Your favorite athletes are budding venture capitalist

Kobe Bryant has finally revealed what he'll be doing with all his time now that he's retired from the NBA. He's partnered with Jeff Stibel to form Bryant Stibel in which he's now a venture capitalist. The two have been actively investing in separate projects since 2013 but has partnered to officially form their firm based out of Los Angeles with a combined $100 million dollars looking to invest in technology, media and data which in today's market is pretty much all investor capitalist are looking for. Kobe joined the ranks of other athletes such as Carmelo Anthony and Steph Curry who have been known to invest in start up ventures but remain silent about their involvement.

How to Change the World

If you want to change the world go home and love your family.  Wiser words have never been spoken in my opinion. We see such horrible atrocities occurring throughout the world and often we feel helpless in preventing such things but the truth is all of these horrible things are done by people who have been wounded in their own lives in some sort of way. If you've never been hurt by someone you love, you're less likely to out into the world and hurt those who you love. So the simplest form of making an impact on the world is to simply love those around you to the best of your ability so that they too can go out into the world and spread the love they have experienced.

Let's start with self love. I believe in self affirmations that uplift. If you're not hearing the words your soul needs to hear then you say them to yourself while looking in the mirror at least 3 times per day. It really does work.  If you love and value yourself, you're less likely to let people into your circle who negatively impact your life. You'll have less patience for the bullshit because at your core, you'll understand and will be able to recognize who feeds your spirit and who sucks the spirit out of you.

Thankful Monday

I swear I woke up today not wanting to face the conflicts that I knew were awaiting me but through it all I'm thankful. Mondays are dreadful to think about on Sunday around 3pm. LOL But I'm thankful for what I have because it could definitely be a lot worse. Despite my mixed emotions on this Monday morning I am grateful and I've learned to not let the things I cannot change alter my emotional state but it's hard. It's difficult to not let the pressures of all those external factors impact how you feel but you must remain level headed and continue to do your personal best while understanding that you'll get through whatever hurdles life throws at you. Appreciate yourself, your family and your peace of mind and learn how to control your emotions with these simple steps.

My Experiences as a Black Women in IT

It's been 8 years now that I've in IT and I've always heard stories about the lack of black IT talent as

well as stories about the lack of women in IT so I would like to add my own perspective on it. When I originally started in IT, I was recruited within the company that I worked for by a black IT manager and a Pilipino women who was fairly new to the department and I was her resource. At the time she supported the department in which I worked and relied on me heavily for assistance to complete her task so they recruited me and I've been in IT ever since. My reason for providing the historical data was to show that I was recruited by people of color based on my skillset and since then, I've continued in the field and I have participated in a group for Women in IT for a large organization which found that women start in IT but for various reasons, end up out of the field entirely. For people of color, the statistics are far worse because the induction into the field doesn't even occur.