BLACK HISTORY - HAVE WE OVERCOME?

Breaking the Generational Curse of Poverty

This is why I do it. 

Generation after generation is steeped in poverty and hopelessness. Studies have shown that if a family stays in poverty for four generations, future generations are likely to remain poor.

 As far back as I can remember our family has remained in the proverbial “poor” class. My grandfather was a “laborer”, meaning he worked in the fields on somebody else’s farm. ”. My grandmother died in a field while working as a “laborer.” My father was a logger(or pulp wood man) and my mom was termed a “laborer” as well. She probably worked the same fields as my grandfather and grandmother before her.  At the age of 12, I was taken to the fields to work alongside my mother. Business law at the time said a child could work at the age of 12 without a social security number. All this meant was that the rich farmer who I worked for could get cheap labor and not have to pay taxes. On the brighter side, it meant that the family income would increase by whatever amount the 12-year old managed to acquire. It was back-breaking work bending and hauling bundles of flowers that were taller than me, and probably weighed more as well. It was not long before I decided that this would NOT be my lot in life. I dreamed that someday I would be a Secretary in an office somewhere, far away from the dust and bugs of the fields of the rural south.

Four years later, I was a teenage mom who had dropped out of school and I saw my dream slowly fading away. I returned to school to complete my high school education and graduated with honors. I was determined not to be a part of the statistics and demographics of my own little village. Everywhere I looked, teenage girls were becoming teen moms and bringing their children home to their parents to add to a family budget that was already sagging under the weight of the burden of “not enough”. I decided to “break free” and like Kunta Kinte, I ran. I ran and ran and ran but it seemed that wherever I went, poverty followed me. As a young wife and mother I struggled to run a household the way I had seen my mother run hers. Once I had my own household to run, I realized why sometimes she would not eat but only have a cup of coffee and a cigarette why the rest of the family consumed the food she had labored to provide. I understood that when we had fried chicken for dinner, she chose the chicken necks and backs as her portion. Every day the thought of how to get out of poverty was on my mind, so I reached for my dream.

I achieved the rank of Secretary after high school and worked in a very nice office. Looking back on my life then, I was still a “laborer”. It was only the location that had changed. The money that I brought home was never a’more than enough” and more than enough is what it will take to break the curse of poverty. So in the spirit of Kunta Kinte, I ran again. I ran as far away from my childhood experiences as I could. I joined the Air Force and took my first plane ride to Basic Training. In doing just that one thing, I had already exceeded the limitations of my ancestors and my siblings.

However, when your life is held in check by a generational curse that is passed on from generation to generation, no amount of running will help. It then became my mission to discover how to break the generational curse of poverty. 

Statistically speaking, we are not in keeping with the plans of God:

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This is not the future that God has planned for my generations of grandchildren. God wants his people to prosper. In fact, his word declares that he already has plans for us to prosper. There is a way out of Poverty and like Sojourner Truth and Harriet Tubman before me, I am bound to find it and once the path is clear, to return to the masses and lead captives to the Promised Land. I'm on the move again with a new business venture that promises to be "the way". Fear not. I'll be back for you.