Author: Roshonda B

My name is Roshonda Blackmon and I have been known in life as “the encourager” God gave me that gift before I even realized what it was or what it truly meant, the only thing I knew is that a vast amount of people liked to come to me for advice and once that advice was received, I never heard from them anymore until they wanted more advice. That gifting soon became my ministry. I’ve been through quite a bit of challenges in life from dealing with suicide, low self-image which resulted in low self-esteem, to the difficulties of growing up in a one parent household and the list goes on and on. But God in all his Mercy and Grace blessed me to overcome those obstacles and situations and gave me a “second” chance by allowing me to live through all that darkness in order to help spread an encouraging light to others. In a world of uncertainty and negatism’s I want to encourage you to LIVE. Yes, Life does get hard sometimes, But if we keep looking up at the SON; we gain strength, we become empowered and we grow in the process with God’s help; for it doesn’t matter where you are in your life at this moment in time; God is able and will meet you within that dark place and change your life from Dark to Light, I’m not only a witness to this; but JustsumInspiration to show you, That you too can make it.

Video: Wednesday’s Word! – Invest in YOU BOO!

Published on July 25, 2018April 18, 2019 by Roshonda B6 Comments

photo above courtesy of bing/investing

I’m sure we’ve all heard the saying “Investing is Wealth” or maybe something like that, however; Investing goes far beyond you and your business – investing has a lot to do with YOU BOO! What do you want to accomplish, what do you want to do and what’s your mindset in getting it done.

I hate to admit this, but I was bad at taking time out to invest in me “especially my business” we’ll be so surprised at how lightly we take things when it comes to ourselves, our business, our health, our mind and our overall life.

You know, we put so much of our time into other things and other people; sometimes so much so, we forget about our own dreams and goals. How do you feel about your business? Are you taking out time to “invest” in it? I talk about this and about the time how I felt like I didn’t think “investing” money into my business was really for me to do.

So here’s today’s video – this is the last one so I hope it inspires and motivates you to invest in you. Let’s get Inspired together!

If you liked the Wednesday Word videos, I said I was only going to do them for the month of July but I can do two a month if you’d like! Let me know below…

Did you miss the other videos? Check them out here:

Wednesday Word 7/11/18: So Be It, See To It

Wednesday Word 7/18/18: Bigger Place for Office Space? Gurrllll Bye!

EnSpired: Pet Hair, Don’t Care. Meet the Grooming Dogs Who Were Born To Be WILD!

Published on July 24, 2018April 18, 2019 by Roshonda BLeave a comment

photo above courtesy of katrinapetsalon

Whether you want it dyed, fried, laid to the side or a rainbow of colors – there’s one salon in California that’s specialized to give your…..PET!…..anything it’s heart or I guess I should say, it’s owner’s heart desire. Thanks to ‘Katrina’s Pet Salon’; now your pet can be just as fashion forward as you are!

Katrina Short is the owner and certified groomer of ‘Katrina’s Pet Salon’ in San Leandro, CA. a salon that specializes in dog, cat and creative grooming and when I say creative, I mean it’s on the next level of creativity! Katrina, whose has been a lover of animals her whole life, had dreams of becoming a vet when she grew up, but when she got bit by the “grooming” field bug; she immediately fell in love with it and decided to combine her love of pets and her new love of grooming together and VIOLA! soon, she began taking pets from ordinary to an extraordinary WILD SIDE, literally.

As you’ll see in the video below – Katrina, gives the pets fresh looks by dying their hair, trimming their tresses and even painting their nails, giving them not only a new look but a new found confidence as well. This new found confidence helped give Khalee a boost, whom according to her owner – suffered from depression (I know that may seem a bit unreal for a dog to be depressed, but I guess it happens for animals too)

Katrina’s not only a master mind when it comes to grooming, but she’s also into the pet’s overall health as well. Due to her thorough grooming services, she’s saved over five pets lives by discovering cancerous lumps early.

“As a groomer, I’m in tune with each individual pet and their bodies” Katrina Short

So, without further ado – get ready to meet the “glam squad” Zeus, Kevin, Khalee and their “rat pack” Brody, Tank, Sterling and Bling in the video below.

To see who’ll be getting a fabulous makeover next or view more videos of her shop and grooming process. Feel free to follow Katrina on one of her social sites below:

Instagram: @Katrina_Short

YouTube: katrina_short pet grooming

You can see more of Katrina’s Creations on her website: Katrina’s Pet Salon

What do you think? Do you like the way Katrina is glamming up pets? Would you get your pet glammed up this way? – Leave your comments below….

ROSHONDA N. BLACKMON

Creator of A Blog, A Magazine. It’s JustsumInspiration, Author, Speaker & Encourager

Back To School Affirmations

Published on July 19, 2018March 9, 2020 by Roshonda B4 Comments

photo source above: bing/backtoschoolaffirmations

Now that the 2017-2018 school year is over, kids of all grades are going to be entering the 2018-2019 year in about a month and a half from now. While most will be hesitant to step back into the school world; others will be excited to go back and get the year started – YAY!!…..But what type of mindset will this year be for our kids – while us parents will have some responsibility for that; it’s up to our kids overall to decide if they will push themselves to success or as the song says “lean back” and let the chips fall where they may.

Because after all, we all have CHOICES!!! & So does our kids!!

Last week for our weekly bible class talk, I began to talk to my children about “Affirmations” and speaking things that they feel they are not into existence/a belief that they could be. (Romans 4:17), now whether you’re religious or a believer or not; I feel as though our kids have the ability to speak “good things” over their lives or situation no matter how small or tall they are.

I began to tell my children about Octavia E. Butler – in which I talked about in this video. She had a mantra “So Be It, See To It” Google, did a doodle of Butler on June 22^nd to celebrate what would have been her 71st birthday.

Octavia E. Butler Google Doodle — Octavia E. Butler (June 22, 1947 – February 24, 2006)

Curious as to whom this African American woman was (please don’t judge me if you’re a Butler fan) – after a little research I came across a journal entry that Butler penned in which she “manifested” “I Shall be a Bestselling Author”, “My books will be on the bestseller lists of the Los Angeles Times, New York Times and etc.” she went on to declare and state that “This is my life, I write Bestselling Novels” “My books will be read by Millions of people” notice that she didn’t think or say “I want to or I believe” she made it known that those words weren’t in her vocabulary as they were replaced by [ctt template=”8″ link=”H5564″ via=”yes” ]”I Shall & I Will. So Be It, See To It!![/ctt]

And this was before she became famous! She knew what she wanted and stuck to her guns – this Affirmation of course didn’t come easy, she worked diligently on her craft daily before the crack of dawn until she went off to work, in which she labored as a dishwasher and then a potato chip inspector; all while working on the career she so desired in the background. Needless to say, Octavia E. Butler; whom suffered from dyslexia – went on to become the first African American science fiction author whom was very well respected in her field. Butler produced over a dozen novels, received numerous awards all ranging from 1980-2012. Her books were indeed read by millions of people, just as she penned in her journal.

Now you may be saying – “What does all of this have to do with back to school?” well, to get back on track – I began to tell my kids to manifest what they wanted their school year to be like. If they felt as though they didn’t have the best year last year; then to “declare and speak” what type of school year they wanted to have this year. As I told them, there really is power in the tongue – whatever they speak or think about themselves, their school year or their life will either move them into success or push them backwards.

Just as Octavia Butler penned, we too can pen our destiny – declaring what we want our destiny to be is one thing – working on it is something different. In order for Butler to manifest what she wanted; she had to “See To It” being done.

So, I gave my kids a homework assignment for our next talk and that was to write down a couple of Affirmations they wanted to see for themselves going into this school year. An assignment that once completed, they’ll read aloud to me. What they don’t know is that, this will be their morning anthem for the rest of the school year.

Would you like to do this activity with your children?

This can be a fun project for all to get involved and do, including the parents as you may have a couple of affirmations you want to write on your own (it’s never too late!)

If you have small kids, ages 5-8

Then you can get them some construction paper and let them write out what they want their school year to be like, they can color it and/or make it their own piece of artwork. You can get it laminated and hang it on their wall or a place in which they’ll have to see or pass by every day.

If your children are older, ages 10-17

Then they can write out their mantra on notebook paper or however they want. The thing is allowing them to be creative with their own project as they’ll be more apt to look and/or follow through with it because it’s what they created. Same thing as above, they’ll place it where they can see it every day.

The goal of affirmations is to speak them over your life every single day, but we know kids and that may not be a practice that they’ll get used to doing overnight. However, keeping them hung in a place where they can see them will help them stay focused on their goal and the positive choices they want to see during the new school year.

Listed below are some affirmations to give them a head start, but feel free to allow them to come up with their own…(that’s what makes it really special)

I am a leader
I am a great kid
I can make healthy choices
I will be a great student
I am one of a kind
I will succeed in school as well as life
I will make good grades
I have the knowledge to pass every test
I am smart
I am handsome/beautiful
I love ME!
I MATTER!
I am good enough
I am unique
I can and will make friends
I will make a difference
It’s okay to not know everything – I’m still smart!
I am Brave
I am Strong
This will be the best school year yet!
I will not let fear keep me from being great!

Creator of A Blog, A Magazine. It’s JustsumInspiration, Author, Speaker & Encourager

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I Have A Big, Huge Announcement!!! – FAIL….

Published on April 5, 2018 by Roshonda B9 Comments

photo above courtesy of Canva – done by moi =)

Okay, let’s take a deep breath now…..because since my last post? Ya’ll really wasn’t going to hear from me again, I declared in my soul that I was just going to give up writing, PERIOD!!! Why Lord!!!! did you give me this gift to be humiliated, my writings are a BLAH, BLAH, BLAH I mean, so like – why do I write, what’s my purpose and how is that purpose serving others???????

This was just the lighter side of the conversation I had with myself during the last week….so, why did I feel that way? Well….just keep reading; here we go…

So, if you’ve been following me (avidly), then you know that I have been working on a book, entitled “Billy Wolf and the Kids of Heavenly Hills Elementary” the book is about bullying and how this one person brought doom and gloom to a school in which didn’t really have any issues, this bully taunted everyone – I mean, no one was off limits; finally someone decided to take a stand against him, someone in whom no one would have expected to take down Billy Wolf. Now, I was sooooo excited about promoting this book because I felt like it’s a topic that our world and children deal with constantly, my goal was to get the books into schools and hopefully be able to talk to kids about the effects of bullying. I got my proof copy in the mail, looked it over and was just about to push the “approve” button, but decided to wait because I had put out an ad to a couple of sites, looking for people whom would help me market it………………………….What did I do that for!

I thought that maybe, the people reading it would be able to give me an idea of the market in which I was trying to reach and make some suggestions as to where I can take it, let’s just say positive feedback wasn’t what I got back and all the excitement of telling everyone today that they can now purchase the book on Amazon and so forth – can to a screeching halt when this particular person said…

I was just wanting to know – Do you have any kids? I mean did you do research before you created this book? Kids are on a much higher reading level now, they’re into chapter books and the 6th grade is now middle school age, not elementary. And what Happened to Billy?, It seems like the story just started with him coming and there was an ending but nothing in sight to say who tried to help him – I also think your book is a little racist.

It took everything within me to not SCREAM!!, like really? Racist? and there comment was, “Well, it seems like you have this African-American young man, torturing the Caucasian kids” and I’m like thinking in my head, I have no idea where you seen that at because clearly, there are other kids of a different race in the book, and why would I do that??? with trying to put this book into schools???? I made it very clear to the illustrator that I wanted the kids to be all colors because bullying affects all races, all origins, all creeds, all nationalities – it’s the one thing to me that isn’t prejudice.

But it was the way she was talking to me, like I was some 3rd grader whom needed to be punished for getting a C on my homework. She clearly over-talked me and every time I wanted to explain or say something – she wouldn’t take the time to listen and when she did; it was very brief and time to go. Another comment I got was that the book wasn’t long enough for older kids and not short enough to hold the attention span of smaller kids andddd.…the fact that I talk about faith in the book, really struck a nerve because schools have taken a backseat to religion, it has now been reduced to “a moment of silence” I was so done, I literally went days with approving the book and just shut down in which is where the conversation at the beginning of this post came into play….

I shut down – I didn’t want to write again, I cried and cried and cried and cried; did I mention I cried? I was done….threw in the towel; was going to shut the blog down and never come back, Until – I talked to God.

Once I got over myself, It was like God brought this back to my mind:

J.K. Rowling – the famed author behind the Harry Potter series was turned down by multiple publishers – for years! If she had given up after being rejected, we all would be like “Harry Potter” who?

The thing is, she didn’t give up! I’m sure there were many publishers whom didn’t see her vision, I mean – what type of story is this?, they probably were all saying – but the girl, kept going – she believed in herself even when no one else did, sort of remind me of the Donald Lawrence song “Encourage Yourself” in which in life is what we all will be faced to do at one point or another. So you know what I did? I replayed all of their comments over in my mind and took out the negative emotions I allowed myself to feel and made quite a few changes to the book according to the positive things that I allowed myself to see…because there were some positive ones.

And, since this book will not be able to go into schools because of the “faith” aspect of it; I embraced that as well because now, it allows me to be able to make changes according to how I feel God wanted me to make them. You see, in a sense I sort of was trying to take certain things out of the book (such as the scripture) to make it appealing to a general audience (note, I said “I”) – but maybe these comments were God’s way of showing me that I needed to be me and do it the way he wanted. So yes, Billy Wolf and the Kids is officially a christian book, that hopefully offers a little bit of funny, love, redemption, encouragement and inspiration to anyone whom decides to pick it up and give it a read.

So, while the BIG announcement I had – did not turn out the way I wanted and was an epic fail. I’m encouraged today, it will be okay….I’m taking my time and going through every page, bit by bit and when the time comes to officially make a HUGE announcement?

I will be completely ready this time….

Roshonda N. Blackmon – Creator of A Blog, A Magazine. It’s JustsumInspiration, Author, Speaker & Encourager

P.S. There will be no post for next Thursday – It’s My B-Day!! or this upcoming Tuesday 4/10 I’m taking a week off =) But, If you follow me on one of the social sites below, I’ll still be posting quotes. I love you all!! (smooches)

Mindsets & Mental Stress

Published on March 29, 2018March 29, 2018 by Roshonda B3 Comments

photo above courtesy of bing

Recently, as me and my brother-in-law were talking, he began to tell me how he was mentally tired. He works all the time it seems like and really never gets a break or have a “down” time and when he is off (which is sometimes only for a day) it’s filled with other things to do, such as take the children to the doctor; mowing the lawn; taking care of things around the house that was pushed on the agenda for his next off day or meeting with his own doctors, he and my sister are both the same way when it comes down to some much needed R&R, they just don’t have the time for it!

I can totally relate to both of their dilemma’s because on top of taking care of the house, working hard to provide for two kids, making sure I stay on top of my own job and keeping up with what needs to be paid, what I did “actually” pay, to kids field trips, to making sure there’s money for this and that and keeping the car running and keeping my own health in check – where in the world is the time to settle down and BREATHE!!! at the end of the day, I’m ready to pull my hair out – LITERALLY!

Mental-Exhaustion3 — **HELP, PLEASSSSSSEEEEEE!!**

We have to find the time and balance to take care of ourselves – No, seriously….we do! It’s detrimental that we do, not only for our sanity but for our overall health. I’ve often heard people say, “I’ll have plenty of time to rest, when I’m DEAD!” and while that is very true; I don’t want to, as Rihanna sings “WERK, WERK, WERK, WERK , WERK, WERK” until I’m dead or so sick until I can’t do anything at all. Some people feel as though they have to plan for some elaborate trip in order to get away and get some ME TIME in, and that’s great – but we all know that sometimes plans are meant to be cancelled. You don’t have to plan for a big trip or go away to some remote location to get a little mental clarity, now don’t get me wrong, if you have it like that and truly plan to go through with it, by all means, do what you have to do; but sometimes there are a couple of simple things we can do right now, before plan that big trip.

Listed below are a couple of things that I currently do to get some “me time” in everyday, while they may be very simple; they’ve really helped to keep my stress level at an all time low.

Mental-Exhaustion4 — *photo taken from okclipart*

Take Your Time and Don’t Rush It

When my kids were much smaller and in daycare, I would get off of work at 5pm and rush to pick them up before 6pm (otherwise, I’d get charged a dollar for every minute after) I worked like 45min away. Sometimes it was a struggle getting there on time due to the traffic but I didn’t want to be late or pay a fine. Everything revolved around my kids when they were younger and the thought of me doing anything for myself, was a forbidden thought that I didn’t think mothers were supposed to have. One day my boss asked me, Roshonda?, “Why do you rush to get your kids – you need to take some time for yourself, get off a little early and stop by to grab you an ice-cream and enjoy it by yourself before you pick the kids up.” The thought of her saying that was like, death to my ears “Stop for Ice-Cream?” was she serious? But, she was right – sometimes we can rush life so fast until we don’t take out time to enjoy the simple things. Just because I had small kids at the time, didn’t mean that I had to forget about me – taking that ice-cream break was not only life changing but it helped my sanity as well.

De-stress and Rest

This is all about finding things you can do to make your “you” day stress free, such as going to the library, checking out that new food chain or clothing store that just opened up or scheduling a massage (you can schedule this for your next day off) or going to the park and feeding the birds or watching the water or just sitting in your car or under a tree, listening to some music or catching up on that book that’s been collecting dust on your shelf, that you promised to read months ago. You may have to think about a couple of simple things that you can do, but trust me – it’ll be worth it. Have you checked out your downtown yet?, I love walking into shops and just looking around. **Getting a good night’s rest, helps your mental clarity and health also – even if you have to schedule it; just make sure you stick to it!**

Sometimes, you gotta keep it a secret

Okay, so I’m still working on being good at this BUT – sometimes you can’t tell people when you’re off work or if you’re leaving work early OR have some spare time in your day (unless you plan to hang out with them) I say this because sometimes people have a tendency to add their to-do list on your off day. Unless it’s an emergency and people need to know you’re off for a particular reason…..It’s okay to keep the day a Hush Hush. Especially if you want to get in some extra sleep or just lounge around the house in your jammies, sipping some tea or coffee and reading the newspaper or catching up on your favorite show (now that you have the remote all to yourself). If you constantly sound the alarm when you’re off of work…..you’ll never get any rest.

Hey, Let’s Walk It Out

Exercise (as I’ve come to really know it) is a great stress relief – it gets those endorphins going and those energy levels up, making you sure to conquer the day – no matter how hard it may be. Do you eat lunch at your desk (I’m so guilty of this one)….I’m learning to stop eating lunch at my desk andddddd also, learning to leave the desk and take a walk. Sometimes, I’ll even go to my car let my seat back and turn on some music and take a nap or just eat and relax, I also take a walk around outside – especially when the day is beautiful. Walking has major benefits, for your mind and your health – it helps you de-stress from a long, busy and hectic day.

There is only one YOU and you only get one BODY, don’t lean on the motto of “I’ll rest when I’m dead” because we all will, one day but that day doesn’t have to be rushed. While, we must werk, werk, werk to make sure our necessities are not interrupted; we must take out time to make sure our mental stress and mindsets are also on our to-do list of important things to take care of as well…..