gets to Be Beautiful. Nobody remembers voting. Yet somehow, human beings have spent generations walking around with imaginary clipboards deciding: Too dark. Too light. Too fat. Too thin. Too loud. Too quiet. Wrong hair. Wrong nose. … Continue reading WEDNESDAY 🌎 →
• MOM, WOMBIE, LET’S LOVE THE WORLD TOGETHER. 🌎❤️‍🔥September 1, 2026
  MOM, WOMBIE, LET’S LOVE THE WORLD TOGETHER. 🌎❤️‍🔥 Beloveds, We have grieved. ❤️‍🩹 We have talked about March. We have given away the flowers. 💐 We have gone home. 🧸 And now— come outside with me. 🌎 There is still a whole world out here. People waking up. People going to sleep. People laughing. People … Continue reading MOM, WOMBIE, LET’S LOVE THE WORLD TOGETHER. 🌎❤️‍🔥 →

Huh?

What?!

6:00?!

*Cassandra snatches up the offending alarm clock, marches to the door, flings door wide and prepares to launch said alarm clock over the railing…*

Huh?

New kicks: You set the alarm, last night, to wake us up for a walk and 6:30 am prayer call.

Stairs: Yea, you said we would start getting up at this time, to beat the heat. Leaving you two hours to catch a quick nap, before work.

Lazy: What kind of dumb idea was that!!…*gasp*.

Me: What kind of a dumb idea was that?!

Heart: It has done me good.

Head: I agree. I can halfway think now.

Me: Okay. Okay! No need in ganging up on me!

*Cassandra snatches up her walking clothes, dons her new kicks, and gets after it*

I must admit. The bed was super comfy. The humidity was already at 93 percent, waiting to join the heat which is supposed to be a cool 99 degrees, here shortly. Whew!!

I did, get my walk in. Snuck in a call with my big bro. Put my walking things neatly in the cute storage box I got, and back in my comfy bed.

Ah.

Aha!

Life is short. Set an alarm, if you have to.

Keep walking.

Even, when lazy tries to keep you, in bed or where ever lazy is currently trying to keep you away from.

with you,

Cassandra

#YourLifeMattersToMe

ttnette37@yahoo.com

https://gofund.me/efbe8c13

• 🎬 MAYBE THEY WEREN’T “TOO BLACK.” MAYBE I WAS STILL HOLDING THE RULER. 🪑🔑Beloveds,Yesterday I told you something uncomfortable.I told you that while watching Black romance movies, I caught myself thinking some of the characters were:Too loud.Too boisterous.Too…Black.😳And I told you that the conviction of the Holy Spirit made me look at what was happening inside me.Well.Pull up your chair.🪑Because then I watched Deliver Us from Eva.And this movie made me look again.Not only at Eva.At everybody.The women.The men.The relationships.The families.The careers.The foolishness.The love.The control.The tenderness.The Blackness.And especially the measuring stick I had sometimes been holding while watching people who looked like me.👀Let’s start with Eva.Eva is strong.Opinionated.Professional.Beautiful.Protective.Intelligent.Controlling.Loving.Bossy.Loyal.Interfering.Complicated.Notice what I just did?I let her be more than one thing.🔑She does not have to become either:The Angry Black Woman Who Needs TamingorThe Strong Black Woman Whose Every Choice Must Be Defended.Eva needs correction.And Eva deserves dignity.Both.She took on enormous responsibility for her sisters after their parents died.Care became part of her identity.Protection became responsibility.And somewhere along the way, protection sometimes became control.That happens.A survival skill can save us in one season and need adjustment in another.⛓️ If I don’t take care of everybody, everything will fall apart.🔑 I can love grown people without controlling grown people.But Eva isn’t the only person who needs a key.Her sisters do too.Because you cannot continually hand somebody the clipboard to your life and then be shocked that she keeps writing on it.🤣At some point:Eva has to stop managing.And:her sisters have to start owning.🪑🪑That’s relationship.That’s adulthood.That’s boundaries.That’s love without possession.And then there are the men.Oh, yes.ALL OF THEM.👀🤣Because I’m not giving the women full humanity and turning the Black men into props.Pull up some more chairs.🪑🪑🪑🪑Ray.Mike.Tim.Darrell.Come on in.🤣Let’s start with Ray.Ray enters Eva’s life because the men have concocted an absolutely ridiculous plan to get Eva out of theirs.Sir.🤣The plan involves deception.And deception matters.Eva believes she is encountering somebody genuinely interested in her.Ray knows information she does not.That is not equal agency.⛓️ Deception steals informed choice.But then something inconvenient happens to Ray’s little plan.Eva becomes a person.Not “the problem.”Not “that difficult woman.”Not the assignment.Eva.And Ray develops real feelings.That matters because stereotypes are easiest to maintain from a distance.Encounter complicates caricature.🔑 Sometimes knowing somebody destroys the story we were telling ourselves about them.But Ray deserves examination beyond Eva too.He’s a Black man.Working.Trying.Saving.Dreaming.Flawed.Funny.Romantic.Capable of deception.Capable of tenderness.Capable of changing.He doesn’t have to become a CEO before the movie lets him be desirable.👀There’s our ten-times-better rule again.Black excellence is beautiful.But ordinary Black life is beautiful too.A Black man’s worth is not his résumé.Neither is a Black woman’s.Then there’s Mike.Mike has a legitimate frustration.Eva’s involvement creates real strain.But listen carefully:A legitimate grievance does not automatically make every remedy legitimate.🔑Mike’s problem is real.His solution?Sir.Take a seat.🪑🤣He participates in manipulation instead of dealing honestly with the relationships involved.And that is something we can do in real life.We identify a genuine problem.Then because our hurt is legitimate, we assume whatever we do next must also be legitimate.Nope.Pain deserves acknowledgment.Choices still deserve examination.Then Tim.Tim made me think about another measuring stick:What is a Black man supposed to look like?Strong?Dominant?Always in charge?Never uncertain?Never conflict-avoidant?Never soft?Never overwhelmed by stronger personalities?Why?👀A quieter man does not need to become a caricature of dominance to become a man.Tim doesn’t need more masculinity.He needs more voice.🔑And there is a difference.Just as the loud Black woman shouldn’t have to shrink, the quieter Black man shouldn’t have to perform loudness to prove himself.Both get chairs.🪑🪑And Darrell.🤣Beloveds, some people are brilliant.Some people are sophisticated.Some people are intellectual heavyweights.And some people are…Darrell.🤣❤️And guess what?HE GETS A CHAIR TOO.Because intelligence is not the admission price for dignity.Sophistication is not the admission price for love.Black people do not have to become exceptional specimens before they are allowed to be funny, ordinary, goofy, imperfect and loved.And THAT hit me.Because maybe part of the hidden burden of “ten times better” is that we start becoming nervous when Black people on screen aren’t representing us “well enough.”👀Read that again.We worry:What will THEY think?Does this reinforce a stereotype?Why are they acting like that?Why are they so loud?Why couldn’t the character be more educated?More polished?More professional?More respectable?More—acceptable?And suddenly we’re not watching a movie anymore.We’re conducting a performance review of Blackness.😳Beloveds…that is exhausting.Because white characters are often permitted to be:Brilliant.Stupid.Rich.Poor.Heroic.Ridiculous.Criminal.Professional.Messy.Romantic.Awkward.Loud.Quiet.Good.Terrible.Ordinary.And nobody necessarily asks one white character to represent the moral worth of an entire race.But Black characters?Sometimes we watch them carrying everybody.And sometimes—without realizing it—we help load the backpack.⛓️That was part of the Holy Spirit’s conviction for me.God was showing me:Cassandra, look at the ruler.Not merely:Look at those people.Look at what you are using to measure them.👀Who gave you that?When did you learn it?Why are you still carrying it?And Beloveds…I think I know part of the answer.Ten times better.That lesson came from people trying to prepare me for a world they knew could be unfair.There was love inside the warning.There was survival inside it.There was history inside it.But there was also a chain hiding nearby.Because “You may have to be ten times better to receive the opportunity” can quietly become:“Black people SHOULD be ten times better.”No.❤️‍🩹I reject that.We should pursue excellence because excellence can be beautiful.We should develop our gifts.Learn.Grow.Work.Create.Build.But our humanity cannot depend upon outperforming somebody else.And our Blackness does not become more respectable because we make ourselves less Black.🔑Eva gets to be loud.And Eva needs boundaries.Ray gets to be masculine and tender.And Ray needs honesty.Mike gets to be frustrated.And Mike needs accountability.Tim gets to be quieter.And Tim needs his voice.Darrell gets to be goofy.And Darrell gets dignity.The sisters get to love Eva.And they need agency.Everybody gets correction.Everybody gets complexity.Everybody gets humanity.EVERYBODY GETS A CHAIR.🪑🪑🪑🪑🪑🪑🪑That’s what I want now.Not a world where nobody gets judged because nobody ever does anything wrong.That’s not discernment.I want a world where we can say:That behavior needs changingwithout saying:That person needs to become less themselves to deserve belonging.WHEW.❤️‍🔥And this is where the conviction of the Holy Spirit becomes beautiful to me.Because God didn’t merely show me what was wrong.He started changing what I enjoyed.🥰I kept watching.I relaxed.I laughed.🤣I fell in love with seeing Black people simply BE.Not representing.Not auditioning.Not proving.Being.And somewhere along the way, I think God was freeing me too.Because if they don’t have to perform acceptable Blackness—neither do I.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿I can be educated.And silly.Faithful.And questioning.Strong.And tired.Professional.And LOUD.🤣A wheelchair user.A woman whose speech changed.A writer.A believer.A Black woman.A work in progress.ME.And I don’t need to become ten times more human than anybody else.I already belong to the human family.And more importantly to me:I belong to God.🙏🏿❤️‍🔥So maybe the question isn’t:Are they too Black?Maybe the Holy Spirit was asking me:Cassandra, why are you still holding the ruler?😳And maybe my answer now is:I’m not.I’m learning to put it down.🔑Beloveds, maybe you have one too.Maybe yours doesn’t measure Blackness.Maybe it measures education.Body size.Disability.Age.Money.Accent.Gender.Religion.Politics.Neighborhood.Clothes.Mental illness.Addiction.Sexuality.Or somebody whose life simply looks nothing like yours.I’m not asking you to perform an answer for me.Be honest with you.For, HIM.🙏🏿What ruler are you carrying?Who handed it to you?Who have you measured with it?Have you measured yourself with it too?And if the Holy Spirit is showing it to you—maybe He isn’t showing you the ruler so you can beat yourself with it.Maybe He’s saying:Child. You don’t need that anymore.Put it down.🔑❤️‍🩹Pull up your chair.🪑And let somebody else pull up theirs.Because maybe freedom looks like finally letting people be fully human in front of us.And maybe—just maybe—that includes letting ourselves be fully human too.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿❤️‍🔥🌎Asking for A Friend,Cassandra#YourLifeMattersToMeNote: One step. One step. One step. You are loved. You are NOT alone. Keep on being…YOU!Unapologetically His.Unapologetically yours.
• 📫 ❤️‍🩹 BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME.Beloveds,Ow.That is probably the best way for me to begin this.Ow.For the past few years, the Holy Spirit has been convicting my heart.Not condemning me.Convicting me.There is a difference.Condemnation tells me to hide.The conviction of the Holy Spirit calls me into the light.And sometimes?That light hits something in me that makes me say:OW!😳🥺❤️‍🩹I love living in my Black skin.I love Black joy.I love Black laughter.I love Black music.I love Black creativity.I love Black excellence.I love the beauty of us.The resilience of us.The tenderness of us.The absolute foolishness of us sometimes.🤣I love everybody.But I especially love my bros and sis.Which is exactly why what the Holy Spirit showed me hurt so much.Just before my stroke, I discovered a ton of Black romance movies.Beloveds…I LOVED THEM.🥰😍Seeing Black people in love was breathtaking to me.People who looked like me were falling in love.Being pursued.Being cherished.Building families.Laughing.Arguing.Reconciling.Getting married.Living.And many of these movies showed something else I loved seeing:Black affluence.Black professionals.Black entrepreneurs.Beautiful Black families in beautiful homes.Black men and women succeeding.Black excellence.I loved seeing us.But then something happened.And this is where I cry.😭Permit me to digress.Growing up, Black folk pounded something into my head:You have to be ten times better than everybody else just to earn a hint of a whiff of a chance at a decent job. At a decent life.So I worked.Hard.HARD.I learned.I became good at what I did.I loved Customer Service.You could hear that love in my voice.I trained people.And I watched many of the white people I trained receive the raise.The promotion.The opportunity.Over me.I offered my skills.I knew I was capable.Still…I was seldom selected.Not chosen.Again.Sigh.❤️‍🩹Now come back to those movies with me.Because one day I caught something happening inside myself.I was watching Black people on the screen.And somewhere in my thoughts I heard:They’re too loud.Too boisterous.Too…Black.😳🥺🥹😦😩😢😭OW.I am a Black woman.I love Black people.And there it was.Inside me.A measuring stick.A judgment.A standard about what kind of Blackness was acceptable.And the Holy Spirit would not let me look away from it.That is important.Because I could have defended myself.I could have said:I’m Black!I love Black people!Look at everything I’ve written!Look at who I am!I could have produced evidence for my own defense.But God wasn’t putting me on trial.He was showing me something because He loves me enough to show me what still needs healing.❤️‍🩹I had learned that Black people are watched.Evaluated.Measured.Judged.How we speak.How we dress.How we wear our hair.How loudly we laugh.How angry we are allowed to become.How professional we appear.Whether we are “articulate.”Whether we make somebody uncomfortable.Whether we are respectable enough.Somewhere along the way, the watcher got inside.⛓️Society didn’t have to sit beside me watching the movie saying:That’s too Black.Some of those old lessons had learned how to speak from inside me.And the Holy Spirit said:Look.👀Not:Hate yourself.Not:You are terrible.Not:You don’t love your people.Look.See it.Tell the truth about it.Let Me deal with it.And Beloveds?I did something important.I forgave ME.❤️‍🩹Not because bias doesn’t matter.Not because judgment doesn’t hurt people.Not because I wanted an excuse.I forgave myself because shame was not going to heal what God was revealing.I forgave the Black girl who learned she was being watched.I forgave the Black woman who learned she needed to work ten times harder.I forgave the professional who watched people she trained receive opportunities she wasn’t given.I forgave the woman who learned that being excellent, controlled, polished and respectable might make the road a little safer.And then I let the Holy Spirit teach that woman something new.🔑Over these last few weeks, I started watching those movies again.🥰Then:😍Then:😅Then:🤣😂And something began changing.I stopped grading everybody’s Blackness.Loud?Okay.Quiet?Okay.Boisterous?Okay.Reserved?Okay.Professional?Okay.Country?Okay.Hood?Okay.Affluent?Okay.Working class?Okay.Harvard?Okay.Grandma’s kitchen table and the school of hard knocks?Okay.🤣❤️Black people do not owe me one acceptable performance of Blackness.And neither do I.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿Because here’s another little piece of God’s sense of humor:After all those years learning how not to be “too loud”…Look at the name of my blog.WHY CAN’T I BE LOUD?!🤣🤣🤣Won’t He do it?!But this revelation went deeper.Because I realized something about Black excellence too.I LOVE Black excellence.I celebrate it.But Black excellence cannot become another chain.⛓️We cannot spend generations being told we must be ten times better and then accidentally turn around and require exceptional achievement from one another before we feel comfortable celebrating Black life.The CEO matters.The doctor matters.The professor matters.The entrepreneur matters.And so does the cashier.The janitor.The unemployed brother trying again.The sister working two jobs.The person without the degree.The person with the accent.The person whose grammar somebody wants to correct.The quiet Black man.The loud Black man.The quiet Black woman.And yes—the LOUD Black woman.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿❤️‍🔥Our dignity cannot depend upon our excellence.And that revelation made me ask an even harder question:What other measuring sticks am I carrying?Not just about Black people.About people.Period.What have I absorbed about disability?Poverty?Weight?Age?Education?Accents?Religion?Gender?Mental illness?Addiction?Homelessness?People who vote differently?People who worship differently?People who don’t believe what I believe?People whose lives I don’t understand?👀What if some of the chains I want broken in the world are also hiding somewhere inside me?⛓️Then I need a key too.🔑That is why I’m telling you this.Because the Holy Spirit convicted me.And the instruction in my spirit was:BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME.For ME.Him.God.🙏🏿Tell them.Don’t polish yourself first.Don’t pretend you arrived.Don’t make yourself the teacher standing above everybody else.Tell them what I showed you.So I am.I judged.God showed me.It hurt.I listened.I forgave myself.I kept watching.I started seeing differently.And I’m still learning.That is conviction.That is grace.That is growth.That is another chain hitting the floor.⛓️💥And now, Beloveds, I turn the question toward you—not from above you.From my chair.🪑Be honest with you.For, HIM.What hidden bias are you struggling to deal with?What measuring stick did somebody put in your hand so early that you forgot somebody gave it to you?And what might happen if you finally put it down?Don’t answer for me.Don’t answer for Facebook.Don’t answer for church.Don’t answer because somebody is watching.Ask God.Be honest with you.For, Him.Because He already knows what is there.And if the Holy Spirit turns the light on?👀Look.Listen.Repent where repentance is needed.Forgive yourself.Learn.Unlearn.Heal.Choose differently.And keep walking.One step.One step.One step.🔑❤️‍🩹God did not show me the chain so I could decorate it with shame.He showed me the chain because chains can be broken.And THAT?That will preach.❤️‍🔥🙏🏿Asking for A Friend,Cassandra#YourLifeMattersToMeNote: One step. One step. One step. You are loved. You are NOT alone. Keep on being…YOU!Unapologetically His.Unapologetically yours.
• 📫 BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME. ❤️‍🩹Beloveds,Ow.For the past few years, the Holy Spirit has been convicting my heart.Not condemning me.Convicting me.And this one hurt.I love living in my Black skin. I love Black joy, Black love, Black laughter and Black excellence. I love everybody, but especially my bros and sis.Which is why this revelation made me cry.Before my stroke, I discovered Black romance movies.🥰😍Seeing people who looked like me falling in love was breathtaking. I loved seeing Black professionals, beautiful homes, successful families and Black people simply enjoying life.But one day I caught myself thinking:They’re too loud.Too boisterous.Too…Black.😳🥺😭OW.There it was.Inside me.And the Holy Spirit said:Look.👀Growing up, Black folk pounded something into my head:You have to be ten times better just to get a hint of a whiff of the same opportunity.So I worked.Hard.I became good at what I did. I loved Customer Service. You could hear it in my voice.I even trained white people who later received raises and promotions over me.Still…I was seldom selected.Sigh.❤️‍🩹I learned early that Black people were being watched.How we talked.How loudly we laughed.How professional we appeared.Whether we were “articulate.”Whether we made somebody uncomfortable.And somewhere along the way—the watcher got inside me.⛓️Nobody had to sit beside me saying, They’re too Black.The old measuring stick had learned how to speak from inside.And THAT is what the Holy Spirit convicted me about.God wasn’t telling me to hate myself.He was showing me something He wanted to heal.So I forgave ME.❤️‍🩹I forgave the Black girl who learned she was being watched.I forgave the woman who learned she had to work ten times harder.I forgave the professional who watched people she trained receive opportunities she wasn’t given.And then I let the Holy Spirit teach that woman something different.🔑I kept watching those movies.🥰😍😅🤣😂And I stopped grading everybody’s Blackness.Loud?Okay.Quiet?Okay.Country?Okay.Hood?Okay.Affluent?Okay.Working class?Okay.Harvard?Okay.Grandma’s kitchen table?Okay.Black people do not owe me one acceptable performance of Blackness.Neither do I.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿And would you LOOK at God’s sense of humor?After learning all those years not to be “too loud,” I now have a blog called:WHY CAN’T I BE LOUD?!🤣❤️‍🔥Won’t He do it?!I love Black excellence.But the Holy Spirit showed me something else:Black excellence cannot become another chain.⛓️The CEO matters.The doctor matters.And so do the cashier, janitor, unemployed brother trying again, sister working two jobs, person without the degree, quiet Black man, loud Black man, quiet Black woman and—YES—LOUD BLACK WOMAN.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿❤️‍🔥Our dignity cannot depend upon being exceptional.And now I’m asking myself:What other measuring sticks am I carrying?About disability?Poverty?Age?Weight?Education?Religion?Accents?Mental illness?Homelessness?People who don’t believe what I believe?What if some of the chains I want broken in the world are hiding inside me?Then I need a key too.🔑And THAT is why I’m telling you.Because the instruction in my spirit was:BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME.ME = HIM.God.🙏🏿Tell them what I showed you.So I am.I judged.The Holy Spirit convicted me.It hurt.I listened.I forgave myself.I’m learning.And I’m choosing differently.⛓️💥🔑Now, Beloveds:Be honest with you. For, HIM.What hidden bias are you struggling with?What measuring stick did somebody put into your hand so early that you forgot it was handed to you?And if the Holy Spirit turns the light on?Look.Listen.Repent.Learn.Unlearn.Heal.Choose differently.❤️‍🩹🔑God didn’t show me the chain so I could decorate it with shame.He showed me the chain because chains can be broken.❤️‍🔥🙏🏿Asking for A Friend,Cassandra#YourLifeMattersToMeNote: One step. One step. One step. You are loved. You are NOT alone. Keep on being…YOU!Unapologetically His.Unapologetically yours.
• 📫 BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME. ❤️‍🩹Beloveds,Ow.That is probably the best way for me to begin this.Ow.For the past few years, the Holy Spirit has been convicting my heart.Not condemning me.Convicting me.There is a difference.Condemnation tells me to hide.The conviction of the Holy Spirit calls me into the light.And sometimes?That light hits something in me that makes me say:OW!😳🥺❤️‍🩹I love living in my Black skin.I love Black joy.I love Black laughter.I love Black music.I love Black creativity.I love Black excellence.I love the beauty of us.The resilience of us.The tenderness of us.The absolute foolishness of us sometimes.🤣I love everybody.But I especially love my bros and sis.Which is exactly why what the Holy Spirit showed me hurt so much.Just before my stroke, I discovered a ton of Black romance movies.Beloveds…I LOVED THEM.🥰😍Seeing Black people in love was breathtaking to me.People who looked like me were falling in love.Being pursued.Being cherished.Building families.Laughing.Arguing.Reconciling.Getting married.Living.And many of these movies showed something else I loved seeing:Black affluence.Black professionals.Black entrepreneurs.Beautiful Black families in beautiful homes.Black men and women succeeding.Black excellence.I loved seeing us.But then something happened.And this is where I cry.😭Permit me to digress.Growing up, Black folk pounded something into my head:You have to be ten times better than everybody else just to earn a hint of a whiff of a chance at a decent job. At a decent life.So I worked.Hard.HARD.I learned.I became good at what I did.I loved Customer Service.You could hear that love in my voice.I trained people.And I watched many of the white people I trained receive the raise.The promotion.The opportunity.Over me.I offered my skills.I knew I was capable.Still…I was seldom selected.Not chosen.Again.Sigh.❤️‍🩹Now come back to those movies with me.Because one day I caught something happening inside myself.I was watching Black people on the screen.And somewhere in my thoughts I heard:They’re too loud.Too boisterous.Too…Black.😳🥺🥹😦😩😢😭OW.I am a Black woman.I love Black people.And there it was.Inside me.A measuring stick.A judgment.A standard about what kind of Blackness was acceptable.And the Holy Spirit would not let me look away from it.That is important.Because I could have defended myself.I could have said:I’m Black!I love Black people!Look at everything I’ve written!Look at who I am!I could have produced evidence for my own defense.But God wasn’t putting me on trial.He was showing me something because He loves me enough to show me what still needs healing.❤️‍🩹I had learned that Black people are watched.Evaluated.Measured.Judged.How we speak.How we dress.How we wear our hair.How loudly we laugh.How angry we are allowed to become.How professional we appear.Whether we are “articulate.”Whether we make somebody uncomfortable.Whether we are respectable enough.Somewhere along the way, the watcher got inside.⛓️Society didn’t have to sit beside me watching the movie saying:That’s too Black.Some of those old lessons had learned how to speak from inside me.And the Holy Spirit said:Look.👀Not:Hate yourself.Not:You are terrible.Not:You don’t love your people.Look.See it.Tell the truth about it.Let Me deal with it.And Beloveds?I did something important.I forgave ME.❤️‍🩹Not because bias doesn’t matter.Not because judgment doesn’t hurt people.Not because I wanted an excuse.I forgave myself because shame was not going to heal what God was revealing.I forgave the Black girl who learned she was being watched.I forgave the Black woman who learned she needed to work ten times harder.I forgave the professional who watched people she trained receive opportunities she wasn’t given.I forgave the woman who learned that being excellent, controlled, polished and respectable might make the road a little safer.And then I let the Holy Spirit teach that woman something new.🔑Over these last few weeks, I started watching those movies again.🥰Then:😍Then:😅Then:🤣😂And something began changing.I stopped grading everybody’s Blackness.Loud?Okay.Quiet?Okay.Boisterous?Okay.Reserved?Okay.Professional?Okay.Country?Okay.Hood?Okay.Affluent?Okay.Working class?Okay.Harvard?Okay.Grandma’s kitchen table and the school of hard knocks?Okay.🤣❤️Black people do not owe me one acceptable performance of Blackness.And neither do I.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿Because here’s another little piece of God’s sense of humor:After all those years learning how not to be “too loud”…Look at the name of my blog.WHY CAN’T I BE LOUD?!🤣🤣🤣Won’t He do it?!But this revelation went deeper.Because I realized something about Black excellence too.I LOVE Black excellence.I celebrate it.But Black excellence cannot become another chain.⛓️We cannot spend generations being told we must be ten times better and then accidentally turn around and require exceptional achievement from one another before we feel comfortable celebrating Black life.The CEO matters.The doctor matters.The professor matters.The entrepreneur matters.And so does the cashier.The janitor.The unemployed brother trying again.The sister working two jobs.The person without the degree.The person with the accent.The person whose grammar somebody wants to correct.The quiet Black man.The loud Black man.The quiet Black woman.And yes—the LOUD Black woman.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿❤️‍🔥Our dignity cannot depend upon our excellence.And that revelation made me ask an even harder question:What other measuring sticks am I carrying?Not just about Black people.About people.Period.What have I absorbed about disability?Poverty?Weight?Age?Education?Accents?Religion?Gender?Mental illness?Addiction?Homelessness?People who vote differently?People who worship differently?People who don’t believe what I believe?People whose lives I don’t understand?👀What if some of the chains I want broken in the world are also hiding somewhere inside me?⛓️Then I need a key too.🔑That is why I’m telling you this.Because the Holy Spirit convicted me.And the instruction in my spirit was:BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME.For ME.Him.God.🙏🏿Tell them.Don’t polish yourself first.Don’t pretend you arrived.Don’t make yourself the teacher standing above everybody else.Tell them what I showed you.So I am.I judged.God showed me.It hurt.I listened.I forgave myself.I kept watching.I started seeing differently.And I’m still learning.That is conviction.That is grace.That is growth.That is another chain hitting the floor.⛓️💥And now, Beloveds, I turn the question toward you—not from above you.From my chair.🪑Be honest with you.For, HIM.What hidden bias are you struggling to deal with?What measuring stick did somebody put in your hand so early that you forgot somebody gave it to you?And what might happen if you finally put it down?Don’t answer for me.Don’t answer for Facebook.Don’t answer for church.Don’t answer because somebody is watching.Ask God.Be honest with you.For, Him.Because He already knows what is there.And if the Holy Spirit turns the light on?👀Look.Listen.Repent where repentance is needed.Forgive yourself.Learn.Unlearn.Heal.Choose differently.And keep walking.One step.One step.One step.🔑❤️‍🩹God did not show me the chain so I could decorate it with shame.He showed me the chain because chains can be broken.And THAT?That will preach.❤️‍🔥🙏🏿Asking for A Friend,Cassandra#YourLifeMattersToMeNote: One step. One step. One step. You are loved. You are NOT alone. Keep on being…YOU!Unapologetically His.Unapologetically yours.
• 📫 BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME. ❤️‍🩹Beloveds,I have been thinking about honesty.Not the kind we demand from everybody else.The kind that requires us to sit with ourselves long enough to tell the truth about what is happening inside us.👀Because sometimes the hardest person to be honest with is yourself.Sometimes we know something hurts, but we keep calling it fine.Sometimes we know we are tired, but we keep calling ourselves lazy.Sometimes we know we need help, but we keep calling needing help weakness.Sometimes we know something has changed, but we keep trying to live as though nothing did.And sometimes we are so busy trying to make everybody else comfortable with our reality that we stop being honest about our own.❤️‍🩹I have had to learn this in ways I never wanted to learn it.My life changed.My body changed.My speech changed.My independence changed.The amount of effort required to do ordinary things changed.And there have been moments when I wanted so badly to be the Cassandra I remembered that I became impatient with the Cassandra who was actually here.But she deserves honesty too.She deserves tenderness too.She deserves patience too.She deserves to be loved without having to pretend that everything is easy.🪑So I am learning to tell the truth.I can be grateful and tired.I can have faith and still have questions.I can laugh and still hurt.I can celebrate progress and grieve what changed.I can be strong and need help.I can love people and still need boundaries.I can forgive somebody and still acknowledge what happened.I can believe God is with me without pretending every part of this journey feels good.Those truths do not cancel each other.They can sit in the same room.Sometimes they can even sit in the same chair.👀🪑And maybe somebody reading this needs permission to stop performing too.You do not have to tell everybody everything.Privacy is not dishonesty.Boundaries are not dishonesty.Taking time before you speak is not dishonesty.But beloved, please find somewhere you can tell the truth.Even if the first place is inside your own heart.Say:This hurt me.I miss what was.I am angry.I am afraid.I need help.I don’t know yet.I changed my mind.I need more time.I am proud of myself.I survived something difficult.I am learning.I am healing.I am still here.🔑Because honesty can be a key.A key that unlocks shame.A key that loosens the chain of pretending.A key that lets grief breathe.A key that allows joy to be real instead of performed.A key that makes room for healing.And sometimes the truth is not:”I have figured everything out.”Sometimes the truth is simply:”I am trying.”And beloved?Trying counts.❤️‍🩹I am learning not to require perfection from myself before I offer myself compassion.I am learning not to make recovery another place where I have to perform.I am learning that one difficult day does not erase every good day that came before it.I am learning that needing rest does not erase determination.I am learning that receiving help does not erase independence.And I am learning that being honest about what hurts does not mean I have stopped believing that healing is possible.It means I stopped requiring myself to lie on the way there.👀So be honest with them when honesty is safe.Be honest with the people who love you.Be honest with the people helping you.Be honest about what you need.Be honest about what you cannot do today.Be honest about what you are learning to do again.But before all of that—Be honest with you.For me.❤️‍🩹Because I want you here.Not the polished version.Not the pretending version.Not the version exhausted from convincing everybody that everything is fine.YOU.The learning you.The healing you.The laughing you.The crying you.The figuring-it-out-as-you-go you.There is room for that person here.🪑Pull up a chair.You don’t have to resolve everything before you belong.You don’t have to perform strength before you are loved.You don’t have to have all the answers before your life matters.Your life matters right now.Exactly here.One step.One step.One step.🔑❤️‍🩹🪑Asking for A Friend,Cassandra#YourLifeMattersToMeNote: One step. One step. One step. You are loved. You are NOT alone. Keep on being…YOU!

What?

What!?

WTW!!??

Kicks: Let’s go.

Day: Let’s go.

Ankle weights: Yall got this one.

God: Let’s go!

Life: Let’s go.

Yikes!: Egads. Yall got this.

Egads!: Let’s go!!

Me: Yall know lazy ain’t going to like this.

Lazy: Let’s go! I am NOT doing chores, today. Nuh, bruh.

Stairs: WTW?! It’s not even 6am?!

Incline: Wellllllllll, look at you. Go on ahead, with your bad self!! I tip my cap to you.

The Universe: You rang, Cassandra? How can I serve you, today?

Me: Long as I have King Jesus, I don’t need nobody else, as the song goes. Walk with me. Let’s see who else we can get, eh?

The Universe: Let’s go!!

*Cassandra struts down the road with:

The Universe.

God.

Life.

Jesus.

Wombie.

Big bro.

Mys D.

Her boo of whom she doeth not yet know his name.

You?

Let’s go!!

Cassandra

#YourLifeMattersToMe

ttnette37@yahoo.com

Note: New habits WILL take over and kick old habits out of their comfort zones. I was up well before 6. Now, I have 26 minutes to enjoy before morning prayer. Ah. Aha!

If you would like some prayer, shoot me your request/need and I shall take you with on my walk later tonight or in the morning: ttnette37@yahoo.com. I promise it won’t hurt. Much.🤣🥰❤🤷‍♀️

Me: I wore this yesterday.

God: Okay, so what?

Me: The neighbors may see.

God: Okay, so what? Didn’t you wash your walking clothes this morning.

Me: Yea, but the neighbors won’t know that.

God: Okay, so what? Do you even KNOW the neighbors?

Me: Well, no.

Me: I’m tired.

God: Okay, so what?

Me: No, I mean rrreeeeeaaallly tired.

God: Okay, so what? Do you plan on staying unhealthy?

Me: No!

God: Okay, so what NOW?

Me: Ah.

God: Aha!

*The Father gives Cassandra a kiss, a shove, and hand her her new kicks and tells her to be about her walk.*

I walk.

Who sez so?

God sez so.

My bod sez so.

My new kicks, who wants to show off to stairs and incline and the universe, says so.

Also, fingers are pointing, at the front door. Lemme scoot before fingers points me towards the bathroom for some chores.

I’m out.

Keep going, even when it’s hard. Especially, when it’s hard. You got this.

One step.

One step.

One step.

Cassandra

#YourLifeMattersToMe

ttnette37@yahoo…..wait! I almost forgot to remind you. My bad. Here…*Cassandra scrounges around in her pocket for some love:

You are loved.

You are not alone.

I love me some you.

https://gofund.me/efbe8c13

• 🎬 MAYBE THEY WEREN’T “TOO BLACK.” MAYBE I WAS STILL HOLDING THE RULER. 🪑🔑Beloveds,Yesterday I told you something uncomfortable.I told you that while watching Black romance movies, I caught myself thinking some of the characters were:Too loud.Too boisterous.Too…Black.😳And I told you that the conviction of the Holy Spirit made me look at what was happening inside me.Well.Pull up your chair.🪑Because then I watched Deliver Us from Eva.And this movie made me look again.Not only at Eva.At everybody.The women.The men.The relationships.The families.The careers.The foolishness.The love.The control.The tenderness.The Blackness.And especially the measuring stick I had sometimes been holding while watching people who looked like me.👀Let’s start with Eva.Eva is strong.Opinionated.Professional.Beautiful.Protective.Intelligent.Controlling.Loving.Bossy.Loyal.Interfering.Complicated.Notice what I just did?I let her be more than one thing.🔑She does not have to become either:The Angry Black Woman Who Needs TamingorThe Strong Black Woman Whose Every Choice Must Be Defended.Eva needs correction.And Eva deserves dignity.Both.She took on enormous responsibility for her sisters after their parents died.Care became part of her identity.Protection became responsibility.And somewhere along the way, protection sometimes became control.That happens.A survival skill can save us in one season and need adjustment in another.⛓️ If I don’t take care of everybody, everything will fall apart.🔑 I can love grown people without controlling grown people.But Eva isn’t the only person who needs a key.Her sisters do too.Because you cannot continually hand somebody the clipboard to your life and then be shocked that she keeps writing on it.🤣At some point:Eva has to stop managing.And:her sisters have to start owning.🪑🪑That’s relationship.That’s adulthood.That’s boundaries.That’s love without possession.And then there are the men.Oh, yes.ALL OF THEM.👀🤣Because I’m not giving the women full humanity and turning the Black men into props.Pull up some more chairs.🪑🪑🪑🪑Ray.Mike.Tim.Darrell.Come on in.🤣Let’s start with Ray.Ray enters Eva’s life because the men have concocted an absolutely ridiculous plan to get Eva out of theirs.Sir.🤣The plan involves deception.And deception matters.Eva believes she is encountering somebody genuinely interested in her.Ray knows information she does not.That is not equal agency.⛓️ Deception steals informed choice.But then something inconvenient happens to Ray’s little plan.Eva becomes a person.Not “the problem.”Not “that difficult woman.”Not the assignment.Eva.And Ray develops real feelings.That matters because stereotypes are easiest to maintain from a distance.Encounter complicates caricature.🔑 Sometimes knowing somebody destroys the story we were telling ourselves about them.But Ray deserves examination beyond Eva too.He’s a Black man.Working.Trying.Saving.Dreaming.Flawed.Funny.Romantic.Capable of deception.Capable of tenderness.Capable of changing.He doesn’t have to become a CEO before the movie lets him be desirable.👀There’s our ten-times-better rule again.Black excellence is beautiful.But ordinary Black life is beautiful too.A Black man’s worth is not his résumé.Neither is a Black woman’s.Then there’s Mike.Mike has a legitimate frustration.Eva’s involvement creates real strain.But listen carefully:A legitimate grievance does not automatically make every remedy legitimate.🔑Mike’s problem is real.His solution?Sir.Take a seat.🪑🤣He participates in manipulation instead of dealing honestly with the relationships involved.And that is something we can do in real life.We identify a genuine problem.Then because our hurt is legitimate, we assume whatever we do next must also be legitimate.Nope.Pain deserves acknowledgment.Choices still deserve examination.Then Tim.Tim made me think about another measuring stick:What is a Black man supposed to look like?Strong?Dominant?Always in charge?Never uncertain?Never conflict-avoidant?Never soft?Never overwhelmed by stronger personalities?Why?👀A quieter man does not need to become a caricature of dominance to become a man.Tim doesn’t need more masculinity.He needs more voice.🔑And there is a difference.Just as the loud Black woman shouldn’t have to shrink, the quieter Black man shouldn’t have to perform loudness to prove himself.Both get chairs.🪑🪑And Darrell.🤣Beloveds, some people are brilliant.Some people are sophisticated.Some people are intellectual heavyweights.And some people are…Darrell.🤣❤️And guess what?HE GETS A CHAIR TOO.Because intelligence is not the admission price for dignity.Sophistication is not the admission price for love.Black people do not have to become exceptional specimens before they are allowed to be funny, ordinary, goofy, imperfect and loved.And THAT hit me.Because maybe part of the hidden burden of “ten times better” is that we start becoming nervous when Black people on screen aren’t representing us “well enough.”👀Read that again.We worry:What will THEY think?Does this reinforce a stereotype?Why are they acting like that?Why are they so loud?Why couldn’t the character be more educated?More polished?More professional?More respectable?More—acceptable?And suddenly we’re not watching a movie anymore.We’re conducting a performance review of Blackness.😳Beloveds…that is exhausting.Because white characters are often permitted to be:Brilliant.Stupid.Rich.Poor.Heroic.Ridiculous.Criminal.Professional.Messy.Romantic.Awkward.Loud.Quiet.Good.Terrible.Ordinary.And nobody necessarily asks one white character to represent the moral worth of an entire race.But Black characters?Sometimes we watch them carrying everybody.And sometimes—without realizing it—we help load the backpack.⛓️That was part of the Holy Spirit’s conviction for me.God was showing me:Cassandra, look at the ruler.Not merely:Look at those people.Look at what you are using to measure them.👀Who gave you that?When did you learn it?Why are you still carrying it?And Beloveds…I think I know part of the answer.Ten times better.That lesson came from people trying to prepare me for a world they knew could be unfair.There was love inside the warning.There was survival inside it.There was history inside it.But there was also a chain hiding nearby.Because “You may have to be ten times better to receive the opportunity” can quietly become:“Black people SHOULD be ten times better.”No.❤️‍🩹I reject that.We should pursue excellence because excellence can be beautiful.We should develop our gifts.Learn.Grow.Work.Create.Build.But our humanity cannot depend upon outperforming somebody else.And our Blackness does not become more respectable because we make ourselves less Black.🔑Eva gets to be loud.And Eva needs boundaries.Ray gets to be masculine and tender.And Ray needs honesty.Mike gets to be frustrated.And Mike needs accountability.Tim gets to be quieter.And Tim needs his voice.Darrell gets to be goofy.And Darrell gets dignity.The sisters get to love Eva.And they need agency.Everybody gets correction.Everybody gets complexity.Everybody gets humanity.EVERYBODY GETS A CHAIR.🪑🪑🪑🪑🪑🪑🪑That’s what I want now.Not a world where nobody gets judged because nobody ever does anything wrong.That’s not discernment.I want a world where we can say:That behavior needs changingwithout saying:That person needs to become less themselves to deserve belonging.WHEW.❤️‍🔥And this is where the conviction of the Holy Spirit becomes beautiful to me.Because God didn’t merely show me what was wrong.He started changing what I enjoyed.🥰I kept watching.I relaxed.I laughed.🤣I fell in love with seeing Black people simply BE.Not representing.Not auditioning.Not proving.Being.And somewhere along the way, I think God was freeing me too.Because if they don’t have to perform acceptable Blackness—neither do I.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿I can be educated.And silly.Faithful.And questioning.Strong.And tired.Professional.And LOUD.🤣A wheelchair user.A woman whose speech changed.A writer.A believer.A Black woman.A work in progress.ME.And I don’t need to become ten times more human than anybody else.I already belong to the human family.And more importantly to me:I belong to God.🙏🏿❤️‍🔥So maybe the question isn’t:Are they too Black?Maybe the Holy Spirit was asking me:Cassandra, why are you still holding the ruler?😳And maybe my answer now is:I’m not.I’m learning to put it down.🔑Beloveds, maybe you have one too.Maybe yours doesn’t measure Blackness.Maybe it measures education.Body size.Disability.Age.Money.Accent.Gender.Religion.Politics.Neighborhood.Clothes.Mental illness.Addiction.Sexuality.Or somebody whose life simply looks nothing like yours.I’m not asking you to perform an answer for me.Be honest with you.For, HIM.🙏🏿What ruler are you carrying?Who handed it to you?Who have you measured with it?Have you measured yourself with it too?And if the Holy Spirit is showing it to you—maybe He isn’t showing you the ruler so you can beat yourself with it.Maybe He’s saying:Child. You don’t need that anymore.Put it down.🔑❤️‍🩹Pull up your chair.🪑And let somebody else pull up theirs.Because maybe freedom looks like finally letting people be fully human in front of us.And maybe—just maybe—that includes letting ourselves be fully human too.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿❤️‍🔥🌎Asking for A Friend,Cassandra#YourLifeMattersToMeNote: One step. One step. One step. You are loved. You are NOT alone. Keep on being…YOU!Unapologetically His.Unapologetically yours.
• 📫 ❤️‍🩹 BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME.Beloveds,Ow.That is probably the best way for me to begin this.Ow.For the past few years, the Holy Spirit has been convicting my heart.Not condemning me.Convicting me.There is a difference.Condemnation tells me to hide.The conviction of the Holy Spirit calls me into the light.And sometimes?That light hits something in me that makes me say:OW!😳🥺❤️‍🩹I love living in my Black skin.I love Black joy.I love Black laughter.I love Black music.I love Black creativity.I love Black excellence.I love the beauty of us.The resilience of us.The tenderness of us.The absolute foolishness of us sometimes.🤣I love everybody.But I especially love my bros and sis.Which is exactly why what the Holy Spirit showed me hurt so much.Just before my stroke, I discovered a ton of Black romance movies.Beloveds…I LOVED THEM.🥰😍Seeing Black people in love was breathtaking to me.People who looked like me were falling in love.Being pursued.Being cherished.Building families.Laughing.Arguing.Reconciling.Getting married.Living.And many of these movies showed something else I loved seeing:Black affluence.Black professionals.Black entrepreneurs.Beautiful Black families in beautiful homes.Black men and women succeeding.Black excellence.I loved seeing us.But then something happened.And this is where I cry.😭Permit me to digress.Growing up, Black folk pounded something into my head:You have to be ten times better than everybody else just to earn a hint of a whiff of a chance at a decent job. At a decent life.So I worked.Hard.HARD.I learned.I became good at what I did.I loved Customer Service.You could hear that love in my voice.I trained people.And I watched many of the white people I trained receive the raise.The promotion.The opportunity.Over me.I offered my skills.I knew I was capable.Still…I was seldom selected.Not chosen.Again.Sigh.❤️‍🩹Now come back to those movies with me.Because one day I caught something happening inside myself.I was watching Black people on the screen.And somewhere in my thoughts I heard:They’re too loud.Too boisterous.Too…Black.😳🥺🥹😦😩😢😭OW.I am a Black woman.I love Black people.And there it was.Inside me.A measuring stick.A judgment.A standard about what kind of Blackness was acceptable.And the Holy Spirit would not let me look away from it.That is important.Because I could have defended myself.I could have said:I’m Black!I love Black people!Look at everything I’ve written!Look at who I am!I could have produced evidence for my own defense.But God wasn’t putting me on trial.He was showing me something because He loves me enough to show me what still needs healing.❤️‍🩹I had learned that Black people are watched.Evaluated.Measured.Judged.How we speak.How we dress.How we wear our hair.How loudly we laugh.How angry we are allowed to become.How professional we appear.Whether we are “articulate.”Whether we make somebody uncomfortable.Whether we are respectable enough.Somewhere along the way, the watcher got inside.⛓️Society didn’t have to sit beside me watching the movie saying:That’s too Black.Some of those old lessons had learned how to speak from inside me.And the Holy Spirit said:Look.👀Not:Hate yourself.Not:You are terrible.Not:You don’t love your people.Look.See it.Tell the truth about it.Let Me deal with it.And Beloveds?I did something important.I forgave ME.❤️‍🩹Not because bias doesn’t matter.Not because judgment doesn’t hurt people.Not because I wanted an excuse.I forgave myself because shame was not going to heal what God was revealing.I forgave the Black girl who learned she was being watched.I forgave the Black woman who learned she needed to work ten times harder.I forgave the professional who watched people she trained receive opportunities she wasn’t given.I forgave the woman who learned that being excellent, controlled, polished and respectable might make the road a little safer.And then I let the Holy Spirit teach that woman something new.🔑Over these last few weeks, I started watching those movies again.🥰Then:😍Then:😅Then:🤣😂And something began changing.I stopped grading everybody’s Blackness.Loud?Okay.Quiet?Okay.Boisterous?Okay.Reserved?Okay.Professional?Okay.Country?Okay.Hood?Okay.Affluent?Okay.Working class?Okay.Harvard?Okay.Grandma’s kitchen table and the school of hard knocks?Okay.🤣❤️Black people do not owe me one acceptable performance of Blackness.And neither do I.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿Because here’s another little piece of God’s sense of humor:After all those years learning how not to be “too loud”…Look at the name of my blog.WHY CAN’T I BE LOUD?!🤣🤣🤣Won’t He do it?!But this revelation went deeper.Because I realized something about Black excellence too.I LOVE Black excellence.I celebrate it.But Black excellence cannot become another chain.⛓️We cannot spend generations being told we must be ten times better and then accidentally turn around and require exceptional achievement from one another before we feel comfortable celebrating Black life.The CEO matters.The doctor matters.The professor matters.The entrepreneur matters.And so does the cashier.The janitor.The unemployed brother trying again.The sister working two jobs.The person without the degree.The person with the accent.The person whose grammar somebody wants to correct.The quiet Black man.The loud Black man.The quiet Black woman.And yes—the LOUD Black woman.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿❤️‍🔥Our dignity cannot depend upon our excellence.And that revelation made me ask an even harder question:What other measuring sticks am I carrying?Not just about Black people.About people.Period.What have I absorbed about disability?Poverty?Weight?Age?Education?Accents?Religion?Gender?Mental illness?Addiction?Homelessness?People who vote differently?People who worship differently?People who don’t believe what I believe?People whose lives I don’t understand?👀What if some of the chains I want broken in the world are also hiding somewhere inside me?⛓️Then I need a key too.🔑That is why I’m telling you this.Because the Holy Spirit convicted me.And the instruction in my spirit was:BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME.For ME.Him.God.🙏🏿Tell them.Don’t polish yourself first.Don’t pretend you arrived.Don’t make yourself the teacher standing above everybody else.Tell them what I showed you.So I am.I judged.God showed me.It hurt.I listened.I forgave myself.I kept watching.I started seeing differently.And I’m still learning.That is conviction.That is grace.That is growth.That is another chain hitting the floor.⛓️💥And now, Beloveds, I turn the question toward you—not from above you.From my chair.🪑Be honest with you.For, HIM.What hidden bias are you struggling to deal with?What measuring stick did somebody put in your hand so early that you forgot somebody gave it to you?And what might happen if you finally put it down?Don’t answer for me.Don’t answer for Facebook.Don’t answer for church.Don’t answer because somebody is watching.Ask God.Be honest with you.For, Him.Because He already knows what is there.And if the Holy Spirit turns the light on?👀Look.Listen.Repent where repentance is needed.Forgive yourself.Learn.Unlearn.Heal.Choose differently.And keep walking.One step.One step.One step.🔑❤️‍🩹God did not show me the chain so I could decorate it with shame.He showed me the chain because chains can be broken.And THAT?That will preach.❤️‍🔥🙏🏿Asking for A Friend,Cassandra#YourLifeMattersToMeNote: One step. One step. One step. You are loved. You are NOT alone. Keep on being…YOU!Unapologetically His.Unapologetically yours.
• 📫 BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME. ❤️‍🩹Beloveds,Ow.For the past few years, the Holy Spirit has been convicting my heart.Not condemning me.Convicting me.And this one hurt.I love living in my Black skin. I love Black joy, Black love, Black laughter and Black excellence. I love everybody, but especially my bros and sis.Which is why this revelation made me cry.Before my stroke, I discovered Black romance movies.🥰😍Seeing people who looked like me falling in love was breathtaking. I loved seeing Black professionals, beautiful homes, successful families and Black people simply enjoying life.But one day I caught myself thinking:They’re too loud.Too boisterous.Too…Black.😳🥺😭OW.There it was.Inside me.And the Holy Spirit said:Look.👀Growing up, Black folk pounded something into my head:You have to be ten times better just to get a hint of a whiff of the same opportunity.So I worked.Hard.I became good at what I did. I loved Customer Service. You could hear it in my voice.I even trained white people who later received raises and promotions over me.Still…I was seldom selected.Sigh.❤️‍🩹I learned early that Black people were being watched.How we talked.How loudly we laughed.How professional we appeared.Whether we were “articulate.”Whether we made somebody uncomfortable.And somewhere along the way—the watcher got inside me.⛓️Nobody had to sit beside me saying, They’re too Black.The old measuring stick had learned how to speak from inside.And THAT is what the Holy Spirit convicted me about.God wasn’t telling me to hate myself.He was showing me something He wanted to heal.So I forgave ME.❤️‍🩹I forgave the Black girl who learned she was being watched.I forgave the woman who learned she had to work ten times harder.I forgave the professional who watched people she trained receive opportunities she wasn’t given.And then I let the Holy Spirit teach that woman something different.🔑I kept watching those movies.🥰😍😅🤣😂And I stopped grading everybody’s Blackness.Loud?Okay.Quiet?Okay.Country?Okay.Hood?Okay.Affluent?Okay.Working class?Okay.Harvard?Okay.Grandma’s kitchen table?Okay.Black people do not owe me one acceptable performance of Blackness.Neither do I.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿And would you LOOK at God’s sense of humor?After learning all those years not to be “too loud,” I now have a blog called:WHY CAN’T I BE LOUD?!🤣❤️‍🔥Won’t He do it?!I love Black excellence.But the Holy Spirit showed me something else:Black excellence cannot become another chain.⛓️The CEO matters.The doctor matters.And so do the cashier, janitor, unemployed brother trying again, sister working two jobs, person without the degree, quiet Black man, loud Black man, quiet Black woman and—YES—LOUD BLACK WOMAN.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿❤️‍🔥Our dignity cannot depend upon being exceptional.And now I’m asking myself:What other measuring sticks am I carrying?About disability?Poverty?Age?Weight?Education?Religion?Accents?Mental illness?Homelessness?People who don’t believe what I believe?What if some of the chains I want broken in the world are hiding inside me?Then I need a key too.🔑And THAT is why I’m telling you.Because the instruction in my spirit was:BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME.ME = HIM.God.🙏🏿Tell them what I showed you.So I am.I judged.The Holy Spirit convicted me.It hurt.I listened.I forgave myself.I’m learning.And I’m choosing differently.⛓️💥🔑Now, Beloveds:Be honest with you. For, HIM.What hidden bias are you struggling with?What measuring stick did somebody put into your hand so early that you forgot it was handed to you?And if the Holy Spirit turns the light on?Look.Listen.Repent.Learn.Unlearn.Heal.Choose differently.❤️‍🩹🔑God didn’t show me the chain so I could decorate it with shame.He showed me the chain because chains can be broken.❤️‍🔥🙏🏿Asking for A Friend,Cassandra#YourLifeMattersToMeNote: One step. One step. One step. You are loved. You are NOT alone. Keep on being…YOU!Unapologetically His.Unapologetically yours.
• 📫 BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME. ❤️‍🩹Beloveds,Ow.That is probably the best way for me to begin this.Ow.For the past few years, the Holy Spirit has been convicting my heart.Not condemning me.Convicting me.There is a difference.Condemnation tells me to hide.The conviction of the Holy Spirit calls me into the light.And sometimes?That light hits something in me that makes me say:OW!😳🥺❤️‍🩹I love living in my Black skin.I love Black joy.I love Black laughter.I love Black music.I love Black creativity.I love Black excellence.I love the beauty of us.The resilience of us.The tenderness of us.The absolute foolishness of us sometimes.🤣I love everybody.But I especially love my bros and sis.Which is exactly why what the Holy Spirit showed me hurt so much.Just before my stroke, I discovered a ton of Black romance movies.Beloveds…I LOVED THEM.🥰😍Seeing Black people in love was breathtaking to me.People who looked like me were falling in love.Being pursued.Being cherished.Building families.Laughing.Arguing.Reconciling.Getting married.Living.And many of these movies showed something else I loved seeing:Black affluence.Black professionals.Black entrepreneurs.Beautiful Black families in beautiful homes.Black men and women succeeding.Black excellence.I loved seeing us.But then something happened.And this is where I cry.😭Permit me to digress.Growing up, Black folk pounded something into my head:You have to be ten times better than everybody else just to earn a hint of a whiff of a chance at a decent job. At a decent life.So I worked.Hard.HARD.I learned.I became good at what I did.I loved Customer Service.You could hear that love in my voice.I trained people.And I watched many of the white people I trained receive the raise.The promotion.The opportunity.Over me.I offered my skills.I knew I was capable.Still…I was seldom selected.Not chosen.Again.Sigh.❤️‍🩹Now come back to those movies with me.Because one day I caught something happening inside myself.I was watching Black people on the screen.And somewhere in my thoughts I heard:They’re too loud.Too boisterous.Too…Black.😳🥺🥹😦😩😢😭OW.I am a Black woman.I love Black people.And there it was.Inside me.A measuring stick.A judgment.A standard about what kind of Blackness was acceptable.And the Holy Spirit would not let me look away from it.That is important.Because I could have defended myself.I could have said:I’m Black!I love Black people!Look at everything I’ve written!Look at who I am!I could have produced evidence for my own defense.But God wasn’t putting me on trial.He was showing me something because He loves me enough to show me what still needs healing.❤️‍🩹I had learned that Black people are watched.Evaluated.Measured.Judged.How we speak.How we dress.How we wear our hair.How loudly we laugh.How angry we are allowed to become.How professional we appear.Whether we are “articulate.”Whether we make somebody uncomfortable.Whether we are respectable enough.Somewhere along the way, the watcher got inside.⛓️Society didn’t have to sit beside me watching the movie saying:That’s too Black.Some of those old lessons had learned how to speak from inside me.And the Holy Spirit said:Look.👀Not:Hate yourself.Not:You are terrible.Not:You don’t love your people.Look.See it.Tell the truth about it.Let Me deal with it.And Beloveds?I did something important.I forgave ME.❤️‍🩹Not because bias doesn’t matter.Not because judgment doesn’t hurt people.Not because I wanted an excuse.I forgave myself because shame was not going to heal what God was revealing.I forgave the Black girl who learned she was being watched.I forgave the Black woman who learned she needed to work ten times harder.I forgave the professional who watched people she trained receive opportunities she wasn’t given.I forgave the woman who learned that being excellent, controlled, polished and respectable might make the road a little safer.And then I let the Holy Spirit teach that woman something new.🔑Over these last few weeks, I started watching those movies again.🥰Then:😍Then:😅Then:🤣😂And something began changing.I stopped grading everybody’s Blackness.Loud?Okay.Quiet?Okay.Boisterous?Okay.Reserved?Okay.Professional?Okay.Country?Okay.Hood?Okay.Affluent?Okay.Working class?Okay.Harvard?Okay.Grandma’s kitchen table and the school of hard knocks?Okay.🤣❤️Black people do not owe me one acceptable performance of Blackness.And neither do I.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿Because here’s another little piece of God’s sense of humor:After all those years learning how not to be “too loud”…Look at the name of my blog.WHY CAN’T I BE LOUD?!🤣🤣🤣Won’t He do it?!But this revelation went deeper.Because I realized something about Black excellence too.I LOVE Black excellence.I celebrate it.But Black excellence cannot become another chain.⛓️We cannot spend generations being told we must be ten times better and then accidentally turn around and require exceptional achievement from one another before we feel comfortable celebrating Black life.The CEO matters.The doctor matters.The professor matters.The entrepreneur matters.And so does the cashier.The janitor.The unemployed brother trying again.The sister working two jobs.The person without the degree.The person with the accent.The person whose grammar somebody wants to correct.The quiet Black man.The loud Black man.The quiet Black woman.And yes—the LOUD Black woman.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿❤️‍🔥Our dignity cannot depend upon our excellence.And that revelation made me ask an even harder question:What other measuring sticks am I carrying?Not just about Black people.About people.Period.What have I absorbed about disability?Poverty?Weight?Age?Education?Accents?Religion?Gender?Mental illness?Addiction?Homelessness?People who vote differently?People who worship differently?People who don’t believe what I believe?People whose lives I don’t understand?👀What if some of the chains I want broken in the world are also hiding somewhere inside me?⛓️Then I need a key too.🔑That is why I’m telling you this.Because the Holy Spirit convicted me.And the instruction in my spirit was:BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME.For ME.Him.God.🙏🏿Tell them.Don’t polish yourself first.Don’t pretend you arrived.Don’t make yourself the teacher standing above everybody else.Tell them what I showed you.So I am.I judged.God showed me.It hurt.I listened.I forgave myself.I kept watching.I started seeing differently.And I’m still learning.That is conviction.That is grace.That is growth.That is another chain hitting the floor.⛓️💥And now, Beloveds, I turn the question toward you—not from above you.From my chair.🪑Be honest with you.For, HIM.What hidden bias are you struggling to deal with?What measuring stick did somebody put in your hand so early that you forgot somebody gave it to you?And what might happen if you finally put it down?Don’t answer for me.Don’t answer for Facebook.Don’t answer for church.Don’t answer because somebody is watching.Ask God.Be honest with you.For, Him.Because He already knows what is there.And if the Holy Spirit turns the light on?👀Look.Listen.Repent where repentance is needed.Forgive yourself.Learn.Unlearn.Heal.Choose differently.And keep walking.One step.One step.One step.🔑❤️‍🩹God did not show me the chain so I could decorate it with shame.He showed me the chain because chains can be broken.And THAT?That will preach.❤️‍🔥🙏🏿Asking for A Friend,Cassandra#YourLifeMattersToMeNote: One step. One step. One step. You are loved. You are NOT alone. Keep on being…YOU!Unapologetically His.Unapologetically yours.
• 📫 BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME. ❤️‍🩹Beloveds,I have been thinking about honesty.Not the kind we demand from everybody else.The kind that requires us to sit with ourselves long enough to tell the truth about what is happening inside us.👀Because sometimes the hardest person to be honest with is yourself.Sometimes we know something hurts, but we keep calling it fine.Sometimes we know we are tired, but we keep calling ourselves lazy.Sometimes we know we need help, but we keep calling needing help weakness.Sometimes we know something has changed, but we keep trying to live as though nothing did.And sometimes we are so busy trying to make everybody else comfortable with our reality that we stop being honest about our own.❤️‍🩹I have had to learn this in ways I never wanted to learn it.My life changed.My body changed.My speech changed.My independence changed.The amount of effort required to do ordinary things changed.And there have been moments when I wanted so badly to be the Cassandra I remembered that I became impatient with the Cassandra who was actually here.But she deserves honesty too.She deserves tenderness too.She deserves patience too.She deserves to be loved without having to pretend that everything is easy.🪑So I am learning to tell the truth.I can be grateful and tired.I can have faith and still have questions.I can laugh and still hurt.I can celebrate progress and grieve what changed.I can be strong and need help.I can love people and still need boundaries.I can forgive somebody and still acknowledge what happened.I can believe God is with me without pretending every part of this journey feels good.Those truths do not cancel each other.They can sit in the same room.Sometimes they can even sit in the same chair.👀🪑And maybe somebody reading this needs permission to stop performing too.You do not have to tell everybody everything.Privacy is not dishonesty.Boundaries are not dishonesty.Taking time before you speak is not dishonesty.But beloved, please find somewhere you can tell the truth.Even if the first place is inside your own heart.Say:This hurt me.I miss what was.I am angry.I am afraid.I need help.I don’t know yet.I changed my mind.I need more time.I am proud of myself.I survived something difficult.I am learning.I am healing.I am still here.🔑Because honesty can be a key.A key that unlocks shame.A key that loosens the chain of pretending.A key that lets grief breathe.A key that allows joy to be real instead of performed.A key that makes room for healing.And sometimes the truth is not:”I have figured everything out.”Sometimes the truth is simply:”I am trying.”And beloved?Trying counts.❤️‍🩹I am learning not to require perfection from myself before I offer myself compassion.I am learning not to make recovery another place where I have to perform.I am learning that one difficult day does not erase every good day that came before it.I am learning that needing rest does not erase determination.I am learning that receiving help does not erase independence.And I am learning that being honest about what hurts does not mean I have stopped believing that healing is possible.It means I stopped requiring myself to lie on the way there.👀So be honest with them when honesty is safe.Be honest with the people who love you.Be honest with the people helping you.Be honest about what you need.Be honest about what you cannot do today.Be honest about what you are learning to do again.But before all of that—Be honest with you.For me.❤️‍🩹Because I want you here.Not the polished version.Not the pretending version.Not the version exhausted from convincing everybody that everything is fine.YOU.The learning you.The healing you.The laughing you.The crying you.The figuring-it-out-as-you-go you.There is room for that person here.🪑Pull up a chair.You don’t have to resolve everything before you belong.You don’t have to perform strength before you are loved.You don’t have to have all the answers before your life matters.Your life matters right now.Exactly here.One step.One step.One step.🔑❤️‍🩹🪑Asking for A Friend,Cassandra#YourLifeMattersToMeNote: One step. One step. One step. You are loved. You are NOT alone. Keep on being…YOU!

The following story, based on true events, may or may not contain a tired old lady who may or may not be waiting for a muscular, marriage material hunk to sweep her off her feet. Or, short of that help her off the floor! Speaking of the floor…

Floor: You really got it tonight, huh?

Me: Yea.

Ankle weights: You probably should have taken your walk this morning. It was hot, today.

New kicks: Yea, I TOLD Cassandra we ought get our walk out of the way. I TOLD her lazy was just being lazy and would BE lazy, ALL day, if she let it. Smh.

Lazy: Hey! Don’t get on me for doing what I do! I am very persistent.

Me: Yea, lazy was quite persistent. Also, lazy made some awfully convincing points and even brought air-conditioner into the dynamics.

Air-conditioner: Hey! Don’t be blaming me! I told you both I would be here, upon return.

Floor: I hear body brought out the big guns.

Ankle weights: Yea, yall, it wasn’t pretty. I almost felt bad adding my weight to the matter.

Egads!: Yikes. What had happened?!👀

Yikes!: So, hands placed themselves upon hips and told lips to tell Cassandra to get to stepping, get walking, get down the blasted street, turn around, march her way up the fresh hell incline, and climb the blessed stairs. Yea, boy, she made quite the sight, Cassandra did.

God: *gasp*….I TOLD her she may want to get her walk in before heat and incline got to carrying on. Smh. I best prepare for a visit. Brb.

Incline: I TOLD night to let you know to bring day, early. Do better, tomorrow, okay?

Stairs:…*confident laugh*. I shall be here, tomorrow.

Me: Ha!…*scraping herself off the floor, Cassandra drug her tired body towards a cheering shower.*

Ah.

Aha!

I made it, beloveds. So can and will you. Keep going. Don’t stop at the bottom of the stairs.

content,

Cassandra

#YourLifeMattersToMe

ttnette37@yahoo.com

https://gofund.me/efbe8c13

• 🎬 MAYBE THEY WEREN’T “TOO BLACK.” MAYBE I WAS STILL HOLDING THE RULER. 🪑🔑Beloveds,Yesterday I told you something uncomfortable.I told you that while watching Black romance movies, I caught myself thinking some of the characters were:Too loud.Too boisterous.Too…Black.😳And I told you that the conviction of the Holy Spirit made me look at what was happening inside me.Well.Pull up your chair.🪑Because then I watched Deliver Us from Eva.And this movie made me look again.Not only at Eva.At everybody.The women.The men.The relationships.The families.The careers.The foolishness.The love.The control.The tenderness.The Blackness.And especially the measuring stick I had sometimes been holding while watching people who looked like me.👀Let’s start with Eva.Eva is strong.Opinionated.Professional.Beautiful.Protective.Intelligent.Controlling.Loving.Bossy.Loyal.Interfering.Complicated.Notice what I just did?I let her be more than one thing.🔑She does not have to become either:The Angry Black Woman Who Needs TamingorThe Strong Black Woman Whose Every Choice Must Be Defended.Eva needs correction.And Eva deserves dignity.Both.She took on enormous responsibility for her sisters after their parents died.Care became part of her identity.Protection became responsibility.And somewhere along the way, protection sometimes became control.That happens.A survival skill can save us in one season and need adjustment in another.⛓️ If I don’t take care of everybody, everything will fall apart.🔑 I can love grown people without controlling grown people.But Eva isn’t the only person who needs a key.Her sisters do too.Because you cannot continually hand somebody the clipboard to your life and then be shocked that she keeps writing on it.🤣At some point:Eva has to stop managing.And:her sisters have to start owning.🪑🪑That’s relationship.That’s adulthood.That’s boundaries.That’s love without possession.And then there are the men.Oh, yes.ALL OF THEM.👀🤣Because I’m not giving the women full humanity and turning the Black men into props.Pull up some more chairs.🪑🪑🪑🪑Ray.Mike.Tim.Darrell.Come on in.🤣Let’s start with Ray.Ray enters Eva’s life because the men have concocted an absolutely ridiculous plan to get Eva out of theirs.Sir.🤣The plan involves deception.And deception matters.Eva believes she is encountering somebody genuinely interested in her.Ray knows information she does not.That is not equal agency.⛓️ Deception steals informed choice.But then something inconvenient happens to Ray’s little plan.Eva becomes a person.Not “the problem.”Not “that difficult woman.”Not the assignment.Eva.And Ray develops real feelings.That matters because stereotypes are easiest to maintain from a distance.Encounter complicates caricature.🔑 Sometimes knowing somebody destroys the story we were telling ourselves about them.But Ray deserves examination beyond Eva too.He’s a Black man.Working.Trying.Saving.Dreaming.Flawed.Funny.Romantic.Capable of deception.Capable of tenderness.Capable of changing.He doesn’t have to become a CEO before the movie lets him be desirable.👀There’s our ten-times-better rule again.Black excellence is beautiful.But ordinary Black life is beautiful too.A Black man’s worth is not his résumé.Neither is a Black woman’s.Then there’s Mike.Mike has a legitimate frustration.Eva’s involvement creates real strain.But listen carefully:A legitimate grievance does not automatically make every remedy legitimate.🔑Mike’s problem is real.His solution?Sir.Take a seat.🪑🤣He participates in manipulation instead of dealing honestly with the relationships involved.And that is something we can do in real life.We identify a genuine problem.Then because our hurt is legitimate, we assume whatever we do next must also be legitimate.Nope.Pain deserves acknowledgment.Choices still deserve examination.Then Tim.Tim made me think about another measuring stick:What is a Black man supposed to look like?Strong?Dominant?Always in charge?Never uncertain?Never conflict-avoidant?Never soft?Never overwhelmed by stronger personalities?Why?👀A quieter man does not need to become a caricature of dominance to become a man.Tim doesn’t need more masculinity.He needs more voice.🔑And there is a difference.Just as the loud Black woman shouldn’t have to shrink, the quieter Black man shouldn’t have to perform loudness to prove himself.Both get chairs.🪑🪑And Darrell.🤣Beloveds, some people are brilliant.Some people are sophisticated.Some people are intellectual heavyweights.And some people are…Darrell.🤣❤️And guess what?HE GETS A CHAIR TOO.Because intelligence is not the admission price for dignity.Sophistication is not the admission price for love.Black people do not have to become exceptional specimens before they are allowed to be funny, ordinary, goofy, imperfect and loved.And THAT hit me.Because maybe part of the hidden burden of “ten times better” is that we start becoming nervous when Black people on screen aren’t representing us “well enough.”👀Read that again.We worry:What will THEY think?Does this reinforce a stereotype?Why are they acting like that?Why are they so loud?Why couldn’t the character be more educated?More polished?More professional?More respectable?More—acceptable?And suddenly we’re not watching a movie anymore.We’re conducting a performance review of Blackness.😳Beloveds…that is exhausting.Because white characters are often permitted to be:Brilliant.Stupid.Rich.Poor.Heroic.Ridiculous.Criminal.Professional.Messy.Romantic.Awkward.Loud.Quiet.Good.Terrible.Ordinary.And nobody necessarily asks one white character to represent the moral worth of an entire race.But Black characters?Sometimes we watch them carrying everybody.And sometimes—without realizing it—we help load the backpack.⛓️That was part of the Holy Spirit’s conviction for me.God was showing me:Cassandra, look at the ruler.Not merely:Look at those people.Look at what you are using to measure them.👀Who gave you that?When did you learn it?Why are you still carrying it?And Beloveds…I think I know part of the answer.Ten times better.That lesson came from people trying to prepare me for a world they knew could be unfair.There was love inside the warning.There was survival inside it.There was history inside it.But there was also a chain hiding nearby.Because “You may have to be ten times better to receive the opportunity” can quietly become:“Black people SHOULD be ten times better.”No.❤️‍🩹I reject that.We should pursue excellence because excellence can be beautiful.We should develop our gifts.Learn.Grow.Work.Create.Build.But our humanity cannot depend upon outperforming somebody else.And our Blackness does not become more respectable because we make ourselves less Black.🔑Eva gets to be loud.And Eva needs boundaries.Ray gets to be masculine and tender.And Ray needs honesty.Mike gets to be frustrated.And Mike needs accountability.Tim gets to be quieter.And Tim needs his voice.Darrell gets to be goofy.And Darrell gets dignity.The sisters get to love Eva.And they need agency.Everybody gets correction.Everybody gets complexity.Everybody gets humanity.EVERYBODY GETS A CHAIR.🪑🪑🪑🪑🪑🪑🪑That’s what I want now.Not a world where nobody gets judged because nobody ever does anything wrong.That’s not discernment.I want a world where we can say:That behavior needs changingwithout saying:That person needs to become less themselves to deserve belonging.WHEW.❤️‍🔥And this is where the conviction of the Holy Spirit becomes beautiful to me.Because God didn’t merely show me what was wrong.He started changing what I enjoyed.🥰I kept watching.I relaxed.I laughed.🤣I fell in love with seeing Black people simply BE.Not representing.Not auditioning.Not proving.Being.And somewhere along the way, I think God was freeing me too.Because if they don’t have to perform acceptable Blackness—neither do I.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿I can be educated.And silly.Faithful.And questioning.Strong.And tired.Professional.And LOUD.🤣A wheelchair user.A woman whose speech changed.A writer.A believer.A Black woman.A work in progress.ME.And I don’t need to become ten times more human than anybody else.I already belong to the human family.And more importantly to me:I belong to God.🙏🏿❤️‍🔥So maybe the question isn’t:Are they too Black?Maybe the Holy Spirit was asking me:Cassandra, why are you still holding the ruler?😳And maybe my answer now is:I’m not.I’m learning to put it down.🔑Beloveds, maybe you have one too.Maybe yours doesn’t measure Blackness.Maybe it measures education.Body size.Disability.Age.Money.Accent.Gender.Religion.Politics.Neighborhood.Clothes.Mental illness.Addiction.Sexuality.Or somebody whose life simply looks nothing like yours.I’m not asking you to perform an answer for me.Be honest with you.For, HIM.🙏🏿What ruler are you carrying?Who handed it to you?Who have you measured with it?Have you measured yourself with it too?And if the Holy Spirit is showing it to you—maybe He isn’t showing you the ruler so you can beat yourself with it.Maybe He’s saying:Child. You don’t need that anymore.Put it down.🔑❤️‍🩹Pull up your chair.🪑And let somebody else pull up theirs.Because maybe freedom looks like finally letting people be fully human in front of us.And maybe—just maybe—that includes letting ourselves be fully human too.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿❤️‍🔥🌎Asking for A Friend,Cassandra#YourLifeMattersToMeNote: One step. One step. One step. You are loved. You are NOT alone. Keep on being…YOU!Unapologetically His.Unapologetically yours.
• 📫 ❤️‍🩹 BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME.Beloveds,Ow.That is probably the best way for me to begin this.Ow.For the past few years, the Holy Spirit has been convicting my heart.Not condemning me.Convicting me.There is a difference.Condemnation tells me to hide.The conviction of the Holy Spirit calls me into the light.And sometimes?That light hits something in me that makes me say:OW!😳🥺❤️‍🩹I love living in my Black skin.I love Black joy.I love Black laughter.I love Black music.I love Black creativity.I love Black excellence.I love the beauty of us.The resilience of us.The tenderness of us.The absolute foolishness of us sometimes.🤣I love everybody.But I especially love my bros and sis.Which is exactly why what the Holy Spirit showed me hurt so much.Just before my stroke, I discovered a ton of Black romance movies.Beloveds…I LOVED THEM.🥰😍Seeing Black people in love was breathtaking to me.People who looked like me were falling in love.Being pursued.Being cherished.Building families.Laughing.Arguing.Reconciling.Getting married.Living.And many of these movies showed something else I loved seeing:Black affluence.Black professionals.Black entrepreneurs.Beautiful Black families in beautiful homes.Black men and women succeeding.Black excellence.I loved seeing us.But then something happened.And this is where I cry.😭Permit me to digress.Growing up, Black folk pounded something into my head:You have to be ten times better than everybody else just to earn a hint of a whiff of a chance at a decent job. At a decent life.So I worked.Hard.HARD.I learned.I became good at what I did.I loved Customer Service.You could hear that love in my voice.I trained people.And I watched many of the white people I trained receive the raise.The promotion.The opportunity.Over me.I offered my skills.I knew I was capable.Still…I was seldom selected.Not chosen.Again.Sigh.❤️‍🩹Now come back to those movies with me.Because one day I caught something happening inside myself.I was watching Black people on the screen.And somewhere in my thoughts I heard:They’re too loud.Too boisterous.Too…Black.😳🥺🥹😦😩😢😭OW.I am a Black woman.I love Black people.And there it was.Inside me.A measuring stick.A judgment.A standard about what kind of Blackness was acceptable.And the Holy Spirit would not let me look away from it.That is important.Because I could have defended myself.I could have said:I’m Black!I love Black people!Look at everything I’ve written!Look at who I am!I could have produced evidence for my own defense.But God wasn’t putting me on trial.He was showing me something because He loves me enough to show me what still needs healing.❤️‍🩹I had learned that Black people are watched.Evaluated.Measured.Judged.How we speak.How we dress.How we wear our hair.How loudly we laugh.How angry we are allowed to become.How professional we appear.Whether we are “articulate.”Whether we make somebody uncomfortable.Whether we are respectable enough.Somewhere along the way, the watcher got inside.⛓️Society didn’t have to sit beside me watching the movie saying:That’s too Black.Some of those old lessons had learned how to speak from inside me.And the Holy Spirit said:Look.👀Not:Hate yourself.Not:You are terrible.Not:You don’t love your people.Look.See it.Tell the truth about it.Let Me deal with it.And Beloveds?I did something important.I forgave ME.❤️‍🩹Not because bias doesn’t matter.Not because judgment doesn’t hurt people.Not because I wanted an excuse.I forgave myself because shame was not going to heal what God was revealing.I forgave the Black girl who learned she was being watched.I forgave the Black woman who learned she needed to work ten times harder.I forgave the professional who watched people she trained receive opportunities she wasn’t given.I forgave the woman who learned that being excellent, controlled, polished and respectable might make the road a little safer.And then I let the Holy Spirit teach that woman something new.🔑Over these last few weeks, I started watching those movies again.🥰Then:😍Then:😅Then:🤣😂And something began changing.I stopped grading everybody’s Blackness.Loud?Okay.Quiet?Okay.Boisterous?Okay.Reserved?Okay.Professional?Okay.Country?Okay.Hood?Okay.Affluent?Okay.Working class?Okay.Harvard?Okay.Grandma’s kitchen table and the school of hard knocks?Okay.🤣❤️Black people do not owe me one acceptable performance of Blackness.And neither do I.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿Because here’s another little piece of God’s sense of humor:After all those years learning how not to be “too loud”…Look at the name of my blog.WHY CAN’T I BE LOUD?!🤣🤣🤣Won’t He do it?!But this revelation went deeper.Because I realized something about Black excellence too.I LOVE Black excellence.I celebrate it.But Black excellence cannot become another chain.⛓️We cannot spend generations being told we must be ten times better and then accidentally turn around and require exceptional achievement from one another before we feel comfortable celebrating Black life.The CEO matters.The doctor matters.The professor matters.The entrepreneur matters.And so does the cashier.The janitor.The unemployed brother trying again.The sister working two jobs.The person without the degree.The person with the accent.The person whose grammar somebody wants to correct.The quiet Black man.The loud Black man.The quiet Black woman.And yes—the LOUD Black woman.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿❤️‍🔥Our dignity cannot depend upon our excellence.And that revelation made me ask an even harder question:What other measuring sticks am I carrying?Not just about Black people.About people.Period.What have I absorbed about disability?Poverty?Weight?Age?Education?Accents?Religion?Gender?Mental illness?Addiction?Homelessness?People who vote differently?People who worship differently?People who don’t believe what I believe?People whose lives I don’t understand?👀What if some of the chains I want broken in the world are also hiding somewhere inside me?⛓️Then I need a key too.🔑That is why I’m telling you this.Because the Holy Spirit convicted me.And the instruction in my spirit was:BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME.For ME.Him.God.🙏🏿Tell them.Don’t polish yourself first.Don’t pretend you arrived.Don’t make yourself the teacher standing above everybody else.Tell them what I showed you.So I am.I judged.God showed me.It hurt.I listened.I forgave myself.I kept watching.I started seeing differently.And I’m still learning.That is conviction.That is grace.That is growth.That is another chain hitting the floor.⛓️💥And now, Beloveds, I turn the question toward you—not from above you.From my chair.🪑Be honest with you.For, HIM.What hidden bias are you struggling to deal with?What measuring stick did somebody put in your hand so early that you forgot somebody gave it to you?And what might happen if you finally put it down?Don’t answer for me.Don’t answer for Facebook.Don’t answer for church.Don’t answer because somebody is watching.Ask God.Be honest with you.For, Him.Because He already knows what is there.And if the Holy Spirit turns the light on?👀Look.Listen.Repent where repentance is needed.Forgive yourself.Learn.Unlearn.Heal.Choose differently.And keep walking.One step.One step.One step.🔑❤️‍🩹God did not show me the chain so I could decorate it with shame.He showed me the chain because chains can be broken.And THAT?That will preach.❤️‍🔥🙏🏿Asking for A Friend,Cassandra#YourLifeMattersToMeNote: One step. One step. One step. You are loved. You are NOT alone. Keep on being…YOU!Unapologetically His.Unapologetically yours.
• 📫 BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME. ❤️‍🩹Beloveds,Ow.For the past few years, the Holy Spirit has been convicting my heart.Not condemning me.Convicting me.And this one hurt.I love living in my Black skin. I love Black joy, Black love, Black laughter and Black excellence. I love everybody, but especially my bros and sis.Which is why this revelation made me cry.Before my stroke, I discovered Black romance movies.🥰😍Seeing people who looked like me falling in love was breathtaking. I loved seeing Black professionals, beautiful homes, successful families and Black people simply enjoying life.But one day I caught myself thinking:They’re too loud.Too boisterous.Too…Black.😳🥺😭OW.There it was.Inside me.And the Holy Spirit said:Look.👀Growing up, Black folk pounded something into my head:You have to be ten times better just to get a hint of a whiff of the same opportunity.So I worked.Hard.I became good at what I did. I loved Customer Service. You could hear it in my voice.I even trained white people who later received raises and promotions over me.Still…I was seldom selected.Sigh.❤️‍🩹I learned early that Black people were being watched.How we talked.How loudly we laughed.How professional we appeared.Whether we were “articulate.”Whether we made somebody uncomfortable.And somewhere along the way—the watcher got inside me.⛓️Nobody had to sit beside me saying, They’re too Black.The old measuring stick had learned how to speak from inside.And THAT is what the Holy Spirit convicted me about.God wasn’t telling me to hate myself.He was showing me something He wanted to heal.So I forgave ME.❤️‍🩹I forgave the Black girl who learned she was being watched.I forgave the woman who learned she had to work ten times harder.I forgave the professional who watched people she trained receive opportunities she wasn’t given.And then I let the Holy Spirit teach that woman something different.🔑I kept watching those movies.🥰😍😅🤣😂And I stopped grading everybody’s Blackness.Loud?Okay.Quiet?Okay.Country?Okay.Hood?Okay.Affluent?Okay.Working class?Okay.Harvard?Okay.Grandma’s kitchen table?Okay.Black people do not owe me one acceptable performance of Blackness.Neither do I.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿And would you LOOK at God’s sense of humor?After learning all those years not to be “too loud,” I now have a blog called:WHY CAN’T I BE LOUD?!🤣❤️‍🔥Won’t He do it?!I love Black excellence.But the Holy Spirit showed me something else:Black excellence cannot become another chain.⛓️The CEO matters.The doctor matters.And so do the cashier, janitor, unemployed brother trying again, sister working two jobs, person without the degree, quiet Black man, loud Black man, quiet Black woman and—YES—LOUD BLACK WOMAN.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿❤️‍🔥Our dignity cannot depend upon being exceptional.And now I’m asking myself:What other measuring sticks am I carrying?About disability?Poverty?Age?Weight?Education?Religion?Accents?Mental illness?Homelessness?People who don’t believe what I believe?What if some of the chains I want broken in the world are hiding inside me?Then I need a key too.🔑And THAT is why I’m telling you.Because the instruction in my spirit was:BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME.ME = HIM.God.🙏🏿Tell them what I showed you.So I am.I judged.The Holy Spirit convicted me.It hurt.I listened.I forgave myself.I’m learning.And I’m choosing differently.⛓️💥🔑Now, Beloveds:Be honest with you. For, HIM.What hidden bias are you struggling with?What measuring stick did somebody put into your hand so early that you forgot it was handed to you?And if the Holy Spirit turns the light on?Look.Listen.Repent.Learn.Unlearn.Heal.Choose differently.❤️‍🩹🔑God didn’t show me the chain so I could decorate it with shame.He showed me the chain because chains can be broken.❤️‍🔥🙏🏿Asking for A Friend,Cassandra#YourLifeMattersToMeNote: One step. One step. One step. You are loved. You are NOT alone. Keep on being…YOU!Unapologetically His.Unapologetically yours.
• 📫 BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME. ❤️‍🩹Beloveds,Ow.That is probably the best way for me to begin this.Ow.For the past few years, the Holy Spirit has been convicting my heart.Not condemning me.Convicting me.There is a difference.Condemnation tells me to hide.The conviction of the Holy Spirit calls me into the light.And sometimes?That light hits something in me that makes me say:OW!😳🥺❤️‍🩹I love living in my Black skin.I love Black joy.I love Black laughter.I love Black music.I love Black creativity.I love Black excellence.I love the beauty of us.The resilience of us.The tenderness of us.The absolute foolishness of us sometimes.🤣I love everybody.But I especially love my bros and sis.Which is exactly why what the Holy Spirit showed me hurt so much.Just before my stroke, I discovered a ton of Black romance movies.Beloveds…I LOVED THEM.🥰😍Seeing Black people in love was breathtaking to me.People who looked like me were falling in love.Being pursued.Being cherished.Building families.Laughing.Arguing.Reconciling.Getting married.Living.And many of these movies showed something else I loved seeing:Black affluence.Black professionals.Black entrepreneurs.Beautiful Black families in beautiful homes.Black men and women succeeding.Black excellence.I loved seeing us.But then something happened.And this is where I cry.😭Permit me to digress.Growing up, Black folk pounded something into my head:You have to be ten times better than everybody else just to earn a hint of a whiff of a chance at a decent job. At a decent life.So I worked.Hard.HARD.I learned.I became good at what I did.I loved Customer Service.You could hear that love in my voice.I trained people.And I watched many of the white people I trained receive the raise.The promotion.The opportunity.Over me.I offered my skills.I knew I was capable.Still…I was seldom selected.Not chosen.Again.Sigh.❤️‍🩹Now come back to those movies with me.Because one day I caught something happening inside myself.I was watching Black people on the screen.And somewhere in my thoughts I heard:They’re too loud.Too boisterous.Too…Black.😳🥺🥹😦😩😢😭OW.I am a Black woman.I love Black people.And there it was.Inside me.A measuring stick.A judgment.A standard about what kind of Blackness was acceptable.And the Holy Spirit would not let me look away from it.That is important.Because I could have defended myself.I could have said:I’m Black!I love Black people!Look at everything I’ve written!Look at who I am!I could have produced evidence for my own defense.But God wasn’t putting me on trial.He was showing me something because He loves me enough to show me what still needs healing.❤️‍🩹I had learned that Black people are watched.Evaluated.Measured.Judged.How we speak.How we dress.How we wear our hair.How loudly we laugh.How angry we are allowed to become.How professional we appear.Whether we are “articulate.”Whether we make somebody uncomfortable.Whether we are respectable enough.Somewhere along the way, the watcher got inside.⛓️Society didn’t have to sit beside me watching the movie saying:That’s too Black.Some of those old lessons had learned how to speak from inside me.And the Holy Spirit said:Look.👀Not:Hate yourself.Not:You are terrible.Not:You don’t love your people.Look.See it.Tell the truth about it.Let Me deal with it.And Beloveds?I did something important.I forgave ME.❤️‍🩹Not because bias doesn’t matter.Not because judgment doesn’t hurt people.Not because I wanted an excuse.I forgave myself because shame was not going to heal what God was revealing.I forgave the Black girl who learned she was being watched.I forgave the Black woman who learned she needed to work ten times harder.I forgave the professional who watched people she trained receive opportunities she wasn’t given.I forgave the woman who learned that being excellent, controlled, polished and respectable might make the road a little safer.And then I let the Holy Spirit teach that woman something new.🔑Over these last few weeks, I started watching those movies again.🥰Then:😍Then:😅Then:🤣😂And something began changing.I stopped grading everybody’s Blackness.Loud?Okay.Quiet?Okay.Boisterous?Okay.Reserved?Okay.Professional?Okay.Country?Okay.Hood?Okay.Affluent?Okay.Working class?Okay.Harvard?Okay.Grandma’s kitchen table and the school of hard knocks?Okay.🤣❤️Black people do not owe me one acceptable performance of Blackness.And neither do I.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿Because here’s another little piece of God’s sense of humor:After all those years learning how not to be “too loud”…Look at the name of my blog.WHY CAN’T I BE LOUD?!🤣🤣🤣Won’t He do it?!But this revelation went deeper.Because I realized something about Black excellence too.I LOVE Black excellence.I celebrate it.But Black excellence cannot become another chain.⛓️We cannot spend generations being told we must be ten times better and then accidentally turn around and require exceptional achievement from one another before we feel comfortable celebrating Black life.The CEO matters.The doctor matters.The professor matters.The entrepreneur matters.And so does the cashier.The janitor.The unemployed brother trying again.The sister working two jobs.The person without the degree.The person with the accent.The person whose grammar somebody wants to correct.The quiet Black man.The loud Black man.The quiet Black woman.And yes—the LOUD Black woman.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿❤️‍🔥Our dignity cannot depend upon our excellence.And that revelation made me ask an even harder question:What other measuring sticks am I carrying?Not just about Black people.About people.Period.What have I absorbed about disability?Poverty?Weight?Age?Education?Accents?Religion?Gender?Mental illness?Addiction?Homelessness?People who vote differently?People who worship differently?People who don’t believe what I believe?People whose lives I don’t understand?👀What if some of the chains I want broken in the world are also hiding somewhere inside me?⛓️Then I need a key too.🔑That is why I’m telling you this.Because the Holy Spirit convicted me.And the instruction in my spirit was:BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME.For ME.Him.God.🙏🏿Tell them.Don’t polish yourself first.Don’t pretend you arrived.Don’t make yourself the teacher standing above everybody else.Tell them what I showed you.So I am.I judged.God showed me.It hurt.I listened.I forgave myself.I kept watching.I started seeing differently.And I’m still learning.That is conviction.That is grace.That is growth.That is another chain hitting the floor.⛓️💥And now, Beloveds, I turn the question toward you—not from above you.From my chair.🪑Be honest with you.For, HIM.What hidden bias are you struggling to deal with?What measuring stick did somebody put in your hand so early that you forgot somebody gave it to you?And what might happen if you finally put it down?Don’t answer for me.Don’t answer for Facebook.Don’t answer for church.Don’t answer because somebody is watching.Ask God.Be honest with you.For, Him.Because He already knows what is there.And if the Holy Spirit turns the light on?👀Look.Listen.Repent where repentance is needed.Forgive yourself.Learn.Unlearn.Heal.Choose differently.And keep walking.One step.One step.One step.🔑❤️‍🩹God did not show me the chain so I could decorate it with shame.He showed me the chain because chains can be broken.And THAT?That will preach.❤️‍🔥🙏🏿Asking for A Friend,Cassandra#YourLifeMattersToMeNote: One step. One step. One step. You are loved. You are NOT alone. Keep on being…YOU!Unapologetically His.Unapologetically yours.
• 📫 BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME. ❤️‍🩹Beloveds,I have been thinking about honesty.Not the kind we demand from everybody else.The kind that requires us to sit with ourselves long enough to tell the truth about what is happening inside us.👀Because sometimes the hardest person to be honest with is yourself.Sometimes we know something hurts, but we keep calling it fine.Sometimes we know we are tired, but we keep calling ourselves lazy.Sometimes we know we need help, but we keep calling needing help weakness.Sometimes we know something has changed, but we keep trying to live as though nothing did.And sometimes we are so busy trying to make everybody else comfortable with our reality that we stop being honest about our own.❤️‍🩹I have had to learn this in ways I never wanted to learn it.My life changed.My body changed.My speech changed.My independence changed.The amount of effort required to do ordinary things changed.And there have been moments when I wanted so badly to be the Cassandra I remembered that I became impatient with the Cassandra who was actually here.But she deserves honesty too.She deserves tenderness too.She deserves patience too.She deserves to be loved without having to pretend that everything is easy.🪑So I am learning to tell the truth.I can be grateful and tired.I can have faith and still have questions.I can laugh and still hurt.I can celebrate progress and grieve what changed.I can be strong and need help.I can love people and still need boundaries.I can forgive somebody and still acknowledge what happened.I can believe God is with me without pretending every part of this journey feels good.Those truths do not cancel each other.They can sit in the same room.Sometimes they can even sit in the same chair.👀🪑And maybe somebody reading this needs permission to stop performing too.You do not have to tell everybody everything.Privacy is not dishonesty.Boundaries are not dishonesty.Taking time before you speak is not dishonesty.But beloved, please find somewhere you can tell the truth.Even if the first place is inside your own heart.Say:This hurt me.I miss what was.I am angry.I am afraid.I need help.I don’t know yet.I changed my mind.I need more time.I am proud of myself.I survived something difficult.I am learning.I am healing.I am still here.🔑Because honesty can be a key.A key that unlocks shame.A key that loosens the chain of pretending.A key that lets grief breathe.A key that allows joy to be real instead of performed.A key that makes room for healing.And sometimes the truth is not:”I have figured everything out.”Sometimes the truth is simply:”I am trying.”And beloved?Trying counts.❤️‍🩹I am learning not to require perfection from myself before I offer myself compassion.I am learning not to make recovery another place where I have to perform.I am learning that one difficult day does not erase every good day that came before it.I am learning that needing rest does not erase determination.I am learning that receiving help does not erase independence.And I am learning that being honest about what hurts does not mean I have stopped believing that healing is possible.It means I stopped requiring myself to lie on the way there.👀So be honest with them when honesty is safe.Be honest with the people who love you.Be honest with the people helping you.Be honest about what you need.Be honest about what you cannot do today.Be honest about what you are learning to do again.But before all of that—Be honest with you.For me.❤️‍🩹Because I want you here.Not the polished version.Not the pretending version.Not the version exhausted from convincing everybody that everything is fine.YOU.The learning you.The healing you.The laughing you.The crying you.The figuring-it-out-as-you-go you.There is room for that person here.🪑Pull up a chair.You don’t have to resolve everything before you belong.You don’t have to perform strength before you are loved.You don’t have to have all the answers before your life matters.Your life matters right now.Exactly here.One step.One step.One step.🔑❤️‍🩹🪑Asking for A Friend,Cassandra#YourLifeMattersToMeNote: One step. One step. One step. You are loved. You are NOT alone. Keep on being…YOU!

I am tired.

So much so the other day I took off my glasses and put them in my eyeglass case. When I went to rub my eyes, my glasses were still on my face!

Confused, I opened the eyeglass case to find the tv remote. Opppsss……scuze me.

HHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!

I started a piece, the other week, about being soul tired. But, I have been soooooooooo tired, I have not been able to finish it. I have a good dozen half finished pieces that were due to be posted the past few days. My bad. I sowwy my pieces.

I am working on another piece called…ha!, thought I was going to spill the beans early, eh? Too bad. Be patient, why don’t you. A cook has to prepare the meal in a tasty way.

Anywho, N-E-waze and so on and so forth…..hahahahahahahahahha.

I tend to get extra goofy, when tired. Blame God, not me. He made me to be such a goofhead…*shrug*.

I realize my soul is tired. To my core. To the depths of my heart. I know other people are tired. Tired of expectation. Tired of the world’s expectation. Tired of their own expectation.

I have been feeling every bit of my 54 years. I am so tired. It feels good to admit this to myself. I used to think being tired was weakness. I now know admitting to be tired was the strongest thing I could have done.

Admitting when we are weak gives us the opportunity to be strong. Is strong and reaching out for support. Strong and tearing down the walls that has kept us from living. Strong in reaching out, to the universe, for love support and help. Strong in reaching out, to God and Life for love, support and help. Strong in reaching out to others for love support and help.

I can’t rest, beloveds. My heart is calling on folk to admit they are soul tired so they can rest. Finally.

Be encouraged.

What are YOU tired of, beloveds?

Are you tired of being disappointed:

With, life.

In, life?

With, you?

With, others?

With…

Saying, outloud, if to no other person than you, WILL change your life. It changed mine. It changes me, still.

I rested, my case, before the universe. I told the world that I was getting off this merry go round. I told God and Life I was going. In pursuit. Of…

Of, you ask?

Ah.

Aha!

Keep asking.

Don’t be afraid of all your heart has been dying to tell you. You believe your heart is disappointed in you so are terrified to turn down the noise to listen.

Beloveds, your heart is simply trying to get you to lift up your head. You are worthy. Of, love. You are. RECEIVE.

Receiving, is not easy. Not, at first. Being open to receiving, is terrifying. Not, at first. Yet, it is sooooooooo rewarding.

Even if it seems nothing has happened. It has. Just your reaching up and reaching out will and has changed your life. Watch and see.

Every day, every single one, beloveds, I think of you all, I pray for all, I rejoice for all, I dance for all, I hope for all. Every one.

Every day, I rush here to give a bit of love. Why? Because we all need a bit of love on the regular.

The more, I reach out, the less my soul is tired.

Ah.

Aha!

What are you tired of?

Keep going.

here,

Cassandra

#YourLifeMattersToMe

ttnette37@yahoo.com

https://gofund.me/efbe8c13

• 🎬 MAYBE THEY WEREN’T “TOO BLACK.” MAYBE I WAS STILL HOLDING THE RULER. 🪑🔑Beloveds,Yesterday I told you something uncomfortable.I told you that while watching Black romance movies, I caught myself thinking some of the characters were:Too loud.Too boisterous.Too…Black.😳And I told you that the conviction of the Holy Spirit made me look at what was happening inside me.Well.Pull up your chair.🪑Because then I watched Deliver Us from Eva.And this movie made me look again.Not only at Eva.At everybody.The women.The men.The relationships.The families.The careers.The foolishness.The love.The control.The tenderness.The Blackness.And especially the measuring stick I had sometimes been holding while watching people who looked like me.👀Let’s start with Eva.Eva is strong.Opinionated.Professional.Beautiful.Protective.Intelligent.Controlling.Loving.Bossy.Loyal.Interfering.Complicated.Notice what I just did?I let her be more than one thing.🔑She does not have to become either:The Angry Black Woman Who Needs TamingorThe Strong Black Woman Whose Every Choice Must Be Defended.Eva needs correction.And Eva deserves dignity.Both.She took on enormous responsibility for her sisters after their parents died.Care became part of her identity.Protection became responsibility.And somewhere along the way, protection sometimes became control.That happens.A survival skill can save us in one season and need adjustment in another.⛓️ If I don’t take care of everybody, everything will fall apart.🔑 I can love grown people without controlling grown people.But Eva isn’t the only person who needs a key.Her sisters do too.Because you cannot continually hand somebody the clipboard to your life and then be shocked that she keeps writing on it.🤣At some point:Eva has to stop managing.And:her sisters have to start owning.🪑🪑That’s relationship.That’s adulthood.That’s boundaries.That’s love without possession.And then there are the men.Oh, yes.ALL OF THEM.👀🤣Because I’m not giving the women full humanity and turning the Black men into props.Pull up some more chairs.🪑🪑🪑🪑Ray.Mike.Tim.Darrell.Come on in.🤣Let’s start with Ray.Ray enters Eva’s life because the men have concocted an absolutely ridiculous plan to get Eva out of theirs.Sir.🤣The plan involves deception.And deception matters.Eva believes she is encountering somebody genuinely interested in her.Ray knows information she does not.That is not equal agency.⛓️ Deception steals informed choice.But then something inconvenient happens to Ray’s little plan.Eva becomes a person.Not “the problem.”Not “that difficult woman.”Not the assignment.Eva.And Ray develops real feelings.That matters because stereotypes are easiest to maintain from a distance.Encounter complicates caricature.🔑 Sometimes knowing somebody destroys the story we were telling ourselves about them.But Ray deserves examination beyond Eva too.He’s a Black man.Working.Trying.Saving.Dreaming.Flawed.Funny.Romantic.Capable of deception.Capable of tenderness.Capable of changing.He doesn’t have to become a CEO before the movie lets him be desirable.👀There’s our ten-times-better rule again.Black excellence is beautiful.But ordinary Black life is beautiful too.A Black man’s worth is not his résumé.Neither is a Black woman’s.Then there’s Mike.Mike has a legitimate frustration.Eva’s involvement creates real strain.But listen carefully:A legitimate grievance does not automatically make every remedy legitimate.🔑Mike’s problem is real.His solution?Sir.Take a seat.🪑🤣He participates in manipulation instead of dealing honestly with the relationships involved.And that is something we can do in real life.We identify a genuine problem.Then because our hurt is legitimate, we assume whatever we do next must also be legitimate.Nope.Pain deserves acknowledgment.Choices still deserve examination.Then Tim.Tim made me think about another measuring stick:What is a Black man supposed to look like?Strong?Dominant?Always in charge?Never uncertain?Never conflict-avoidant?Never soft?Never overwhelmed by stronger personalities?Why?👀A quieter man does not need to become a caricature of dominance to become a man.Tim doesn’t need more masculinity.He needs more voice.🔑And there is a difference.Just as the loud Black woman shouldn’t have to shrink, the quieter Black man shouldn’t have to perform loudness to prove himself.Both get chairs.🪑🪑And Darrell.🤣Beloveds, some people are brilliant.Some people are sophisticated.Some people are intellectual heavyweights.And some people are…Darrell.🤣❤️And guess what?HE GETS A CHAIR TOO.Because intelligence is not the admission price for dignity.Sophistication is not the admission price for love.Black people do not have to become exceptional specimens before they are allowed to be funny, ordinary, goofy, imperfect and loved.And THAT hit me.Because maybe part of the hidden burden of “ten times better” is that we start becoming nervous when Black people on screen aren’t representing us “well enough.”👀Read that again.We worry:What will THEY think?Does this reinforce a stereotype?Why are they acting like that?Why are they so loud?Why couldn’t the character be more educated?More polished?More professional?More respectable?More—acceptable?And suddenly we’re not watching a movie anymore.We’re conducting a performance review of Blackness.😳Beloveds…that is exhausting.Because white characters are often permitted to be:Brilliant.Stupid.Rich.Poor.Heroic.Ridiculous.Criminal.Professional.Messy.Romantic.Awkward.Loud.Quiet.Good.Terrible.Ordinary.And nobody necessarily asks one white character to represent the moral worth of an entire race.But Black characters?Sometimes we watch them carrying everybody.And sometimes—without realizing it—we help load the backpack.⛓️That was part of the Holy Spirit’s conviction for me.God was showing me:Cassandra, look at the ruler.Not merely:Look at those people.Look at what you are using to measure them.👀Who gave you that?When did you learn it?Why are you still carrying it?And Beloveds…I think I know part of the answer.Ten times better.That lesson came from people trying to prepare me for a world they knew could be unfair.There was love inside the warning.There was survival inside it.There was history inside it.But there was also a chain hiding nearby.Because “You may have to be ten times better to receive the opportunity” can quietly become:“Black people SHOULD be ten times better.”No.❤️‍🩹I reject that.We should pursue excellence because excellence can be beautiful.We should develop our gifts.Learn.Grow.Work.Create.Build.But our humanity cannot depend upon outperforming somebody else.And our Blackness does not become more respectable because we make ourselves less Black.🔑Eva gets to be loud.And Eva needs boundaries.Ray gets to be masculine and tender.And Ray needs honesty.Mike gets to be frustrated.And Mike needs accountability.Tim gets to be quieter.And Tim needs his voice.Darrell gets to be goofy.And Darrell gets dignity.The sisters get to love Eva.And they need agency.Everybody gets correction.Everybody gets complexity.Everybody gets humanity.EVERYBODY GETS A CHAIR.🪑🪑🪑🪑🪑🪑🪑That’s what I want now.Not a world where nobody gets judged because nobody ever does anything wrong.That’s not discernment.I want a world where we can say:That behavior needs changingwithout saying:That person needs to become less themselves to deserve belonging.WHEW.❤️‍🔥And this is where the conviction of the Holy Spirit becomes beautiful to me.Because God didn’t merely show me what was wrong.He started changing what I enjoyed.🥰I kept watching.I relaxed.I laughed.🤣I fell in love with seeing Black people simply BE.Not representing.Not auditioning.Not proving.Being.And somewhere along the way, I think God was freeing me too.Because if they don’t have to perform acceptable Blackness—neither do I.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿I can be educated.And silly.Faithful.And questioning.Strong.And tired.Professional.And LOUD.🤣A wheelchair user.A woman whose speech changed.A writer.A believer.A Black woman.A work in progress.ME.And I don’t need to become ten times more human than anybody else.I already belong to the human family.And more importantly to me:I belong to God.🙏🏿❤️‍🔥So maybe the question isn’t:Are they too Black?Maybe the Holy Spirit was asking me:Cassandra, why are you still holding the ruler?😳And maybe my answer now is:I’m not.I’m learning to put it down.🔑Beloveds, maybe you have one too.Maybe yours doesn’t measure Blackness.Maybe it measures education.Body size.Disability.Age.Money.Accent.Gender.Religion.Politics.Neighborhood.Clothes.Mental illness.Addiction.Sexuality.Or somebody whose life simply looks nothing like yours.I’m not asking you to perform an answer for me.Be honest with you.For, HIM.🙏🏿What ruler are you carrying?Who handed it to you?Who have you measured with it?Have you measured yourself with it too?And if the Holy Spirit is showing it to you—maybe He isn’t showing you the ruler so you can beat yourself with it.Maybe He’s saying:Child. You don’t need that anymore.Put it down.🔑❤️‍🩹Pull up your chair.🪑And let somebody else pull up theirs.Because maybe freedom looks like finally letting people be fully human in front of us.And maybe—just maybe—that includes letting ourselves be fully human too.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿❤️‍🔥🌎Asking for A Friend,Cassandra#YourLifeMattersToMeNote: One step. One step. One step. You are loved. You are NOT alone. Keep on being…YOU!Unapologetically His.Unapologetically yours.
• 📫 ❤️‍🩹 BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME.Beloveds,Ow.That is probably the best way for me to begin this.Ow.For the past few years, the Holy Spirit has been convicting my heart.Not condemning me.Convicting me.There is a difference.Condemnation tells me to hide.The conviction of the Holy Spirit calls me into the light.And sometimes?That light hits something in me that makes me say:OW!😳🥺❤️‍🩹I love living in my Black skin.I love Black joy.I love Black laughter.I love Black music.I love Black creativity.I love Black excellence.I love the beauty of us.The resilience of us.The tenderness of us.The absolute foolishness of us sometimes.🤣I love everybody.But I especially love my bros and sis.Which is exactly why what the Holy Spirit showed me hurt so much.Just before my stroke, I discovered a ton of Black romance movies.Beloveds…I LOVED THEM.🥰😍Seeing Black people in love was breathtaking to me.People who looked like me were falling in love.Being pursued.Being cherished.Building families.Laughing.Arguing.Reconciling.Getting married.Living.And many of these movies showed something else I loved seeing:Black affluence.Black professionals.Black entrepreneurs.Beautiful Black families in beautiful homes.Black men and women succeeding.Black excellence.I loved seeing us.But then something happened.And this is where I cry.😭Permit me to digress.Growing up, Black folk pounded something into my head:You have to be ten times better than everybody else just to earn a hint of a whiff of a chance at a decent job. At a decent life.So I worked.Hard.HARD.I learned.I became good at what I did.I loved Customer Service.You could hear that love in my voice.I trained people.And I watched many of the white people I trained receive the raise.The promotion.The opportunity.Over me.I offered my skills.I knew I was capable.Still…I was seldom selected.Not chosen.Again.Sigh.❤️‍🩹Now come back to those movies with me.Because one day I caught something happening inside myself.I was watching Black people on the screen.And somewhere in my thoughts I heard:They’re too loud.Too boisterous.Too…Black.😳🥺🥹😦😩😢😭OW.I am a Black woman.I love Black people.And there it was.Inside me.A measuring stick.A judgment.A standard about what kind of Blackness was acceptable.And the Holy Spirit would not let me look away from it.That is important.Because I could have defended myself.I could have said:I’m Black!I love Black people!Look at everything I’ve written!Look at who I am!I could have produced evidence for my own defense.But God wasn’t putting me on trial.He was showing me something because He loves me enough to show me what still needs healing.❤️‍🩹I had learned that Black people are watched.Evaluated.Measured.Judged.How we speak.How we dress.How we wear our hair.How loudly we laugh.How angry we are allowed to become.How professional we appear.Whether we are “articulate.”Whether we make somebody uncomfortable.Whether we are respectable enough.Somewhere along the way, the watcher got inside.⛓️Society didn’t have to sit beside me watching the movie saying:That’s too Black.Some of those old lessons had learned how to speak from inside me.And the Holy Spirit said:Look.👀Not:Hate yourself.Not:You are terrible.Not:You don’t love your people.Look.See it.Tell the truth about it.Let Me deal with it.And Beloveds?I did something important.I forgave ME.❤️‍🩹Not because bias doesn’t matter.Not because judgment doesn’t hurt people.Not because I wanted an excuse.I forgave myself because shame was not going to heal what God was revealing.I forgave the Black girl who learned she was being watched.I forgave the Black woman who learned she needed to work ten times harder.I forgave the professional who watched people she trained receive opportunities she wasn’t given.I forgave the woman who learned that being excellent, controlled, polished and respectable might make the road a little safer.And then I let the Holy Spirit teach that woman something new.🔑Over these last few weeks, I started watching those movies again.🥰Then:😍Then:😅Then:🤣😂And something began changing.I stopped grading everybody’s Blackness.Loud?Okay.Quiet?Okay.Boisterous?Okay.Reserved?Okay.Professional?Okay.Country?Okay.Hood?Okay.Affluent?Okay.Working class?Okay.Harvard?Okay.Grandma’s kitchen table and the school of hard knocks?Okay.🤣❤️Black people do not owe me one acceptable performance of Blackness.And neither do I.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿Because here’s another little piece of God’s sense of humor:After all those years learning how not to be “too loud”…Look at the name of my blog.WHY CAN’T I BE LOUD?!🤣🤣🤣Won’t He do it?!But this revelation went deeper.Because I realized something about Black excellence too.I LOVE Black excellence.I celebrate it.But Black excellence cannot become another chain.⛓️We cannot spend generations being told we must be ten times better and then accidentally turn around and require exceptional achievement from one another before we feel comfortable celebrating Black life.The CEO matters.The doctor matters.The professor matters.The entrepreneur matters.And so does the cashier.The janitor.The unemployed brother trying again.The sister working two jobs.The person without the degree.The person with the accent.The person whose grammar somebody wants to correct.The quiet Black man.The loud Black man.The quiet Black woman.And yes—the LOUD Black woman.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿❤️‍🔥Our dignity cannot depend upon our excellence.And that revelation made me ask an even harder question:What other measuring sticks am I carrying?Not just about Black people.About people.Period.What have I absorbed about disability?Poverty?Weight?Age?Education?Accents?Religion?Gender?Mental illness?Addiction?Homelessness?People who vote differently?People who worship differently?People who don’t believe what I believe?People whose lives I don’t understand?👀What if some of the chains I want broken in the world are also hiding somewhere inside me?⛓️Then I need a key too.🔑That is why I’m telling you this.Because the Holy Spirit convicted me.And the instruction in my spirit was:BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME.For ME.Him.God.🙏🏿Tell them.Don’t polish yourself first.Don’t pretend you arrived.Don’t make yourself the teacher standing above everybody else.Tell them what I showed you.So I am.I judged.God showed me.It hurt.I listened.I forgave myself.I kept watching.I started seeing differently.And I’m still learning.That is conviction.That is grace.That is growth.That is another chain hitting the floor.⛓️💥And now, Beloveds, I turn the question toward you—not from above you.From my chair.🪑Be honest with you.For, HIM.What hidden bias are you struggling to deal with?What measuring stick did somebody put in your hand so early that you forgot somebody gave it to you?And what might happen if you finally put it down?Don’t answer for me.Don’t answer for Facebook.Don’t answer for church.Don’t answer because somebody is watching.Ask God.Be honest with you.For, Him.Because He already knows what is there.And if the Holy Spirit turns the light on?👀Look.Listen.Repent where repentance is needed.Forgive yourself.Learn.Unlearn.Heal.Choose differently.And keep walking.One step.One step.One step.🔑❤️‍🩹God did not show me the chain so I could decorate it with shame.He showed me the chain because chains can be broken.And THAT?That will preach.❤️‍🔥🙏🏿Asking for A Friend,Cassandra#YourLifeMattersToMeNote: One step. One step. One step. You are loved. You are NOT alone. Keep on being…YOU!Unapologetically His.Unapologetically yours.
• 📫 BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME. ❤️‍🩹Beloveds,Ow.For the past few years, the Holy Spirit has been convicting my heart.Not condemning me.Convicting me.And this one hurt.I love living in my Black skin. I love Black joy, Black love, Black laughter and Black excellence. I love everybody, but especially my bros and sis.Which is why this revelation made me cry.Before my stroke, I discovered Black romance movies.🥰😍Seeing people who looked like me falling in love was breathtaking. I loved seeing Black professionals, beautiful homes, successful families and Black people simply enjoying life.But one day I caught myself thinking:They’re too loud.Too boisterous.Too…Black.😳🥺😭OW.There it was.Inside me.And the Holy Spirit said:Look.👀Growing up, Black folk pounded something into my head:You have to be ten times better just to get a hint of a whiff of the same opportunity.So I worked.Hard.I became good at what I did. I loved Customer Service. You could hear it in my voice.I even trained white people who later received raises and promotions over me.Still…I was seldom selected.Sigh.❤️‍🩹I learned early that Black people were being watched.How we talked.How loudly we laughed.How professional we appeared.Whether we were “articulate.”Whether we made somebody uncomfortable.And somewhere along the way—the watcher got inside me.⛓️Nobody had to sit beside me saying, They’re too Black.The old measuring stick had learned how to speak from inside.And THAT is what the Holy Spirit convicted me about.God wasn’t telling me to hate myself.He was showing me something He wanted to heal.So I forgave ME.❤️‍🩹I forgave the Black girl who learned she was being watched.I forgave the woman who learned she had to work ten times harder.I forgave the professional who watched people she trained receive opportunities she wasn’t given.And then I let the Holy Spirit teach that woman something different.🔑I kept watching those movies.🥰😍😅🤣😂And I stopped grading everybody’s Blackness.Loud?Okay.Quiet?Okay.Country?Okay.Hood?Okay.Affluent?Okay.Working class?Okay.Harvard?Okay.Grandma’s kitchen table?Okay.Black people do not owe me one acceptable performance of Blackness.Neither do I.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿And would you LOOK at God’s sense of humor?After learning all those years not to be “too loud,” I now have a blog called:WHY CAN’T I BE LOUD?!🤣❤️‍🔥Won’t He do it?!I love Black excellence.But the Holy Spirit showed me something else:Black excellence cannot become another chain.⛓️The CEO matters.The doctor matters.And so do the cashier, janitor, unemployed brother trying again, sister working two jobs, person without the degree, quiet Black man, loud Black man, quiet Black woman and—YES—LOUD BLACK WOMAN.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿❤️‍🔥Our dignity cannot depend upon being exceptional.And now I’m asking myself:What other measuring sticks am I carrying?About disability?Poverty?Age?Weight?Education?Religion?Accents?Mental illness?Homelessness?People who don’t believe what I believe?What if some of the chains I want broken in the world are hiding inside me?Then I need a key too.🔑And THAT is why I’m telling you.Because the instruction in my spirit was:BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME.ME = HIM.God.🙏🏿Tell them what I showed you.So I am.I judged.The Holy Spirit convicted me.It hurt.I listened.I forgave myself.I’m learning.And I’m choosing differently.⛓️💥🔑Now, Beloveds:Be honest with you. For, HIM.What hidden bias are you struggling with?What measuring stick did somebody put into your hand so early that you forgot it was handed to you?And if the Holy Spirit turns the light on?Look.Listen.Repent.Learn.Unlearn.Heal.Choose differently.❤️‍🩹🔑God didn’t show me the chain so I could decorate it with shame.He showed me the chain because chains can be broken.❤️‍🔥🙏🏿Asking for A Friend,Cassandra#YourLifeMattersToMeNote: One step. One step. One step. You are loved. You are NOT alone. Keep on being…YOU!Unapologetically His.Unapologetically yours.
• 📫 BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME. ❤️‍🩹Beloveds,Ow.That is probably the best way for me to begin this.Ow.For the past few years, the Holy Spirit has been convicting my heart.Not condemning me.Convicting me.There is a difference.Condemnation tells me to hide.The conviction of the Holy Spirit calls me into the light.And sometimes?That light hits something in me that makes me say:OW!😳🥺❤️‍🩹I love living in my Black skin.I love Black joy.I love Black laughter.I love Black music.I love Black creativity.I love Black excellence.I love the beauty of us.The resilience of us.The tenderness of us.The absolute foolishness of us sometimes.🤣I love everybody.But I especially love my bros and sis.Which is exactly why what the Holy Spirit showed me hurt so much.Just before my stroke, I discovered a ton of Black romance movies.Beloveds…I LOVED THEM.🥰😍Seeing Black people in love was breathtaking to me.People who looked like me were falling in love.Being pursued.Being cherished.Building families.Laughing.Arguing.Reconciling.Getting married.Living.And many of these movies showed something else I loved seeing:Black affluence.Black professionals.Black entrepreneurs.Beautiful Black families in beautiful homes.Black men and women succeeding.Black excellence.I loved seeing us.But then something happened.And this is where I cry.😭Permit me to digress.Growing up, Black folk pounded something into my head:You have to be ten times better than everybody else just to earn a hint of a whiff of a chance at a decent job. At a decent life.So I worked.Hard.HARD.I learned.I became good at what I did.I loved Customer Service.You could hear that love in my voice.I trained people.And I watched many of the white people I trained receive the raise.The promotion.The opportunity.Over me.I offered my skills.I knew I was capable.Still…I was seldom selected.Not chosen.Again.Sigh.❤️‍🩹Now come back to those movies with me.Because one day I caught something happening inside myself.I was watching Black people on the screen.And somewhere in my thoughts I heard:They’re too loud.Too boisterous.Too…Black.😳🥺🥹😦😩😢😭OW.I am a Black woman.I love Black people.And there it was.Inside me.A measuring stick.A judgment.A standard about what kind of Blackness was acceptable.And the Holy Spirit would not let me look away from it.That is important.Because I could have defended myself.I could have said:I’m Black!I love Black people!Look at everything I’ve written!Look at who I am!I could have produced evidence for my own defense.But God wasn’t putting me on trial.He was showing me something because He loves me enough to show me what still needs healing.❤️‍🩹I had learned that Black people are watched.Evaluated.Measured.Judged.How we speak.How we dress.How we wear our hair.How loudly we laugh.How angry we are allowed to become.How professional we appear.Whether we are “articulate.”Whether we make somebody uncomfortable.Whether we are respectable enough.Somewhere along the way, the watcher got inside.⛓️Society didn’t have to sit beside me watching the movie saying:That’s too Black.Some of those old lessons had learned how to speak from inside me.And the Holy Spirit said:Look.👀Not:Hate yourself.Not:You are terrible.Not:You don’t love your people.Look.See it.Tell the truth about it.Let Me deal with it.And Beloveds?I did something important.I forgave ME.❤️‍🩹Not because bias doesn’t matter.Not because judgment doesn’t hurt people.Not because I wanted an excuse.I forgave myself because shame was not going to heal what God was revealing.I forgave the Black girl who learned she was being watched.I forgave the Black woman who learned she needed to work ten times harder.I forgave the professional who watched people she trained receive opportunities she wasn’t given.I forgave the woman who learned that being excellent, controlled, polished and respectable might make the road a little safer.And then I let the Holy Spirit teach that woman something new.🔑Over these last few weeks, I started watching those movies again.🥰Then:😍Then:😅Then:🤣😂And something began changing.I stopped grading everybody’s Blackness.Loud?Okay.Quiet?Okay.Boisterous?Okay.Reserved?Okay.Professional?Okay.Country?Okay.Hood?Okay.Affluent?Okay.Working class?Okay.Harvard?Okay.Grandma’s kitchen table and the school of hard knocks?Okay.🤣❤️Black people do not owe me one acceptable performance of Blackness.And neither do I.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿Because here’s another little piece of God’s sense of humor:After all those years learning how not to be “too loud”…Look at the name of my blog.WHY CAN’T I BE LOUD?!🤣🤣🤣Won’t He do it?!But this revelation went deeper.Because I realized something about Black excellence too.I LOVE Black excellence.I celebrate it.But Black excellence cannot become another chain.⛓️We cannot spend generations being told we must be ten times better and then accidentally turn around and require exceptional achievement from one another before we feel comfortable celebrating Black life.The CEO matters.The doctor matters.The professor matters.The entrepreneur matters.And so does the cashier.The janitor.The unemployed brother trying again.The sister working two jobs.The person without the degree.The person with the accent.The person whose grammar somebody wants to correct.The quiet Black man.The loud Black man.The quiet Black woman.And yes—the LOUD Black woman.👩🏿‍🦼💃🏿❤️‍🔥Our dignity cannot depend upon our excellence.And that revelation made me ask an even harder question:What other measuring sticks am I carrying?Not just about Black people.About people.Period.What have I absorbed about disability?Poverty?Weight?Age?Education?Accents?Religion?Gender?Mental illness?Addiction?Homelessness?People who vote differently?People who worship differently?People who don’t believe what I believe?People whose lives I don’t understand?👀What if some of the chains I want broken in the world are also hiding somewhere inside me?⛓️Then I need a key too.🔑That is why I’m telling you this.Because the Holy Spirit convicted me.And the instruction in my spirit was:BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME.For ME.Him.God.🙏🏿Tell them.Don’t polish yourself first.Don’t pretend you arrived.Don’t make yourself the teacher standing above everybody else.Tell them what I showed you.So I am.I judged.God showed me.It hurt.I listened.I forgave myself.I kept watching.I started seeing differently.And I’m still learning.That is conviction.That is grace.That is growth.That is another chain hitting the floor.⛓️💥And now, Beloveds, I turn the question toward you—not from above you.From my chair.🪑Be honest with you.For, HIM.What hidden bias are you struggling to deal with?What measuring stick did somebody put in your hand so early that you forgot somebody gave it to you?And what might happen if you finally put it down?Don’t answer for me.Don’t answer for Facebook.Don’t answer for church.Don’t answer because somebody is watching.Ask God.Be honest with you.For, Him.Because He already knows what is there.And if the Holy Spirit turns the light on?👀Look.Listen.Repent where repentance is needed.Forgive yourself.Learn.Unlearn.Heal.Choose differently.And keep walking.One step.One step.One step.🔑❤️‍🩹God did not show me the chain so I could decorate it with shame.He showed me the chain because chains can be broken.And THAT?That will preach.❤️‍🔥🙏🏿Asking for A Friend,Cassandra#YourLifeMattersToMeNote: One step. One step. One step. You are loved. You are NOT alone. Keep on being…YOU!Unapologetically His.Unapologetically yours.
• 📫 BE HONEST WITH THEM. FOR, ME. ❤️‍🩹Beloveds,I have been thinking about honesty.Not the kind we demand from everybody else.The kind that requires us to sit with ourselves long enough to tell the truth about what is happening inside us.👀Because sometimes the hardest person to be honest with is yourself.Sometimes we know something hurts, but we keep calling it fine.Sometimes we know we are tired, but we keep calling ourselves lazy.Sometimes we know we need help, but we keep calling needing help weakness.Sometimes we know something has changed, but we keep trying to live as though nothing did.And sometimes we are so busy trying to make everybody else comfortable with our reality that we stop being honest about our own.❤️‍🩹I have had to learn this in ways I never wanted to learn it.My life changed.My body changed.My speech changed.My independence changed.The amount of effort required to do ordinary things changed.And there have been moments when I wanted so badly to be the Cassandra I remembered that I became impatient with the Cassandra who was actually here.But she deserves honesty too.She deserves tenderness too.She deserves patience too.She deserves to be loved without having to pretend that everything is easy.🪑So I am learning to tell the truth.I can be grateful and tired.I can have faith and still have questions.I can laugh and still hurt.I can celebrate progress and grieve what changed.I can be strong and need help.I can love people and still need boundaries.I can forgive somebody and still acknowledge what happened.I can believe God is with me without pretending every part of this journey feels good.Those truths do not cancel each other.They can sit in the same room.Sometimes they can even sit in the same chair.👀🪑And maybe somebody reading this needs permission to stop performing too.You do not have to tell everybody everything.Privacy is not dishonesty.Boundaries are not dishonesty.Taking time before you speak is not dishonesty.But beloved, please find somewhere you can tell the truth.Even if the first place is inside your own heart.Say:This hurt me.I miss what was.I am angry.I am afraid.I need help.I don’t know yet.I changed my mind.I need more time.I am proud of myself.I survived something difficult.I am learning.I am healing.I am still here.🔑Because honesty can be a key.A key that unlocks shame.A key that loosens the chain of pretending.A key that lets grief breathe.A key that allows joy to be real instead of performed.A key that makes room for healing.And sometimes the truth is not:”I have figured everything out.”Sometimes the truth is simply:”I am trying.”And beloved?Trying counts.❤️‍🩹I am learning not to require perfection from myself before I offer myself compassion.I am learning not to make recovery another place where I have to perform.I am learning that one difficult day does not erase every good day that came before it.I am learning that needing rest does not erase determination.I am learning that receiving help does not erase independence.And I am learning that being honest about what hurts does not mean I have stopped believing that healing is possible.It means I stopped requiring myself to lie on the way there.👀So be honest with them when honesty is safe.Be honest with the people who love you.Be honest with the people helping you.Be honest about what you need.Be honest about what you cannot do today.Be honest about what you are learning to do again.But before all of that—Be honest with you.For me.❤️‍🩹Because I want you here.Not the polished version.Not the pretending version.Not the version exhausted from convincing everybody that everything is fine.YOU.The learning you.The healing you.The laughing you.The crying you.The figuring-it-out-as-you-go you.There is room for that person here.🪑Pull up a chair.You don’t have to resolve everything before you belong.You don’t have to perform strength before you are loved.You don’t have to have all the answers before your life matters.Your life matters right now.Exactly here.One step.One step.One step.🔑❤️‍🩹🪑Asking for A Friend,Cassandra#YourLifeMattersToMeNote: One step. One step. One step. You are loved. You are NOT alone. Keep on being…YOU!