Today we’d like to introduce you to Cassandre Davis.
Cassandre, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
My story is much like the story of Black women my age in America. I was born to loving parents who instilled principles of hard work and discipline based on their understanding of the world. My parents are immigrants from Haiti who left their homeland to thrive in the United States. Their desire for more has always pushed me to achieve, often with a pursuit of perfection.
As a primarily straight-A student through middle school, high school, and college, I was under the false notion that life was a formula of simply hard work yielding results. I eventually found out that hard work also sometimes left me spent, tired, in poor relationships, and without the things that weren’t always obvious, like peace of mind, internal validation, self-affirmation, and knowledge of my worth.
However, because I always looked the part of academic and professional success, I didn’t fit the profile of someone in distress. I went through many years of my life checking boxes, like a career as an engineer for a global fortune 500 company, a dutiful member of my Baptist church, a loving girlfriend, an administrator in the family business, a model teacher, and a present, never-forget-a-birthday family member. It wasn’t until I realized these roles and my self-imposed demands were suffocating me did my life begin to develop into this present-day work of love, gratitude, and growth. I know this is a pretty intense answer to your question, but I feel it is important to talk about the parts of my life that really shaped who I am. Like most, it wasn’t just one thing, but a multitude of decisions culminating in an ebb and flow of self-discovery.
My life has been a series of great, poor, selfish, selfless, emotional, logical, self-sabotaging, and self-loving decisions and events. I have a million specific stories of the ins and outs of these decisions and events, but you would need several books to lay it all out. The point is this: I started out on the path most believe is the “right” way: academic excellence, hard work, professional accolades and financial success to what I now know is the right way for me – living in the flow of God, doing the right work, dedication, and belief in the process of creating the best version of myself. It took me a long time to realize I have a responsibility to not only be of service to others, but I must also be of service to myself. Often, as Black women in America, we are taught to be strong and push forward, without considering the toll this drive/passion/force can take on us. I now know, I must exercise love and compassion for myself. Without this starting place, I won’t fully be able to be the person I am destined to be.
Has it been a smooth road?
Absolutely not. I have struggled with overextending myself, self-doubt, economic hardships, broken friendships, and abusive relationships, just to name a few. I will give you an example. Several years back, when the housing market was booming, around 2003/2004, I was in my mid-twenties and had successfully purchased and flipped two homes in Florida. I was currently living in my third property and was renting my fourth property. When the market fell apart, like many others, I lost my rental property and my own home was going into foreclosure. All of this happened within months. I went from supporting myself with two properties to barely being able to pay the mortgage for my primary property because I spent so much money trying to keep the rental property afloat. I was still subscribing to good principles of being honest and pushing through, even at my own demise.
Current day, I would have let the rental property go. At the time, I held on at my own detriment. Finding myself exhausted and losing this economic battle, I gave up. I let one house go into foreclosure and was bracing myself for my primary home’s path to the same fate. It was not until I truly let go and began working on my own mental and spiritual well-being did my life turn around. After several months, between a loving family member who argued with banks on my behalf and a global bailout effort, I was able to get back on my feet and keep my home. This home is now my present-day rental property as my family and I enjoy our new place of peace a few miles away. This is just one of the many ups and downs I have experienced. While painful, I am grateful for not only the outcome but the example I can lean on whenever I am troubled. I am reminded that everything will be ok, somehow or another, it will all be ok.
Please tell us about A Light for Girls.
My professional story begins in my role as a technology analyst roughly 20 years ago for a global fortune 500 technology company. I had recently graduated from THE Florida Agricultural & Mechanical University with a master’s degree in Industrial Engineering. While the pay was great, the role was unfulfilling. I decided to pursue my original passion of teaching. I worked as a classroom teacher for a little over ten years. In my time as a teacher, I saw the need for mentorship of young people, specifically young girls. This need prompted the creation of a school-based mentoring program, which ultimately led to the creation of my business, A Light for Girls.
A Light for Girls is a movement whose mission is to empower and educate through various bodies of work such as books, professional development for educators, and motivational and information workshops for all persons who are responsible for supporting the mind, body, and souls of young girls. The first text entitled, Girls Talk… But Can She Talk to You, How to Effectively Communicate with Our Girls, focuses on ways to create and sustain relationships with young women. Often, parents, caretakers, mentors, and teachers desire to support young women, but don’t always know how. Sometimes mentors need mentors. The information in the book serves as a guide on ways to show love and sustain a relationship without criticism and judgement.
A Light for Girls also specializes in speaking engagements around topics such as gender-responsive programming, culturally responsive teaching, and mentoring. I am known for my point-of-view. The words I hear most are, “I never thought of it that way.” For example, in my book, Girls Talk… But Can She Talk to You, I explain why I have not pierced my daughter’s ears: “I made the decision to raise my daughter as close to her natural state as possible until she decides differently. This declaration may not seem like a big feat at my daughter’s age (she is two), but I got the side-eye more times than I could count when people realized I had not pierced her ears.
The conversation usually went something like this:
A WOMAN: Oh, she is so cute!
ME: Thank you! I helped make her.
A WOMAN: When are you going to pierce her ears?
ME: Oh, I’m not. She can do it when she wants it.
A WOMAN: What! Why not?
ME: Because she is beautiful and those are not my ears to pierce. What if she doesn’t want her ears pierced?
A WOMAN: That’s just ridiculous. Why wouldn’t she want her ears pierced?
ME: Do you know why you wanted your ears pierced or did someone pierce them for you?
Silence.
I am not against enhancements, like earrings or nail polish or makeup. I am against the idea that we are not beautiful unless we have these things. For argument’s sake, before someone says, “We are not saying she is not beautiful without these things,” when did you give her a chance to feel beautiful without these enhancements?
I want my daughter to know she has been beautiful since we prayed for her existence. This principle of self-contained, natural beauty and value should be the basis and foundation for everything else in our girls’ lives. If our girls knew their beauty and worth, they would not do anything—and I mean anything—to take away from their value.
Girls Talk… But Can She Talk to You? P. 22 – 23
This perspective (and what I am most proud of) is what sets me apart from others. I am constantly checking my understanding of people and how I interact with and support others. The more I get to know people, the more I realize how complex we really are. Not much is simply black and white, which is sometimes difficult for me to grasp from the engineer’s side of my being, but my doctorate in Education and life experience constantly reminds me of the need to learn more and evaluate what isn’t obvious, but extremely relevant.
How do you think the industry will change over the next decade?
We are slowly but surely growing. Women’s movements like Me Too and Time’s Up are helping to put our issues and concerns in the national spotlight. Hopefully, people will continue to be interested in what women and young girls need to be successful and healthy. I will be part of the conversation and service to our girls and women.
Pricing:
- Girls Talk… But Can She Talk to You? How to Effectively Communicate with Our Girls by Cassandre Davis, Ed.D. $20.00
Contact Info:
- Website: alightforgirls.com
- Email: alightforgirls@gmail.com
- Instagram: @alightforgirls
- Facebook: A Light for Girls
Image Credit:
AJ Shorter
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