Living In Legacy & Breaking The Curse With Khalisa Rae

Original Air Date: July 5, 2021

Have you ever had a conversation that changed your life? 

This week’s episode, ‘Living In Legacy & Breaking The Curse’, with Khalisa Rae, is all of that and more. 

Our guest, Khalisa Rae, is an award winning poet and journalist in Durham, NC that speaks with furious rebellion. She is also the author of Ghost in a Black Girl's Throat (Red Hen Press 2021).

Her essays are featured in Autostraddle, Catapult, LitHub, as well as articles in B*tch Media, NBC-BLK, and others.

Her poetry appears in Frontier Poetry, Florida Review, Rust & Moth, PANK,  Carousel, HOBART, among countless others. 

She is the winner of the Bright Wings Poetry contest, the Furious Flower Gwendolyn Brooks Poetry Prize, and the White Stag Publishing Contest, among other prizes. 

Currently, she serves as Assistant Editor for Glass Poetry and co-founder of Think in Ink and the Women of Color Speak reading series. Her second collection Unlearning Eden is forthcoming from White Stag Publishing in 2022. 

This day, Khalisa gifted all of us with her honesty, poetry, insights, brilliance, and creativity. I am truly grateful for the courage and vulnerability she brought to our conversation. We explored:

-Healing from trauma

-How to create your own team of superheroes 

-The importance of honoring your gifts

-The power of words 

-Protecting your light 

Khalisa shared some really powerful stories that left me feeling more grounded and connected to my inner power. 

Not to mention that she shared with us two poems that hit me right in my soul. 

I’m telling you - this episode will be a game-changer. For anyone who is serving a mission greater than themselves - this episode is for you. 

You can learn more about Khalisa through her website. Khalisarae.com

Or you can follow her on twitter or instagram

tomearl.me/khalisa

Listen to "Living In Legacy & Breaking The Curse With Khalisa Rae" on Spreaker.

Living In Legacy & Breaking The Curse With Khalisa Rae

Have you ever had a conversation that changed your life? 

This week’s episode, ‘Living In Legacy & Breaking The Curse’, with Khalisa Rae, is all of that and more. 

Our guest, Khalisa Rae, is an award winning poet and journalist that speaks with furious rebellion. She is also the author of Ghost in a Black Girl's Throat (Red Hen Press 2021). 

This day, Khalisa gifted all of us with her honesty, poetry, insights, brilliance, and creativity. I am truly grateful for the courage and vulnerability she brought to our conversation. We explored:

-Healing from trauma

-How to create your own team of superheroes 

-The importance of honor your gifts

-The power of words 

-Protecting your light 

Khalisa shared some really powerful stories that left me feeling more grounded and connected to my inner power. 

Not to mention that she shared with us two poems that hit me right in my soul. 

I’m telling you - this episode will be a game-changer. For anyone who is serving a mission greater than themselves - this episode is for you. 

You can learn more about Khalisa through her website.

Or you can follow her on Twitter @k_lisarae

--

Here is Khalisa Rae’s Full Bio:

Khalisa Rae is a poet and journalist in Durham, NC that speaks with furious rebellion. She is the author of Ghost in a Black Girl's Throat (Red Hen Press 2021). 

Her essays are featured in Autostraddle, Catapult, LitHub, as well as articles in B*tch Media, NBC-BLK, and others.

Her poetry appears in Frontier Poetry, Florida Review, Rust & Moth, PANK,  Carousel, HOBART, among countless others. 

She is the winner of the Bright Wings Poetry contest, the Furious Flower Gwendolyn Brooks Poetry Prize, and the White Stag Publishing Contest, among other prizes. 

Currently, she serves as Assistant Editor for Glass Poetry and co-founder of Think in Ink and the Women of Color Speak reading series. Her second collection Unlearning Eden is forthcoming from White Stag Publishing in 2022. Follow her at @k_lisarae on Twitter. Find more information here and here.

Listen to "Living In Legacy & Breaking The Curse With Khalisa Rae" on Spreaker.

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Feel All The Feelings (Without Toxic Positivity)

Feel all of the feelings. 

Even the ones that feel messy. 

Or don’t fit neatly into a polished box of positivity. 

Create your own paintings. 

Express your unique style. 

They’ll tell you:

To put on a smile,

Take the stage, 

Work the gimmick, 

Wear the mask of plastic happiness. 

It’s what they want to see...

The spectators. 

The followers. 

The audience. 

Do it for the show.

The hallowed accolades

Followed by the inevitable silence. 

Artificial lights that glowed begin abruptly fade. 

When will we come home to the movement inside us? 

The honesty behind the performance. 

The fuel. 

The sadness. 

The fire. 

The heaviness. 

The energy. 

The struggle. 

The ignition. 

The pain. 

Feelings are feelings when we let ourselves feel them. 

Trapped inside a lie of good vibes 

It’s the farce that starts to tear us apart. 

An elephant’s painting, 

Words created by AI. 

Without the:

Worry or 

anxiety... 

Sans the risk, 

Of ridicule

And rejection…

Creation without risk is imitation. 

It’s the vulnerability that makes it creativity. 

Feeling all the feelings. 

It’s not easy. 

But it sure beats the drudgery

Of pretending. 

Feeling all the feelings

Is human.

Feeling all the feelings 

Is you and me

Being. 

P.S. 

I hope you enjoy this week’s episode: Feel All The Feelings (Without Toxic Positivity) 

Listen to "Feel All The Feelings (Without Toxic Positivity)" on Spreaker.

If you'd like to learn more about T.H.E. Celebration Academy.  Here's 30 days of Free Membership.

A Q&A Session With Close Friends

In this week’s episode, I host a special Q&A session with some of my awesome friends for an intimate and engaging opportunity. I allow my friends to ask any questions they like - including questions around politics, privilege in the coaching space, how to grow an audience as a musician, advice for creatives about how to get over the feeling of vulnerability when you’re putting out new work, how to decide which social media platforms to leverage if you have limited time and more. 

What I love about Q&A sessions is that you are sure to find some clarity related to questions that you’ve also been wondering. 

Q&A is my favorite form of content because instead of general advice, I can provide specific and nuanced feedback according to the asker’s concerns. I enjoy hearing the range of topics my friends are working on.

If any questions come up for you be sure to reach out on social media or email me at tom@tomearl.com.  

For our next Live Q&A session, visit - www.tomearl.com/events 

Guests: 

Sadiya Sassine IG - @sadiyasassine

@yummy.online

Samia Bano

Grant Hartwell IG - @grantsyourguy

Women’s Mosque

Listen to "A Q&A Session With Close Friends" on Spreaker.

If you'd like to learn more about T.H.E. Celebration Academy.  Here's 30 days of Free Membership.

We Are All Creatives

On this week’s episode, we talk about creativity! Each and every single one of us are creatives, and we are continually expressing ourselves in unique and wonderful ways. We discuss the relationship between creativity and vulnerability, and how getting lost in the process of creating is often more important than the product. There are so many different ways to express your creativity aside from traditional “art”, from showing people how you love to setting up your spreadsheets. 

The second half of this episode is a replay from a Live and Online: Expression Session. You will hear the poetry people created during the freewrite session using the prompt “We Are All Creatives”. 

The world needs your gifts! How are you showing up creatively in your life?

For future Live and Online: Expression Sessions, visit tomearl.com/events.

Listen to "We Are All Creatives" on Spreaker.

If you'd like to learn more about T.H.E. Celebration Academy.  Here's 30 days of Free Membership.

Poetry for Incarcerated Youth With Matthew Cuban

This week, I’m joined by Matthew ‘Cuban’ Hernandez, a poet, speaker, and performance coach from Jacksonville, Florida. He has toured as far as Abu Dhabi and nearly every major city in the United States and Europe, performing, teaching and coaching poetry. 

 Matthew is the author of 3032, and is currently fundraising to provide 3,032 copies of his book to incarcerated youth in the Greater Los Angeles area and beyond. A teaching artist for nearly ten years, Matthew has spent the last four years working in youth detention centers across LA County. He believes allowing young people to see themselves reflected in art will empower them with the knowledge that they also have a story to tell. 

 A powerful performer as well, he has opened for artists such as Wu-Tang and has performed for platforms like BuzzFeed and NPR. Matthew is also a three time Southern Fried poetry slam champion and an award-winning poetry coach. Cuban’s favorite activity is making people feel great, including through poetry. 

 On this episode, Matthew shares how he started writing poetry and what inspires his work, as well as what it’s like teaching poetry with young people and campaigning to get their art funded. We talk about the relationship between creativity and vulnerability, how to practice self-love from secondary trauma, and what it’s like to live as an empath. Enjoy our hugging, laughing, and “singing”, in addition to three of Matthew’s incredible poems. 

 You can support Matthews Kickstarter here https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/3032bookgiveaway/matthew-cuban-3032-books-of-poetry-to-incarcerated-youth

Listen to "Poetry for Incarcerated Youth With Matthew Cuban" on Spreaker.

If you'd like to learn more about T.H.E. Celebration Academy.  Here's 30 days of Free Membership.