We did not think of the great open plains, the beautiful rolling hills, the winding streams with tangled growth, as 'wild'. Only to the white man was nature a 'wilderness' and only to him was it 'infested' with 'wild' animals and 'savage' people. To us it was tame. Earth was bountiful and we were surrounded with the blessings of the Great Mystery. ☥ ... But we were wise. We knew that man's heart, away from nature, becomes hard. ☥ ☥ Chief Luther Standing Bear ☥ Chief Of The Oglala, Lakota (1905-1939)
You'll find the following unconventional descriptors on every page of phyllishubbard.com:
☥ A Mixed Media Hammam
☥ Pictures ☥ Storytelling ☥ Video
☥ A Cross-Cultural Healing Haven
We must expand our awareness in order to elevate ourselves to the level of the solutions to the challenges that we face in life. Life experience taught me to embrace unconventional thought as an indispensable pathway to healing. That said, the descriptors are not a random selection of words. They were chosen to reflect the purpose of this website.
☥ A Mixed Media Hammam ☥
Look at the image above. What do you see? Now click on the picture. Where does it take you? This image is an example of mixed media, which can include images, art and video. Phyllishubbard.com functions like an online “Hammam” and uses mixed media to communicate healing messages that transcend the written or spoken word. You can have a deeper understanding of healing through a feeling, a thought or an insight. Mixed media allows phyllishubbard.com to present a customized exploration into and experience of self-care at a pace determined by each individual. No one knows you better than you.
Hammam is the traditional Islamic practice of cleansing the body with steam or water. It is a beautiful public healing space that can include a variety of steam rooms, saunas and warm baths. I chose the word “Hammam” because of its Islamic origins – and because of a travel planning experience that uncovered a need for detoxing our minds.
I was planning an international trip with an older family member. Because we lived in two different cities that were thousands of miles apart, it was challenging to find a way for us to fly together. I was super excited to finally experience Qatar Airway’s innovative “Q Suite.” After many hours of searching, I found a way. We would meet in Doha, and then fly together to our destination. I was thrilled, but when I spoke to my family member, they said that they didn’t feel comfortable flying to Doha by themself. Ignoring their hesitation, I enthusiastically explained that they could wait in the lounge because we were flying business class, they would only have to wait about 90 minutes before my flight arrived and the airport was beautiful. Finally, they admitted that they were afraid of terrorism in the Middle East. As I was determined to take our conversation to a healing place, it went something like this:
“Have you ever experienced terrorism from a Middle Eastern person?” No. “Have you been around Middle Eastern people most of your life?” Yes. “Didn’t you tell me that you were the first generation to integrate an all-white school?” Yes. “And you explained to me how the white kids threw rocks and bottles at you while you were trying to enter the school, that they spit on you, taunted, teased, hunted you - about the history of Red Summer and that white extremists were bombing Black churches (killing children), profiling, intimidating, assaulting and murdering Black People?”
I could have gone on with more examples, but the lightbulb went off in their head and they said, Oh my God. I never thought of it that way. I continued, "Do you realize that for most of your life, you experienced microaggressions, molestation and harassment from a group of people who have stereotyped Black People as dangerous? Do you also realize these same people created a stereotype and applied it to an entire region of the world?" We have to be careful and question the negative rhetoric against nations that have resources that other people want to control. Although colonizers have invested billions of dollars to sustain a narrative of themselves as superior and Indigenous People as primitive, ungodly and dangerous, the numbers simply don’t add up:
☥ Between 1492 and 1600, the British killed over 52 million people in the land we now call
America, including 90% of the Indigenous Indian population in New England. When
Indigenous Indians fought for Massachusetts colony, they lost 8,000 more of their
people to death, enslavement or exile.
☥ In India, British colonizers killed over 100 million Indians between 1880 and 1920.
☥ In Australia, the British killed over 1 million Aborigines between 1788 and 1920.
☥ In South America, the Spanish/Portuguese killed approximately 8 million Indigenous
People.
☥ In Africa, the true numbers may never be known, but the Belgians killed and brutalized
more than 10 million Africans during the Congolese genocide. The numbers across the
continent and during the middle passage are in the hundreds of millions.
It was an Indigenous man who helped me to understand the importance of recognizing the psychosis of colonization. If colonizers do not recognize their conscious or unconscious tendencies to be violent, they will not heal ☥ remove the root causes of their violent tendencies and will continue to revert to violence as a knee-jerk reaction. This is why history keeps repeating itself, and why it is so important to understand and call out their behaviors.
We sat in silence for a little while. I asked them to explain to me how they have been treated by Middle Eastern People. They were disturbed by their feelings of fear. Unfortunately, we ended up having to cancel the trip for other reasons, so I still have not experienced the “Q Suite.” America has been the place where I have felt unsafe. As far as I can tell, there is no monopoly on microaggressions, molestation, harassment or terrorism.
When I visited a Turkish Bath House, my first experience with a Hammam, I explored different steam rooms and hot tubs. I could go to the cold room, if I felt overheated, to stimulate my lymphatic system. People of all cultures came to have their own experiences of detoxification, cleansing, praying, meditation and rejuvenation. I coined the term "Mixed Media Hammam" while grappling with the best way to describe phyllishubbard.com.
☥ Pictures ☥ Storytelling ☥ Video ☥
Public speaking has been a part of my work since my first corporate job out of college. I encourage a high level of interaction and engagement by including representations of my audience through images and video. During my presentations, I would see the look of surprise and pride of the Black ☥ Indigenous ☥ Immigrant People. They would often wait in line to thank me after the session.
I was often the only Black employee or manager and felt the pressure to conform to company culture. However, all nationalities enjoyed my presentations which made it difficult for white people to ignore the inclusion of Black ☥ Indigenous ☥ Immigrant People or the positive feedback I would receive. Over time, the pressure to conform transformed into the courage to speak truth to power, and inclusion became my mission.
While preparing for a presentation for a group of youth leaders, I struggled to find empowering images of Black, Indian, Indigenous, Middle Eastern, Asian, Caribbean and other students to include in my PowerPoint slides. Because I teach Qigong, I wanted a picture of a Black male taking a deep breath. Every picture that I found was of a Black male smoking a cigarette. I was horrified to see a plethora of images of young Asian girls in bikinis when I searched for a picture of an Asian student. I was especially disturbed by the lack of Indigenous and Pacific Islander images – a challenge that I still work to overcome. Although my image searches have improved over the years, I consistently find myself spending hours sifting through images of white people to find relevant images of Black ☥ Indigenous ☥ Immigrant People. I took the time to offer feedback to one of my biggest outside sources of images. While they have some beautiful images to offer, I shared with them that:
☥ When I search for African People, art, etc., I get an unusually large number of apes, even
when I’m not searching for animals.
☥ I can tell when a white photographer takes a picture of a Black ☥ Indigenous ☥
Immigrant Person. I told the company to hire Black ☥ Indigenous ☥ Immigrant
photographers to take pictures of Black ☥ Indigenous ☥ Immigrant People.
☥ The images of many different types of Indigenous People, such as Aborigine People
from Australia, are disempowering.
I asked them to make these changes ASAP and to fix their tags because even if I search for a Black man jogging, I’ll still get pictures of white women. On a number of occasions, I’ve seen images of white women in g-strings mixed in with images tagged for Black ☥ Indigenous ☥ Immigrant men.
Because I grew up around many different cultures, I knew that Black ☥ Indigenous ☥ Immigrant People had fun, demonstrated excellence in their personal/professional lives, ate great food, loved each other and explored new opportunities, but I couldn’t find evidence of us on TV, in the movies, in magazines or online. I couldn't find an accurate representation of the people who lived in my multicultural neighborhood. I was baffled by my white teachers who said that Egypt was not in Africa because I grew up with Africans who walked me through a map of Africa. Before they were destroyed by the British, the Great Walls of Benin were 10,000 miles long, some parts of which were 60 feet high.
Africa is 11.7 million square miles (the surface of our moon is 14 million square miles) which is much larger than the U.S.A. (3.7 million square miles) and Europe (4.006 million square miles), yet my history classes focused solely on Europe, and especially Greece which is about the size of Alabama (3,219 square miles). If Africa was not worth studying, then why does Europe earn millions of euros each year on the art that it took from Africa?
I didn't learn about my history in school, but a family member gave me a small deck of cards that taught me about great Black inventors. Because the inventions of Black People are a vital part of our everyday life, such as traffic lights, open heart surgery, an almanac, blood banks, etc., I wondered why I never learned about them in school. In high school, I could easily name Tolstoy, Whitman, Kafka, Faulkner, Browning, Frost, Hawthorne, Melville, Alcott and Dickens.
I started learning about Black authors such as Wheatley, Hurston, Ellison, Baldwin, Chesnut, Harper, Hughes, Truth, Washington, Morrison and African authors, such as Chinua Achebe, in college by taking the few courses I could find on Black literature. If I could turn back time, I would have gone to an HBCU (which wasn't even mentioned in high school as an option). My high school college preparatory experiences were abysmal. Other cultures’ histories, such as the life and influence of Paramahansa Yogananda in America and around the globe, were non-existent in my head. I learned about AfroCuba, Allende, Coyolxāuhqui, etc., from friends, book festivals or seminars. white culture was so dominant and pervasive that it took me a while to realize I was culturally ignorant. If Black People had achieved so much in the midst of racism and oppression, surely other cultures had significantly contributed to building a better world for everyone. I was concerned that it would take me the rest of my life to have a true understanding of world history.
☥ The mixed bag of emotions that I feel as I discover more about the world is sometimes overwhelming which is why I strongly recommend that we develop a mental health self-care toolkit ☥
When I first became a healer, I had a lot of white clients and discovered how cultural ignorance contributed to their health issues. When I unpacked their desire to feel superior, I found fear, insecurity and a lack of conscious awareness. It was like heroin, because the impulse to feel superior cannot be satisfied. I never understood that need, because I don’t have it. I love to witness the greatness in others and don’t believe that it takes anything away from me.
In “Understanding An Afrocentric World View: Introduction To Optimal Psychology,” Dr. Linda James Myers explains that the Eurocentric World View doesn't benefit humanity because it creates and perpetuates harm. I am a serious homebody and introvert, but these struggles pushed me to do my part to create change. If I wanted pictures that accurately represented all of who we are, I would have to take them myself. I became almost obsessed with collecting and taking pictures of and with people that I meet.
My hope is that phyllishubbard.com becomes a cross-cultural healing haven for everyone that centers Black ☥ Indigenous ☥ Immigrant People who endeavor to heal ☥ nourish ☥ rise so that we all can master ☥ our ☥ lives.
If you are a Black ☥ Indigenous ☥ Immigrant Person who has a beautiful, high-resolution picture of yourself actively engaging in your own self-care, please email it to heal@phyllishubbard.com with your written permission, and we'll feature your image on phyllishubbard.com. We love pictures of children, but respectfully request that you do not send a picture of a child by themselves. To protect the beautiful energy of children, who can't give permission without a true understanding of the internet, we want pictures of children with at least one adult. Teenagers understand the internet, so they are welcome to send in images by themselves or with consenting friends. Images that we’d love to receive can include but is certainly not limited to:
☥ Breathing/exercising in nature
☥ Exploring historical sites/learning about ancestry/culture
☥ Eating healthy foods
☥ Attending cultural festivals
☥ Engaging in self-care (praying, resting, meditating, journaling, etc.)
☥ Hiking/biking in the mountains/on beautiful trails
☥ Walking/jogging/biking by a lake/stream/the ocean
☥ Participating in hobbies such as playing a musical instrument, art, etc.
☥ Healthy activities with family/friends (please secure/provide their consent)
Many of us don’t know much about each other’s history. We would love to learn more about your history, languages, art, healing practices, culture, etc. Share your story with us and we’ll share it on phyllishubbard.com.
☥ A Cross-Cultural Healing Haven ☥
I was looking for a raven feather in a beautiful curio shop owned by a Navajo man. I noticed that he kept talking in circles instead of answering my questions. I soon realized that he was stalling and waiting for the white people to leave his store. When we were alone, he thanked me for honoring and respecting his place of business. He knew that I understood. There is a telepathy that exists between people who have endured centuries of racism and oppression.
He felt frustrated that white people put systems in place to ensure that they are the dominant shoppers and then throw their weight around in his store. He resented that he had to rely on their business because they are rude, devalue his products or attempt to talk the price down, and they know that he needs the money to feed his family. I could feel and hear the weariness in his voice. I cracked a few jokes to lighten the mood, and we talked for a while. By the time I left, he felt better. His curio shop became a cross-cultural healing haven for us to speak our truth.
He was so excited that I made the effort to find his shop and said that he wished he had more patrons of other cultures. I have had many similar conversations with people of other cultures in Uber rides, at stores, festivals and other gatherings. I must have that “safe” look because people seem to seek me out to have conversations about race and to release their pent-up frustrations. Stories reflect universal truths, in an objective environment, that increase our understanding of ourselves and each other. That said, I have often found that my clients get stuck in the drama of the story to the point that they miss the lesson that the story was intended to bring. The true purpose of storytelling is to transcend the story in order to facilitate the self-care process so that we can recognize fear, suppressed and repressed emotions and heal unresolved trauma.
☥ Online Time Devoted To Self-Care ☥
I invite you to hang out with phyllishubbard.com often. Each time you interact with our Rise TV page and the mixed media embedded within the Blog/Home/About/Journey pages, you'll cultivate a deeper level of understanding. You’ll learn about identity and culture, nutrition, herbal remedies, mental and emotional balance, and how to practice breathing and movement exercises. The Shop, Kamitology and Reclaiming Our Humanity pages offer personal and professional self-care guides and discovery journals and video courses. Your purchases of these products supports our efforts to develop healing strategies for our community and helps prevent the disenfranchisement of wellness information.
I work primarily as a Root Cause Analyst and Visual Healing Artist. Because personal consultations are expensive for me to offer, I created online consultations to keep them cost effective. Phyllishubbard.com is raising funds to develop and produce reports, books and healing visual aids. The phyllishubbbard.com interactive video courses are available for rent ☥ purchase. Please consider purchasing the interactive video courses and workbooks for staff members, small business owners and nonprofit organizations. SPIRIT subscribers to our Reclaiming Our Humanity Channel have unlimited access to the video courses and get first dibs on requests for new content. Healing work is rarely funded for Black ☥ Indigenous ☥ Immigrant ☥ communities. Please visit our Ujamaa page to support phyllishubbard.com's efforts to develop ☥ disseminate wellness information to Black ☥ Indigenous ☥ Immigrant ☥ communities through sponsorships ☥ monthly ☥ anonymous donations.
There is nothing supernatural, everything is natural. We in Africa know that the human being possesses twelve senses, not five senses as Western People believe. ☥ ☥ Vusamazulu Credo Mutwa ☥
Sacred Geometry ☥ Art That Teaches ☥ Heals
Most people do not know that I am a Visual Healing Artist and often categorize me based on their first encounter with my work. Colonization causes us to put people ☥ ourselves into boxes and slap on labels that limit who we are and what we offer to the world. We must continually work to decolonize our minds. My favorite type of art to create has been labeled “Sacred Geometry.” Sacred Geometry calms the mind ☥ cultivates mental acuity ☥ higher intelligence ☥ consciousness ☥ problem solving skills. I am primarily a gel pen sketch and photo artist, but I create other forms of art as well such as digital art. Art is a powerful healing ☥ teaching tool. Afrocentric People experience at least 12 senses, and art can help us to understand ☥ overstand deeper meanings that lie beneath the surface of a concept. If you would like for me to customize visual healing artwork, please use the Consultancy link to contact me.
About The Gods, Goddesses, Symbols (☥ॐ☯) And The Logo On This Website
For as long as I can remember, I've had a series of recurring dreams. I was walking amongst structures that were so huge, I couldn't quite figure out what they were. As a young child, I didn't think I was dreaming of a real place. As an adult, I deduced that it must be some place in Egypt.
Our ancestors guide us to connect with them. I’ve wanted to travel to Egypt for a long time but thought my first trip to the motherland ought to be to West Africa. Because each attempt to visit other African countries fell apart, I wondered if I was being Spiritually guided to Egypt.
My travel plans for Egypt came together effortlessly. A few weeks before my trip, I met an Egyptian woman who couldn’t stop looking at me and then told me that I looked like I was from Egypt. Then, my DNA test results revealed that my maternal ancestry is from the Kush/Nubia People of Kamit (Ancient Egypt) and my paternal ancestry is from the Bamileke People of Cameroon who fled Egypt to prevent being forced to renounce their religion.
While in Egypt, I learned that Shu is the God Of Air ☥ Sustenance Of Life which helped me to understand my deep connection to the study ☥ practice of Qigong (a healing modality anchored in breath ☥ movement). Shu represents a reconnection to my ancestry and culture. I also solved the mystery of my recurring dreams the day I arrived at Nesut-Tawy (renamed Karnak). It was as if every cell in my body was an ancestor ecstatic that I finally found my way back home. I am often pictured with Shu to represent healing through breathology ☥ connection to identity ☥ ancestry ☥ culture.
The Gods and Goddesses represent aspects of Spirit (God), however Spirituality manifests for you, and qualities to learn about ☥ cultivate within yourself. Identity, ancestry and culture are indispensable parts of the healing process for Black ☥ Indigenous ☥ Immigrant People.
☥ Auset ☥ Goddess Of Alchemy ☥ The Body Whisperer Extraordinaire ☥
Auset connects us to our innate wisdom and power which allows us to take actions that serve our highest good. The Auset icon on phyllishubbard.com takes you to our facebook page.
☥ Sekhmet ☥ Warrior Goddess ☥ Goddess Of Healing ☥
Sekhmet empowers us to advocate for isonomy and actively engage in self-care to ensure success in our endeavors. The Sekhmet icon on phyllishubbard.com takes you to our linkedin page.
☥ Pharaoh Menkaure ☥ Fourth Dynasty (age of the pyramids, 2700–2200 BC) ☥
Menkaure directs us to lead with a solid strategic vision as we hone our expertise and manifest our aspirations. The first Menkaure icon takes you to our youtube channel. The second Menkaure icon on phyllishubbard.com (pictured with Hathor ☥ Goddess of Love ☥ Bat ☥ Goddess of Interdependent Opposites) takes you to our instagram page. The innate wisdom of Pharaoh Menkaure, who commissioned the building of the smallest of the Giza Pyramids, is vital for Black ☥ Indigenous ☥ Immigrant People to study ☥ understand ☥ embody.
Menkaure is the only icon included that is not a God or Goddess, but I included him twice as he represents what a Black ☥ Indigenous ☥ Immigrant Person can accomplish when we commit ourselves to the fusion of connection with SPIRIT ☥ expertise ☥ strategy.
☥ Ausar ☥ God Of Transformation ☥ Our Ancestors ☥
Ausar facilitates growth, change and reconnection to the truest part of ourselves so that we can live in our purpose. The Ausar icon on phyllishubbard.com takes you to our pinterest page.
☥ Ma'at ☥ Goddess Of Truth ☥ Justice ☥ Cosmic Order ☥
Ma'at is our inner knowing of that which serves the highest good in any situation. She strengthens our ability to speak ☥ live in truth ☥ ensures that our inner wisdom drives our outer actions. The Ma'at icon on phyllishubbard.com takes you to our x (twitter) page.
As you experience phyllishubbard.com, you’ll learn about other Gods and Goddesses such as Set (God Of The Chaordic, Transformation), Shango (God Of Thunder), Horus (a Sky God), Hathor (Goddess Of Love), Ra (a Sun God), Bat (Celestial Goddess of Interdependent Opposites), Oshun (Goddess Of Fertility, Sexuality, Sensuality, Water {For Cleansing}, Purity) and many more.
☥ Ankh ☥
Ankh means "key of life." It is the Kamitian (Ancient Egyptian) hieroglyphic symbol for life. I use the ankh symbol in a variety of ways including:
☥ To replace the conventional bullet in a list
☥ To replace other conventional punctuation marks such as a colon, semicolon, dash or
period ☥
☥ To send positive energy to and around the name of the author of a quote that I've
shared
☥ To symbolize breathing life into a concept or idea
☥ The ankh is the dominant symbol on this website because it represents my ancestry
and culture, but it also pays homage to the motherland and our world's first people ☥
ॐ Om ॐ
Om is the primordial sound of the universe. I use ॐ in the same ways that I use the ankh symbol. The om symbol is dominant on this website because it represents my connection and devotion to the study and practice of Ayurveda, the healing modality that helped me to liberate myself from a 27-year bout with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD).
☯ Yin Yang ☯ (阴阳)
Yin yang is an ancient Chinese philosophical concept of interdependent opposites. I use the ☯ or the Chinese characters, 阴阳, in the same ways that I use the ankh and the om symbols. The yin yang symbol is dominant on this website because it represents my connection and devotion to the study and practice of Qigong, the healing modality that restored my lungs back to its pre-COPD state.
I use the ankh, om and yin yang (☥ॐ☯, respectively) symbols because they represent a glimpse of holistic healing. The healing strategies of Black ☥ Indigenous ☥ Immigrant People might help us to solve a health challenge or rejuvenate our lives - an auspicious invitation for us to share with and learn from each other.
Om ☥ Shu ☥ Ra ☥ Hotep ☥ॐ☯ The Phyllishubbard.com Logo
The phyllishubbard.com logo is an example of a mixed media image. I create mixed media images to help us focus our attention and practice meditation. So many people tell me that they cannot meditate, so I'm determined to help us recognize meditation in everyday life. Let's imagine that you are excited to reconnect with a long lost friend. You meet at a popular restaurant, but are disappointed by the loud talking and music blasting from the speakers. However, you become engrossed in your conversation. What happened to the background noise?
The conversation with your long lost friend is an example of a focal point. In meditation, breathing is the focal point. Anyone can meditate with a shift in perspective and consistent practice. Om is the primordial sound of the universe, Shu is the God Of Air ☥ Sustenance Of Life, Ra is a Sun God and hotep means "peace." Om ☥ Shu ☥ Ra ☥ Hotep is an invitation to reconnect with the truest part of yourself, breathe deeply, rise with the sun and be at peace☥ॐ☯
Contemplative Quotes
You’ll notice contemplative quotes throughout phyllishubbard.com. The quotes are a way to encourage deep thinking around a specific subject. I invite you to consider the following quotes as I bring this blog to a close.
Racial trauma baits Black ☥ Indigenous ☥ Immigrant People into competing within and with other cultures. Without conscious awareness and a strong sense of identity, we will begin to internalize the propaganda and devalue ourselves. ☥ The constant barrage of incessant microaggressions and the overwhelming pressure to conform is reinforced by the assertion of white economic and social power in the world. white culture is tantamount to a spammer in that they inundate us with their images, traditions and societal norms. A spammer wins when it exhausts us and banks on the fact that we’ll give in to its requests. ☥ Black ☥ Indigenous ☥ Immigrant People don’t have the luxury of exhaustion because humanity as well as our mental health, emotional stability and identity is in jeopardy. We cultivate peace by dropping our ignorance, healing and cleansing our pasts and improving our behavior to co-create lasting fulfillment. ☥ ☥ Dr. Phyllis SHU Hubbard ☥
The Cambridge Dictionary (n.d.) defines cultural appropriation as 'the act of taking or using things from a culture that is not your own, especially without showing that you understand or respect this culture.' There are three main elements that need to be highlighted here. First, this definition implies that the 'appropriator' is not part of the group to which the cultural element itself belongs. Second, this concept implies the act of 'taking or using' cultural elements, meaning that whoever is engaging in this process can engage with the culture on their own term, thus indicating that power dynamics are at play. Third, and perhaps most important, the cultural element is taken out of its context in a way that either does not credit its origins or is disrespectful to its meaning. ☥ ☥ Maha Ikram Cherid ☥
We are a part of a multiethnic and multiracial Jewish community – and yet the normative view of a Jew in the U.S., both inside and outside the Jewish community, is a white, Ashkenazi Jew from Eastern Europe. Jewish values call us to wrestle with how our Jewish identity connects to race, to white cultural norms and privileges, and to the need to address racial inequity both within and outside the Jewish community. ☥ אַהֲבָה 'Jewish Perspectives On Racial Justice At The Shabbat Dinner Table' אַהֲבָה
Your body can manufacture and administer the precise balance of neurochemicals that can reverse illness and cure virtually any disease. ☥ Your body possesses the innate capacity to heal itself. Science has proven, beyond doubt, that the content of our thoughts and emotions directly and immediately influence our biochemistry. ☥ We can consciously influence and direct the body’s output of healthy chemical information through meditation and other mental techniques. ☥ ☥ Kelly Howell ☥ Founder Of Brain Sync ☥
From about 1885 to the end of the Second World War, most of Africa was under the yoke of colonialism; and hence colonial historiography held sway. According to this imperial historiography, Africa had no history and therefore the Africans were a people without history. They propagated the image of Africa as a 'dark continent.' Any historical process or movement in the continent was explained as the work of outsiders ... African history was seen as the history of Europeans in Africa ... Colonialism was celebrated as a 'civilising mission' carried out by traders, missionaries and administrators ... By Africa, for instance, many of the scholars meant 'sub-Saharan' or 'Black' Africa, definitions which were intended for various ideological and political reasons to divorce North Africa from the rest of the continent. Since the 19th century, many Western scholars have made strenuous efforts to deny the Africanness of North Africa and its peoples, especially the Africanness of the great civilization of Ancient Egypt. ☥ ☥ Dr. Bethwell Allan Ogot ☥
It's the ones who smile at you while they're plotting in the dark that I've learned to worry about ... ☥ ☥ Esa Khattak ☥ 'Ausma Zehanat Khan, A Deadly Divide' ☥
You cannot have Jesus and racism at the same time. white Christians need to choose. ☥ ☥ Dr. Phyllis SHU Hubbard ☥
Often the world tells biracial kids that our existence is a 50-50 thing — that you can only ever be less than a whole or not enough, but I feel 100 percent Congolese and 100 percent Chinese. For anyone of mixed heritage, there is great power when you can harness that mindset about your identity. ☥ ☥ Zhong Feifei ☯
Love is a longing to include someone as a part of yourself. It is a possibility to become more than what you are, by inclusion. ☥ ॐ Sadhguru ॐ
Heal ☥ Nourish ☥ Rise
Epilogue ☥ Your Treasure Map For Self-Care
Thank you for taking the time to actively engage in your own self-care. If you have ever spent time at a hammam ☥ steam room ☥ sauna, you will notice that it is a comfortable space because you are wearing minimal or no clothing and you can just be yourself. However, after a short time, it starts to get hot, and you begin to sweat. This is a good thing because you are helping your body to eliminate toxins. If you want to detoxify your body correctly you will:
☥ Breathe slowly and deeply to help your body adjust to the intensity of the heat.
☥ Sip water every 15 minutes to stay hydrated.
☥ Have a piece of fruit ☥ pumpkin seeds ☥ favorite healthy snack available.
☥ Take a shower after excessive sweating.
☥ Go into a cold room/take a cold plunge/cold water rinse off to cool down before doing
another sweat and to stimulate your lymphatic system.
☥ Go for a walk in nature, spend time in meditation ☥ contemplation, have a healthy meal
and give your body some time to complete the healing process (which could include
sending you messages through your intuition about your next steps).
As you journey through ☥ interact with the blogs ☥ other content on phyllishubbard.com, you might have an insight that causes you to suddenly feel mentally ☥ emotionally “hot” -- which could show up as:
☥ “Ah-ha” moments
☥ A hop-in-the-bed-and-cry-yourself-to-sleep or fetal position crying time of intensive
self-care
☥ Intense feelings of anger/regret about something in your past
☥ Disorientation caused by the realization of truth
☥ Strong reactions such as heightened senses, vomiting; an urge to release emotions
such as yelling/screaming, going outside for fresh air/to take a walk, punching a
boxing bag/pillow; a feeling of tightness in the chest, etc.
If you find yourself having a strong reaction, I encourage you to flow with it while helping your body to release mental ☥ emotional toxins by using the same five self-care strategies listed above for releasing physical toxins. Your body talks to you all the time, but unconscious adherence to social conditioning can mute its messages.
Strong reactions are your body’s way of letting you know that there is a deeper issue requiring your attention.
Keep revisiting the content ☥ utilizing the five self-care strategies until you no longer experience the strong reaction, release fears and have identified ☥ transformed ☥ removed the root cause of the issue. You will find additional strategies throughout this website that you can add to your mental health self-care toolkit.
Self-Care Sustainability Suggestions
☥ Check out our blog page for an experiential healing journey. Revisit the content
periodically and make a note of if/how your perceptions have evolved.
☥ Check out the other pages on phyllishubbard.com:
☥ Home - watch the videos. Click on the images in the Spiritual Guidance
section. Each image has a story that might assist your self-care journey. Learn
about other spiritual practices.
☥ About - Learn about my background ☥ reasons for co-creating
phyllishubbard.com with Spirit. Explore healing through the images ☥ videos.
☥ Shop ☥ Kamitology - Purchase and download vital tools for your personal growth
☥ development.
☥ Reclaiming Our Humanity - Help us develop and disseminate video courses.
☥ Rise TV - Practice breathing and movement exercises and deepen your
understanding of healing through the experiences of community members.
Check back periodically to discover new/re-experience the content.
☥ Journey - This is your invitation to own the journey to radiance. Experience the
journey and download healing resources to share with your friends, family and
community.
Revisit the content periodically and make a note of if/how your perceptions have evolved.
About Sharing ...
During my first presentation to an all-Black audience, I introduced 20-year-old research on the hazards of sitting. I presented the research because I noticed that people sat for way too long at convenings and realized that the information was not disseminated to Black ☥ Indigenous ☥ Immigrant communities. I was determined to intentionally include this research, often surprising participants by getting people up to stretch. After more than 13 years of intentional work, Black ☥ Indigenous ☥ Immigrant People are just barely beginning to normalize conscious movement. We still have a long way to go, and it is important that we share what we know as much as we can to prevent the disenfranchisement of wellness information to Black ☥ Indigenous ☥ Immigrant communities.
Please do not keep phyllishubbard.com to yourself. We will not co-create a better world until we heal our current, past/childhood traumas. We will not love others until we learn to love ourselves. When you share healing, healing comes back to and flows through you.
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A bonus for those of you who follow through all the way to the end. May your efforts be blessed. When we say our ancestors' names, we reclaim our stolen legacies.
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