Tissa Talks: "I Am" Statements

Let's talk about you.

Hi Loves! This is a quick memo about the power of "I Am" statements! Hope you enjoy have a great week! Click here for the video. 

Tissa Talks about College!

Let's Talk About College 

Hi my loves! I know it has been awhile but I have created another video for you all. Today I am telling you all about my transition to college and how that has effected my life! 

Click here to view. 

Hope you enjoy!

XOXO
-Martissa 

My Top 5 Books!

So I know I’ve been slacking. 

I moved to NY late August and began my first semester in University.  All exciting, but nonetheless very time consuming. My goal is to post once a week but I will definitely be posting every other week…I promise.

Recently I was challenged to make a list of books that have most transformed my life. So, below I have listed, in no particular order, the books which have had the most impact on me so far: 

1. For Colored Girls who have Considered Suicide when the Rainbow is Enuf by Ntozake Shange: 
• I was first introduced to this choreopoem in 2010 with the release of Tyler Perry’s adaptation of this work in his movie For Colored Girls. The second I got my hands on the book I was hooked. Within the last four years I have read over this text countless times and to this day am still brought to tears. Last year, I had the fabulous opportunity to produce, direct, and act in my own production of For Colored Girls as a senior project in high school. If you have not read the play do yourself a favor and get a copy. To this day, Shange’s masterpiece has a significant impact on my self identity as a black female but more importantly as a person. 
2. A Return to Love by Marianne Williamson 
• Released in 1992, this book is Williamson’s reflection on A Course In Miracles. Recommend to me by my mother who found the book transformative in her own life, I finally read it my junior year and the book had a similar effect on me. Reading A Return to Love was part of my ongoing self-love journey; the book taught me to free myself from my own self-inflected personal hell and to find heaven right here on earth.  
3. The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison 
• I actually read this one for my Advanced Placement Literature course and completely fell in love with Morrison’s style of writing and her beautiful imagery. The Bluest Eye is a great novel exploring America’s obsession of beauty, the impact of white supremacy on the black community and the rampant transmission of self hatred from person to person, generation to generation. 
4. Lean In by Sheryl Sandberg 
• Written by the CEO of Facebook, Lean In is the 2014 version of The Feminine Mystique.  Everyone needs to read this book. It is a great manifesto of the gender climate in the modern day American workforce and home. Lean In pushes women to take a stand and men to stand right alongside them to continue to advance social and political equality for the sexes.  
5. This Bridge Called My Back, Writings by Radical Women of Color edited by Cherríe Moraga and Gloria E. Anzaldúa
• I was given this feminist anthology by my high school dean in my junior year. Although I have yet to read all of the poems, essays and short memoirs in the anthology, I love the richness and intersectionality of the collection of work. 

I do have a few posts I am currently working on: a “Why Am I a Feminist” video and a post about my transition to college. So look for those posts coming soon. Hope you enjoyed this one! 

HELP! I am Stuck in My Body!

As a woman I have been reduced to a commodity for centuries. My worth, based on my physical exterior and its usefulness to men.  I am simply the house of the womb and a unit used for sexual pleasure.

And because of this, I have internalized these functions as my sole purpose. The sole definition of my femininity.  

I've been told…I am valuable if I am a virgin.  If not I have given myself away and have tarnished my body and soul.  No longer am I special for my future husband and a chunk of my identity has been broken away.  

And if I am not a virgin, I can find validation in my sensuality and sexuality.  I can sell myself short and use my body merely as a tool to afford male’s with physical pleasure.  Never once thinking about my own wants and desires, I can hand over my pleasure (to a man) in order to fulfill his sexual needs.  

But the thing is! 

I do not live in my body.  

Well yes my spirit is housed there. But who I am…who I truly am is not identified by the social standards and limitations projected upon me.  

I am spirit. More than my breast and hips. More than my purity or impurity. My worth is not derived from how large or small my behind is, my choice to have sex or not, my physical beauty or lack there of, or my decision to show off my body or to cover it. I can not and will not be defined by tangible ever changing standards of beauty, femininity, and/or worthiness.  

I am more than my body. I am my soul. 

When did you Realize you are Black?

Recently I was texting a close friend who, like I, is away at college.  During the conversation she abruptly asks “when did you realize that you are black?”  

My immediate answer was the first time I was called the ’N’ word by a white classmate in middle school.  But looking back I really can not say that was a turning point in my racial identity.  I only look back on that experience now and think ‘WOW’ that was deep.  But at the time it seemed kind of trivial.  

As I think further about the question I think about the journey of my racial identity.

I attended a diverse montessori school from the age of two to fourteen.  As most children in preschool to elementary school, I was color blind.  It was not until my latter elementary school years when I began spending summers with my cousins that I began to recognize color at all.  Even at that time I did not understanding my own blackness but I was beginning to realize that there were differences connected to ones skin tone and how that person is perceived.  

During those summers with my cousins I was teased…teased for being “too white”.  Apparently my vocabulary and my mastery of proper english articulation was an indiction that I was not black enough.  

In middle school I can remember some of my white peers joking about how I wasn’t a “real” black person.  I would ignorantly laugh along with them in agreement, oblivious to the implication of their lightheartedness. 

At that time in my life, and the lives of my cousins and peers, being Black was based off the oh-so popularized stereotypes of hip hop culture.  Being educated, articulate and cool headed was, and to a large degree still is, not characteristics assigned to those within the Black culture. 

It was not until high school that I “realized” that I was black and began to understand what that meant to myself and others. Going to a predominately white school full of white privilege and ingrained racism, I found that being black was all about a shared history, not about slang, gold chains, and apple bottom jeans. 

And that’s when I found the truth in my melanin.

I am Narcissistic...

People tell me all the time that I am narcissistic.  "Oh yeah you know you're cute", they say.

So I admit it...
I know I'm pretty.

But let me tell you what else I know.

I know that the idea of 'pretty' is a joke.
A falsification.  An illusion governed by social law.

Physical beauty is an idea that traps people in their bodies; constrains them to the idea that long hair, pretty eyes, the right skin tone, a sexy body is the measure of their worth.

It is an idea that breeds insecurity,  low self worth, self hatred and negative outlooks on life and the world.  People spend their lives searching for validation in their outer appearance.  Maybe if my eyes were hazel or blue, or if my stomach was smaller, or if I was taller...then maybe just maybe I would be pretty.

STOP IT.

Am I pretty because I just so happened to be born with a set of physical characteristics which society has deemed as so?  Or because I have poked, pricked, cut, dyed, bleached, and changed my body to parallel an ever changing social construct?

Or,

Am I beautiful because I am exactly who I am supposed to be? Because I know who I am and I know that I am perfect exactly as God/the Creator/the Universe made me?

Check out these links!

Pretty by Katie Makkai                      So Fly by Elle Varner 

My People are More

My people are more. 

More than rap stars and jail birds

video vixens and baby mama’s 

we encompass every professional and artistic sector. 

We are diversity in it's purist definition.

My people are more.

Our characteristics run the gamut 

from big noses to narrow ones

from brown eyes to blue

from tall and lean to thick and voluptuous

from dark to light.

We are the unscathed definition of beauty.

My people are more.

We are opinionated, 

passionate.

Fighters.

Educators.

Creators. 

Lovers.

Friends.

Family.

My people are more.

We are the nation’s reason for life

the nation’s 

Unappreciated 

Underrepresented 

Unrecognized backbone.

My people are 

the symbol of the earth

the symbol of the heavens 

and the symbol of the sun.

My people are life.

                             -Martissa

Photo taken from Rachardwolf.com

Get you some 'Me' Time

'Me' Time

Hello beloveds! This video is all about the importance of carving out some time for yourself.  I have scheduled weekly time for myself once a week and this has helped me get focused on my goals,  enhances my self-awareness, and prompts overall self love.  Click the link above to check out my video! 

Much love,

-Martissa 

100 Happy Days Challenge!

Hey guys! Just wanted to do a quick post about the start of my 100 Happy Days Challenge.  Basically all you do is either post (on Twitter, Instagram or Facebook using the #100happydays) or email a picture everyday of something in your day that makes you happy.  This challenge is basically like a gratitude challenge and will help you appreciate the beautiful and wonderful things in your life.  I will be emailing in my happy moments each day but I will post one every week on my Instagram (@belleza_elegido).  Check out the challenge it has some great perks! Have a great day!

                                         -Martissa

My first happy day post! Spongebob and video editing, the best way to start a morning! 

Because You are Just a Baby...

Baby you are humanity,
naive and new
blinded by these flashy lights,
these soft folds
and all this glamorous facade.

Baby I am wisdom,
versed and learning
articulate and profound
I have viewed the world with critical eyes
eyes full of compassion and longing,
waiting for the moment that you wake.

Until then
I care for you
wait for you
love you
knowing that one day you will indeed realize the fault in your stars

until then
I will continue to clean up your messes
give you violent orgasms
rock you back to good health 
keep a smile on your face

until that day when you wake up and realize
You are no longer a baby.
Stand erect and walk in your totality.

                    -Martissa 

Who is She?

Who is she?

Hey guys! I just uploaded a video introducing myself and my blog.  

So check out the link above to officially meet me.  Enjoy! 

First Vlog: Ann Arbor Art Fair

TissaTalks Vlog: Ann Arbor Art Fair

What's up guys? So recently my friend Jillian from Breakfast at Jillian's and I spent a day in Ann Arbor at the Ann Arbor Art fair.  We checked out some of the vendors, took a stroll down graffiti alley, watched some street performances and ate good.  To check out my Vlog from this day check out the link above.  

Hope you enjoy!

XOXO

-Martissa 

I Am More than Your Sex Symbol!

There is a person here.
And my worth does not lie between my thighs
Those sweet folds can not begin to define my brilliance

My hips are the representation of life itself
They hold the power to create the world
The power of these curves are more than you could ever comprehend

Beyond my breast is a heart
A soul
Which has the capacity to hold every emotion ever felt
To heal the sick
And comfort the wounded
I am the protector

Beyond my thick lips are the words of sweet baby Jesus himself
My words speak life into the world

Behind my eyes are the presence of who you are.
Who you were and
Who you are becoming

                              -Martissa