On the first day of February, I started drafting a Black History Month message with some progress updates on The Empowerment Experiment (EE). I wanted to give you some insights on how our life has changed since our year of living off Black business, tell you about how Kellogg has an outstanding team of researchers working on the historic study based on that journey, and promise you that the tour and a victory party are still in the works.
Last week I buried my mother. Everything I am and have been able to do - including my being a loving and devoted wife and mother, and including my conceiving and conducting The Empowerment Experiment - I owe to her. Her struggle with cancer took something from my whole family, and I have not been able to focus on EE as I would have liked.
So I write today, not to give you the project updates, but to send you love and strength. We will all need it if we are ever going to earn and create the justice and prosperity to which our people are entitled. She is just another fighter, another warrior, another teacher who went home before the battle was won. I will not disappoint her by living the easy and excuse-filled life. I am stronger than that and I hope you are too.
Each and every one of us can support a Black business everyday. Each and every time we do, we show our children and the world how special we are. Each and every penny we spend can contribute to resolving our community's social, educational, and health problems.
As far as updates are concerned, know that I am still trying to raise the money to make finding and supporting quality Black businesses easier for all of you. I am still working on ways to get more VIPs, celebrities, academics and community leaders to be more vocal about our economic empowerment. So don't give up on EE. And EE will never give up on you.
Please show your support at www.EEforTomorrow.com.
Please understand if we have not responded to your notes and emails.
We will get back to the good work very soon.
My mother was born in Cuba. She spoke Spanish. She taught me to fight for the less fortunate. She taught me to defend the poor and the exploited. She taught me to be smart and strong. Till the very end, she always said, "Lucha!” That means ‘to try’, ‘to struggle’, ‘to fight’.
Lucha!
Maggie Anderson
Founder, The Empowerment Experiment
