Koffee ChitChat
Koffee ChitChat
Resilience and Empowerment: Sharon Jones on Poetry, Heritage, and Healing
Join us for an enlightening discussion with Sharon Jones, a licensed psychotherapist and celebrated author, whose profound poetry captures the spirit of resilience and empowerment. Sharon weaves her heritage and the wisdom of her ancestors, like her fifth grandmother Scylla, into her latest book, "Bile”e Poetic Stream Across the Water Reflective Poems for the Soul." Her work addresses generational trauma and celebrates the strength of African-American women, drawing a poignant parallel to Kamala Harris's historical achievements. The deep connection to her roots and her grandmother's legacy offers listeners a unique perspective on healing and gratitude through the power of verse.
In this episode, Sharon sheds light on her poetic journey, one marked by the pursuit of peace and self-reflection. Her book, written with remarkable spiritual discipline, is a beacon of tranquility amidst today's chaos, offering solace through its 69 poems penned within a month. Inspired by her grandmother, Mama Honey, whose love for words transcended her illiteracy, Sharon's work is a testament to the enduring legacy of love and kindness. We explore how her cultural heritage from Bioko Island enriches her writing and how poetry serves as a tool for personal growth and spiritual alignment, nurturing a harmonious connection with others.
Hey y’all hey, don’t miss the next episode of Koffee Chitchat!!
Hey y'all. Hey, it's your girl, paula, with another exciting episode of Coffee Chit Chat. We have a friend of the show in the house today. Before we introduce our guest, let's shout out our coffee of the week, which is a caramel macchiato, which, of course, is my favorite. But y'all know Sharon, she is no stranger to the show and she is back on this milestone season to discuss her book of poetry called Ballet A, and I might have pronounced it wrong, but she will correct me when she starts. Sharon Jones is best known for providing support as a licensed psychotherapist for over 30 years. She recently received her spot as an Amazon number one bestselling. Co-author of International Day of the Girl, a Walk in the Life, pandemic Version, she is a beginning author, pouring out what she has learned through the years and recognizes as alabaster moments to the world. So welcome back, sharon. Welcome back. Let's discuss this awesome book of poetry.
Speaker 2:Yes, thank you for having me, Paula. I truly appreciate it.
Speaker 1:Oh, we are so excited to have you all the time and we know your book was released on August 26th and the name. What was your inspiration behind the name?
Speaker 2:I think the inspiration, first of all, is anything that I do. It's to foster healing or to invoke healing for people, and so the name is Bile'e Poetic Stream Across the Water Reflective Poems for the Soul. At this point in my life, my goal is for people to go deep into their soul and to find the healing that they need. So many people are suffering, so many people are worried, so many people are not living their lives. A lot of it comes from generational trauma, things that have happened years ago, and so many people come out of a history of being oppressed, being mistreated, having to leave their ancestral lands, their ancestral way of doing things, and so Belay Poetic Stream Across the Water Reflective Poems from the Soul really kind of comes back from my fifth grandmother, whose name was Scylla, who I believe was connected to Bioko Island as a booby woman, and so as I reflect and write poetry, I'm writing from probably the voice of Grandma Scylla, many years ago.
Speaker 1:I love that, I really do. And at least right to the next question, the book. What did the book ideas come from this particular book?
Speaker 2:Yes, it came out of my, my booby heritage and just thinking about previous grandmothers and what they had to go through, and I think it's very pivotal you know, we have an upcoming election not to be speaking politics. We have, for the first time in America, someone who identifies as African-American. But it wasn't always easy for African-American women and as I think of Grandma Scylla being enslaved on a ship, the uncertainty, the fear being moved away from her way of doing things, and so I think that this book is timely, you know, to empower women and to kind of give us that spirit of gratitude that things were not always easy. We may have found ourselves in places that we didn't know what to do, how to feel, did not understand.
Speaker 1:We didn't know what to do, how to feel, did not understand. Yeah, I love that how you were just relating it all back to your grandmother, and especially like the upcoming election with the African-American, south Asian lady who's actually, you know, a person of color. Years ago that probably was unheard of, no one would have know. Think about, think about our ancestors. You think that what would they be thinking, especially the women to see this today? You know, I'm like spectacular. It's a moment in history and I just wonder uh, what do you think? What do you think your ancestors like? Even the movie people would think of this, you know.
Speaker 2:I think that my ancestors probably are speaking and you know, I believe that you know the energy that people have, the thought energy that people have when they're alive. I think that the memories are in the soil and I have a poem in this book called the Memories in the Soil.
Speaker 2:I think memories are transferred from generation to generation. There is a particular code. You know the hopes and dreams as we release them. I don't think they go away. I think it just takes the right person to pick up those hopes and dreams and carry it forward. And so in this case, it's Kamala Harris. You know she. She's moving forward with power. That's what I had to do. They had to, in spite of they had to move forward with power. They couldn't give up because of what people were saying. They couldn't give up because they didn't look the right color. You know, they still had to move forward.
Speaker 1:I love it. I love it and can you describe, sort of like your, your writing process? Cause I know this is like I can't allow this camp, but I know that you have a lot of excellent books out there, from the Alibis Basta Moments to even your collaboration with other ladies. So how would you describe your writing process?
Speaker 2:I try to write from the spirit and I cultivate it. You know, if the spirit says, sharon, that's not the way you go, I have to be in alignment with it, and it can be about me or ego, or, you know, said, oh, I'm gonna make the people feel like that, it authentically have to come from the spirit, and it has to be a message or an intention from the spirit to reach the heart of people, Because what comes from the heart touches the heart, and so I believe that firmly. And so my writing process is to get up early in the morning.
Speaker 2:I think, that's the most fertile time to receive spiritual insight and encounters.
Speaker 2:And right before I go to sleep and that's something that my grandmother taught me many years ago she said Sharon and my grandmother's name was Mama Honey and she said if you want to ace every spelling test and I've shared this before my grandmother couldn't read or write, but she was a wise woman and a woman of wisdom.
Speaker 2:She said if you want to ace every spelling test and I've shared this before my grandmother couldn't read or write, but she was a wise woman and a woman of wisdom. She said if you want to pass every spelling test, write all those words out on a piece of paper, put it under your pillow before you go to sleep and you'll ace every test. So I followed her instructions and I aced every test. And at first I followed her instructions and I aced every test. And at first I was really in awe and amazement because I said, wow, I'm passing these tests. I was looking at my other, the other students in the class that was having such trouble, and they and the teacher kept saying Sharon got all A's on her spelling test. And I said it's that remedy that mama honey gave me.
Speaker 1:I know like we talked about, I think, in a previous episode, that mother yes.
Speaker 2:Yes, and it's that wisdom, the wisdom of the ages. It's the wisdom that helps me to write and to carry these messages forward.
Speaker 2:I never met some of the ancestors, but they're with me in spirit Cause still kind of feel that presence, yes, present, of ancestors and we got pulled away from that understanding of that knowing. But in africa, many people and many the value of the ancestors. Even in the booby culture the ancestors are held with such high regard because, if you just really think about it, they pave the way, they are the wisdom keepers. Ancestors are the wisdom keepers and if we quiet ourselves and I think just to begin to do, try to do right, that wisdom will come forth.
Speaker 1:That's deep, that quieting yourself. Sometimes we are just so, you know, chatter, chatter, chatter, that we don't take the time to just kind of be still, even when we pray to God. You know, I said we were asking and we were sending up all these prayers, but sometimes let him speak to us through our spirit as well. You know, before or after you finish praying, just sit there still and he'll speak to us as well. So I love that. Quiet the spirit. Yes, quiet, quiet the spirit. And what do you do, like when a new idea jumps out at you while you're still maybe working on something else? You know, maybe something you're trying to do at your job or another extracurricular, but another idea pops into your head. How do you handle that?
Speaker 2:I listen to the voice of God because I think God comes first and foremost, and I think that it is so busy to be caught up in chaos, but chaos is the breeding ground for something good happening and for change. If I, if I never, ever listened to God, I would have never written a book, because I'd have been walking in fear. I would have been saying, well, what if they don't like it? What if nobody purchased it? And so the God message to me is that it's not about the other people, it is about the message that you're bringing forth, and the message is for somebody. It might not even be for you, but you are the vessel in which this message is coming through. And so I don't worry, I listen to the voice of God. Even when it gets rocky and bumpy, I keep moving.
Speaker 1:Love it, love it. And what is your favorite part of being a writer? Love it.
Speaker 2:Love it. And what is your favorite part of being a writer? My favorite part of being a writer is interconnected with my favorite part of being a part of the healing arts.
Speaker 2:Being a healing arts practitioner, I love to help people find a new way and not be stuck in life. It's not uncommon for a person to go through life and have not experienced anything, haven't experienced the beauty of nature, the beauty of going to a different place, traveling, the beauty of learning new information that takes them to a new reality, the beauty of love and connecting with family and fostering that. And so a book can open you up where a family member can. You might look in a book and believe what's in a book before you believe your own family member or your parents, and so I use it as a way to open the heart of people and to cultivate the heart and to bring forth the very best in people I love that because I hear a lot of people who say that they might not have traveled and to cultivate the heart and to bring forth the very best in people.
Speaker 1:I love that because I hear a lot of people who say that they might not have traveled a whole lot as children or even as adults, but they take their favorite book, or a variety of books, and it's like they're traveling the world because they're just, you know, living it through the lens of that book that they're reading.
Speaker 2:So, yes, I love that. I love that.
Speaker 1:So we know that your book came out on the 26th and the cover is just spectacular. But do you mind just reading a poem out of the book so the listeners can hear and make sure chit-chatters, y'all go and grab the book. It is on.
Speaker 2:Amazon. Yes, I'm just going to open up the book to a page and read whatever poem comes to. Okay, so it came to the poem Peace, oh, awesome. Remember when things were calm. Happiness was plentiful. You could experience it daily. It was sunny all the time. You could experience it daily. It was sunny all the time. Easily accessible. You could lie down, relax in the eye of the storm, in the hot bubbly springs, safe from all hurtful things. Watch the waves, enjoy the mist on your face. Keep running a strong race, keep in a steady pace. See beautiful, empowering scenes, new realities, imagine different worlds, joy that shall never cease. Life becomes a jewel of wonderful time spent. You feel an energetic pull. The description of full peace.
Speaker 1:Oh, I love that. That was just awesome because, I promise you, while you were reading it just felt like I'm laying on the beach, you know, and the sun is shining and the waves are going and I'm just peaceful. I love that poem. I love it. That was awesome.
Speaker 2:Yes, and so I wrote 69 poems. We were speaking about the spirit and God, and so working a full-time job and multiple part-time jobs. I wrote 69 poems to share with the world poems to share with the world.
Speaker 1:I mean, that's a lot of poems in one book. Sometimes people have a problem writing 10 when you wrote 60 and a half. That speaks volumes, that poem On Peace, because what the world needs now is so much peace. It seems like it's just chaos. Every morning you wake up breaking news this and and this, and that one bomb, this one. So, uh, it's just to me, this book is just like right on time. It's coming, you know, uh, and when you need that peace and joy and that relaxation, grab the book.
Speaker 2:Yes, I'll read another one. Okay, and this one is called Never Rise. I am speaking. Are you aware? Do you even care? Do you see me? Are you aware? Are you just caring on externally? Are you Putting on a show that no one is watching? No one cares, it is insignificant. What are you sharing? Have you walked into the stream? The rhythm of life, the alignment that helps you to seize your prize? Are you just existing, trying to find your way around the rocks, carrying on with your day, not knowing the place or time? Can you even hear the chime of the frequency of life? Are you ignoring me, the uncertainty that causes you to start all over again and never rise?
Speaker 1:oh, oh, wow. That's another excellent. Oh, sharon, these poems are just awesome, girl, I can't wait to get the book to keep reading and keep reading. I just love it, love it. And now, how long did it take you to write the 69 poems you know for this book to come to part?
Speaker 2:I would say a little over a month. Okay.
Speaker 1:Okay, that's not bad, though I mean, that's working full time and you, you had a chance to write 69 poems.
Speaker 2:Oh my, and that's because I am obedient to the spirit and, you know, oftentimes I want to lay down and relax. But since I have, you know, rediscovered my identity, you know, as being a booby woman, being an island girl, and all of this, and as I always share, you know, my grandmother, mama, honey, couldn't read or write, and just like I shared with you about placing the words under your pillow and all of a sudden acing, all the text. When I was a young girl, my grandmother, she told me about a word. She said there's a word and it's pronounced island, she said, but it's spelled like is, it's pronounced like is I-S and land. And so this was me.
Speaker 2:I was a little girl, about three or four years old, and I remembered that.
Speaker 2:And so, when I began to learn more about my identity as being a booby woman, my ancestral land, bioko Island and of course that's the new name that they've given it it's really the land of Erie, and so just all of these DNA codes that are carried through oral story, and if you're tuned in, you'll remember them. And so I've always been a person that has tuned in to the spirit. Even as a little girl, I knew that there was something higher than myself. I knew that in life, out of life, you know the issues of the heart create this life. You know people be having outward anger, people hurting other people, people talking about other people having outward anger, people hurting other people, people talking about other people, people not trying to live in peace with other people, and so poetry helps you to reflect. And out of that reflection, it's not just to reflect, but it's to show some improvement in how you're treating other people, how you're treating yourself, how you're treating family, and so it's reconnecting you to your spirit.
Speaker 1:Absolutely love it, and we know that grandma honey is smiling day. Yes, yes, and with a name like honey, I'm sure she was sweet as pie.
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, you know she earned the name, and so that's another thing. What name are you earning? All right that's good.
Speaker 1:What name are you? Yes, that's awesome. So when you leave from here, people can say, oh, cheryl is a sweet person. I can't spirit up all. I have a heart for the people. That is the type of main things that we want to leave, you know, as a legacy. I know that's what I want to. I don't want people to know me as an angry or grouchy type person.
Speaker 2:I want them to remember me as a good person, you know, a person that had a heart for the people, and so that brings up Paula. I want to talk a little bit about the meaning of B'le'e, because it's a unique name to say, just like Barack. You know, b'le'e is a unique name, the funny name. Yeah, it's like a funny name. So I want to just share a little bit about the meaning of Belay, and I'm going to read it right out of the book, because I put this in the book because I knew people were going to say well, what is that? You know what is going on with Sharon.
Speaker 2:So Belay is an essential name in the booby culture and the booby culture is connected to my maternal ancestry. The booby are the indigenous people of Achula Eri, formerly known as Fernando Po, known today as Bioko Island. Bioko is in the Bight of Biafra, gulf of Guinea, equatorial Guinea, bifara, gulf of Guinea, equatorial Guinea. So in the Bube language, ibobe, which is the name of the language, it means tender love, caring, a stream of life, fountain of grace. The name Bileye is significant, just like palm oil is to the Bube culture. And the name Bileye resonates with me. You might say, well, why are you using it? It resonates with my soul because it embraces my purpose of helping others live and breathe better in life. I always try to keep a positive spirit by bubbling with hope and possibility, and I know it is essential to extend grace to other people.
Speaker 2:The name Belay is personal because it links me to my identity. We all have to have an identity. It also links me to my people's customs, their traditions, their rites of passage and spirituality. So there's power in a name, and so names are not to be taken lightly. Even sometimes people name their kids just something that has a negative meaning. But you have to be intentional about naming things. You know how they say in the baptist church paula, you have to name it and claim it. So what you want to claim something good.
Speaker 1:Exactly I like that and it means love. And then you capture all of the customs and the traditions of the people and you're so correct on making sure that when you name a child that you know the meaning. I think sometimes people name their child not really have did the research, so they don't understand or even know what that means. So I love that you have brought that point out. Yes, so I love it, love it. So now we're going to ask you how can our listeners follow you?
Speaker 2:Well, I'm new to all of this, but I do have a Facebook page, alabaster Moments, and I also have a Facebook page, alabaster Spirit, that I think I use the most. So I would say those two ways. And I have a website, with information as well, that I'm always trying to improve and do the right thing on, which is alabastermomentscom. So, if you want to check out what I do, I am a practitioner of the healing arts, a licensed therapist.
Speaker 1:I love it, love it and y'all. This is all my chit-chatters that are in Facebook. The Coffee Chit-Chat Facebook group is in there. I actually shot it out, her book, on september 26th, so go check it out and we will put it in again, again and again because, um, this book of poetry can be very healing to the soul. You know, when you just need maybe just a a break during the day, your lunch break, pull out that book of poetry and that can can be just like really healing for your soul. Okay, thank you.
Speaker 2:Hold on. Let me read one more.
Speaker 1:Let me close it out with one more poem. Yes, ma'am, that'll be our quote of the week. How about that?
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, let's close it out with one more poem. Okay, and this poem is called Medicine. Okay, as I move in life, I am in the flow or I am out of the loop. At times, my life is in synchronicity. Sometimes I ask questions, looking for answers to what it means to be. Sometimes I'm surrounded. The energy is positive. I am convinced of that. I need to reconnect more. On the inside, a lot is going on, draining my power. No lights are shining. I must fight to stay strong. I must move away from what could have been. I need to create a new medicine.
Speaker 1:Love it. So guys, listen to that poor medicine. Medicine for the soul, I love it. Thank you so much, Sharon Chit Chatters. Make sure you tune in next week for another exciting episode of Coffee Chit Chat.
