sharonksobotta

Even when our time or the time of a loved one is up, we live on through our stories. During her time on earth, Corliss Watkins was a fierce advocate who lived a life of service, empowerment and advocacy as she strived to inspire those she worked with to be the best versions of themselves. 

Corliss had battled cancer for a few years at the time she did this interview and died five years later. She describes how she used the fighter within her to advocate for herself and her faith to get her through. Although she is no longer with us, her legacy and her story live on. 

In honor of International Women's Day and the moms, who due to the circumstances of life, are finding a way to do it on their own, Do It Yourself Mama, shares the stories of five women from vastly different places in life, who have built community, pieced together their lives and learned to take what they have and make what they need.

Each year, people around the United States take time to celebrate the legacy of Martin Luther King Jr. These are voices from the 2020 demonstration in Walnut Creek, California, with the most powerful voice belonging to a 5 year old child.

 

Quotes by Martin Luther King Jr.

Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.

 

Life's most persistent and urgent question is, 'What are you doing for others?

 

Free at last, Free at last, Thank God almighty we are free at last.

 

The quality, not the longevity, of one's life is what is important.

 

In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.

 

The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.

 

Faith is taking the first step even when you don't see the whole staircase.

 

The function of education is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically. Intelligence plus character - that is the goal of true education.

Josephina Lopez discusses the reemergence of 'Real Women Have Curves.' Lopez's work of art and heart began as a play, morphed into a screenplay and is on the verge of making its way back to the stage. Listen to learn how Lopez found her path and what keeps her inspired. 

What does it look like to follow your dream and make ends meet? Hear from a professional gardener, a healthcare access attorney, a life coach and yoga instructor and a Preschool Center Director...

Mitali Perkins always knew she wanted to write for children--not to write about bunnies but about complex social justice issues like gender equity, hyphenated identities and border politics. With each book, Perkins pushes readers to conceptualize a world that is bigger, more complex and filled with more possibilities that even walls and borders can't stop. Perkins' book Rickshaw Girl, the story of a Bangladeshi girl's determination to help her family earn money in the most unconventional of ways, is being adapted into a screenplay and her book Between Abuela and Us offers a glimmer of hope to children who are separated by borders for their loved ones. On a community level, Perkins strives to help adults learn from children in how to engage in difficult convrsations about race. Listen and be inspired. 

As tensions escalate in Iran, people of all backgrounds are taking to the streets to voice their opposition and say no to war. At the San Francisco protest, I ran into Professor Persis Karim from the Center for Iranian Diaspora Studies and Donna Favard, the Organizing Director of NIAC Action.