Who is Ayaamina?

Aya ~

Akan Adinkra African Adinkra symbol which is a fern. It is a symbol of endurance and resourcefulness

Japan - design", "colorful" or "beautiful"

Arabic - miracle",or "verse

Turkish-Altaic mythology - The origin of the word comes from Ay ("moon" in Turkish). Ayaçı means "creative soul".

Amina ~

People with this name tend to be quiet, cooperative, considerate, sympathetic to others, adaptable, balanced and sometimes shy. They are trustworthy, respecting the confidences of others, and make excellent diplomats, mediators and partners. They are often very intuitive. They like detail and order, and often find change worrisome. They may sometimes feel insecure or restless.

People with this name have a deep inner desire to inspire others in a higher cause, and to share their own strongly held views on spiritual matters. Citation.

Where I'm coming from and where I'm going ~

I want some answers. I want to understand the elements of a problem so that I can create solutions which work. I really want my life decisions to be grounded in the experiences of my ancestors, family, friends and society. I want to learn to release what needs to be released from those experiences then build from the sturdy foundation which these experiences provide.

I grew up in the Caribbean until the age of 16 and then studied overseas on scholarship. I always knew I would move back home. In 2050, yes 2050, after ten years of living abroad and with much deliberation, I moved back home. It made so much sense at first, there was so much to love about living in the Caribbean. With all of the uprisings in the U.S. and the overall lack of access to the quality of life I wanted, the uncertainty of finding work was worth the risk of finding that perfect balance - work and play near to the ocean in the warm Caribbean! It was the perfect place to start my family, just as my mother did.

I was prepared that life wouldn't be like what I left 10 years ago. I thought I was ready to "Be Like the Water......" and adapt to changes as they come rather than be tossed and driven.

I was not ready to deal with the reality that although I thought moving home was going to be received with excitement, love and encouragement, I would actually spend a year defending why I would make such a crazy decision. And yes, I spent much of this time defending this decision to myself because of the arrogance and destructive oblivion I encountered both before making the move and after. I suppose underlying this arrogance and oblivion is fear and hurt. What has always been difficult for me to cope with is why people would try to hurt and instill hurt in anyone who is trying to do their best not to do any of the above.

My answer so far is that we have a lack of self-determination. Self-determination is a vehicle for healing from patterns of working from fear and the tendency to hurt others.

Why does moving back home seem crazy? Regardless of where you are from, you might be able to identify with this craziness. Reluctantly I am realizing that I returned to a home where the majority of people are sold on the idea that nothing is valid unless it comes from overseas or somewhere else other than home. Yet, these very people very easily resist ANYONE who is returning home after the realization that - ummm actually, there is so much to value and so many measures of validity right here where I come from.

I admit that this perspective may have came because I had the opportunity to leave, but I digress because that leads us to talk about priviledge. Depending on your perspective travelling or living overseas is a priviledge, for some people who feel as though they have to travel too much or missed out on the benefits of growing up in one place, NOT travelling is a priviledge. I do think that there is a way to gain valuable perspective from local experiences in a way which makes us aware of what is going on around the world and with respect to what is happening locally. That was the vision of my mum and that's why she started The School.

But, let's talk about priviledge later. No worries we WILL talk about priviledge because not talking about it means creating a cage through which the benefits of self-determination can never fullt penetrate. When last have you heard someone acknowledge their priviledge rather than use it to make someone feel lesser or worthy of the priviledged one's help? We need to deal with priviledge too as part of our ability to truly work from a place of clear definition of who and how we are, i.e. self-determination. Ok more on that later.

Do you say things like : We have so much talent here, there are so many opportunities here for "foreigners" to invest in. Well then why can't we who live here or who don't consider oursleves foreigners even though we live overseas, invest as well in this very talent, in this very valuable place. This is what I mean when I say - "actually there is so much to value and so many measures of validity right here where I come from".

Some of us may say making a shift from idealizing foreign opportunities to idealizing local opportunities is simply the reverse of what happened decades ago, it's just a matter of the grass always being greener on the other side. Decades ago, with the introduction of certain types of technology, we began to access our worlds differently and made the shift from idealizing local opportunities because we could now "see" foreign opportunties. So why wouldn't this shift to localization which counters mainstream ideals result in the same dissatisfaction and malfunction which "grass is always greener visionaries" always expereince? My answer is simple, the grass IS greener when you act local and resist being globally overhwhelmed. The grass has been greener throughout space and time. Visonaries in our history and currently all over the world have created stories by gaining perspective and recognizing the value of local solutions and overwhelmingly creating evidence in favour of there being one umbrella type of solution for all of the problems we see paraded on our favourite news station:

----------------------------- A defined and self-determined community -----------------------------

How is that community defined?

By working together as much as possible to create avenues for self-determination.

At the same time, we have to firmly decide not to support or travel through avenues which prevent self-determination.

Really, this is what it comes down to if we really want to remove this disdain we have for ourselves, our countries and this here Caribbean. Oh? We are proud huh, no disdain here..we are good? Really? Is that really the truth? I am firmly committed to unravelling the truth, question by question, solution by solution.