You may have seen this news on IG or via my other email list, but...I’m speaking at ESSENCE Fest! Yes, THE ESSENCE FESTIVAL OF CULTURE 2026! On not one stage, but two! A biiiig pinch me moment.

It’s wild that I get to say this. I’ve been in the media game for a looong time, but mostly in my own lane, swimming consistently as I follow a mission I’ve had since day one: share Black women’s stories. I’ve never looked for accolades or public recognition (possibly to my own detriment), just being a steward of this community has been rewarding enough. But then moments like this happen, when people outside of the world you’re building start to notice what you got going on and decide to give you a bigger platform. It feels good. I’m reminded that there is value in my perspective, and people would benefit from hearing my learnings. , I’m grateful for you and the NV Fam for seeing me and encouraging me.

The way I plan to milk this opportunity, you’d think I was a farmer with an udder in front of me. Business cards printed, a rush small batch of Black Women In Bloom on the way, and my networking agenda is shaping up. Will you be in New Orleans? Reach out, I’d love to connect!

Now on to this week’s story…

Take care,

Anayo Awuzie
EIC of Carefree Mag

I’m Coming To Terms With My Appearance Through My Ancestor, Queen Haley

by Andrea Blackstone

When I was a little girl, my Black father encouraged me to play in the sun. 

I dug in brown dirt while running free and bare-chested under beams of hot light. As I grew older, I was restricted to the protocol of wearing t-shirts, and threats of burned skin when the sun I loved proved too strong for me to endure unprotected. I sought out treetops and shade simply because basking in the glory of warmth too long came with a price.

Although my skin darkened, pain wrapped itself around me. I was unsure why my father kept telling me to get some sun, but Dad was my hero. If he urged me to do something, the advice must have been good for me. I kept playing in the sun until sunburn became a rite of passage. Then I grew to feel as though I looked better because I regarded dark skin as wonderfully made. In time, I envied ebony eyes and dusky hues. To me, my olive skin was not enough like my father’s. As a daddy’s girl, I wanted to be exactly like him. And on top of that, other people began to point out that I simply wasn’t. 

Pre-order Carefree Magazine’s limited edition coffee table book featuring 30+ stories from Black women across the diaspora. Get your copy 🌸

One time in elementary school, another little Black girl peered into the parts of my sectioned hair, informing me and others that my scalp looked lighter than theirs. One by one, the schoolmate compared hues of our peers, pointing out differences I never cared to notice. The ugliness of colorism began to pollute the innocence of youth. This strange experience unfolded as we waited to purchase lunch in a cafeteria line in elementary school. It foreshadowed episodes of intra-racism. On the other end of the spectrum, bold comments were unleashed by others who did not look like me, simply because I was given a partial pass to hear how discriminatory others could be. Noting differences was force-fed to me, although I could care less.

Over the years, poisonous words kept creeping into my personal space from many angles. I recall rude names being hurled my way such as light “bright” and “pale,” but I was also called “Kunta Kinte.” Although I knew that the name wasn’t an insult, laughter that bellowed from kids’ mouths made me feel embarrassed in the very town where Kunta Kinte was said to have arrived in America.

My uncle—Alex Haley—had written “Roots” by then. I was teased because I was his niece. The irony was that my late mother, Lois Ann Haley, was my uncle’s half-sister. Mom was undoubtedly proud of her brothers—Alex, George, and Julius. My grandmother, Zeona Haley, was the boys’ stepmother. My mom shared a father in common with her brothers, but was not related to them through Kunta Kinte. Simon Haley was the DNA link. His daughter inherited many physical traits from him.

When she was a young girl, some individuals advised my grandmother to teach my mother to pass for another race, but my mother openly welcomed her Blackness. She married a man who appeared to be her opposite. My father’s broad nose and rich melanin were my mother’s symbolic Black fist hoisted in the air. She stepped out of the box and married a visibly Black man who did not share the privilege of having two parents who were college professors. 

When my mom was a child, her mother and father worked at small, historically Black colleges. Simon was a professor of agriculture, and Zeona was an English professor. Although they did not make much money in their professions, prestige did accompany their education. Mom sat on a piano bench practicing her musical craft at home, in addition to diving into her studies. At some point, she attended Catholic school. My mother was groomed to succeed. She became a music teacher who specialized in piano. On the other hand, my father fought tirelessly to uplift himself through the military. He achieved the rank of Staff Seargent after receiving munitions training and being assigned to a dangerous job such as loading bombs on aircraft in a segregated era. 

Subscribe now

I opted to live with my father when my parents divorced. Countless people often remarked how much I began to look like my mother. Others questioned my relationship to my dad. Over time, I was forced to understand our differences in appearance. I quietly developed empathy for the way some people stereotyped my father. His broad shoulders and visibly Black features led some to draw presumptuous conclusions about him. 

I sat quietly once as a policeman made Dad walk in a straight line and count backwards, simply because he forgot to turn on his car lights after leaving a gas station. I sat frozen with fear for hours as the event unfolded. I wished I could have hit stop on a permanently recorded bad memory. All Dad could do was comply with the order as I sat in the car pondering why many people in the world seemed to treat my parents differently.

Regardless, I was a blend of two worlds. My hair was thick and wild. It was a mixture of every race that filled my bloodlines. It left me in tears most days because even my mother never figured out how to properly tame it. And when I grew older, I covered my confusion with braids and sometimes sewn hair weaves. I just wanted perfect hair—even perfectly kinky would’ve been okay—so long as it reflected one side of my DNA. On top of it all, I was unusually thin with long limbs like stretched string beans. 

At many turns, I struggled with my Blackness. One way I tried to learn more about it was by attending the same HBCU dad did. My presence was marked by pride and difficulty. Some girls threatened to beat me up. Others assumed that I was stuck up because of my appearance. I cried nearly every night for a year straight and even considered transferring because of this. A few caring mentors led me to stay put. I learned to thrust myself into my studies and feel grateful for the few friends who accepted me as I was. It became good enough. These girls introduced me to sisterhood. If color or size ever came up, it never divided us. We simply loved each other as people. And that is a beautiful element of true, Black sisterhood.

But one day the topic of Alex Haley’s “Queen” came up in one of my classes. The movie, starring Halle Berry, began to air on television. When a discussion brewed about the portrayal of the biracial enslaved woman who portrayed Alex Haley’s grandmother, I openly revealed my identity as her great-granddaughter for the first time. I inherited my small stature and lighter hue from her. Queen was a mixture of Black, Cherokee, Scottish and Irish. Like many, I too was a close descendant of a plantation daughter. 

My mother displayed Queen’s picture in her living room atop a glass side table near my grandfather’s photograph. She began to share more about her with me after the movie aired. I took this as a collective sign to untangle my longstanding confusion over my identity. I always acknowledged my Blackness, but it also forced me to face other parts of myself. Seeing Queen’s struggles portrayed on-screen helped me to heal and further shape my identity.

Today, I still can’t blow dry my own hair. My partner is teaching me many Black rites of passage Mom never could. And when I peer in the mirror understanding that a Confederate colonel’s blood also runs through my veins, all I can do is accept that knowing my family history is a mixed bag of joy and sorrow. Queen’s father points out the irony of racial discrimination. Like it or not, we are not simply one race or another, even if the premise causes a segment of the population discomfort.

I no longer worry if I act, sound, or look Black enough. The days when I consumed weight gainer and thousands of calories, then lifted heavy weights at the gym just to pack on pounds to look more like a Black woman are behind me. I merely kept fifteen extra pounds above my natural weight and gave up on owning classic sisterly assets. When people tell me how thin I am today, it no longer stings. I think of Queen and how she inspired me to embrace who God made me to be. Confidence makes people back off and see beyond the superficial.

My ancestor inspires me to keep going, even when life gets hard or I simply feel awkward. When my mom took her last breath, I took the same photo of Queen she once displayed and placed it in my care. I now look at it daily, using this woman to inspire me to keep going, no matter how discouraged I feel. If she could raise my grandfather and other children who made something great of themselves, I must strip down my inadequacies to nothingness and push until change comes. My grandfather’s mother was once enslaved, yet she played a role in producing an architect, a lawyer who also served as an ambassador, a Pulitzer Prize-winning author, and an accomplished music teacher. 

My father’s DNA left marks of spunk and industriousness within me. Dad shut his eyes a final time during the pandemic. He helped to shape my identity, too. We did not always get along, but when I watched my father lay in a hospital bed through a screen, I felt proud of the lessons he gave me. I now realize that embracing my multicultural blood does not mean that I deny the genetic gifts of my father. It simply means that I no longer must prove who I am. I’m finally free to unapologetically be me. 

Now, when my skin drinks the sun rays at the beach, I revisit my father’s attempt to help me embrace my Blackness. But all along, I already did. Knowing where I come from is all I ever truly needed.

Leave a comment

Andrea Blackstone is a mother, award-winning journalist, media consultant, and author who resides in Virginia. She has worked as a freelance writer for community newspapers and digital publications, including Black Enterprise. Her professional passion is telling undertold stories. Blackstone also participates in contributing content to @alexhaleyfamily on Facebook. In her spare time, supporting veterans and embracing healthy living are some of her hobbies. You may find her @blackstoneandrea on Instagram.

by Brianna Doe

I remember sitting at the kitchen table telling my parents I wanted to major in Film & Media Studies.

I was 16, only a few months into my freshman year of college. My mom looked at me like I’d said I wanted to join the circus. My dad just stared at me and got quiet, the kind of quiet where you know they’re doing math in their head. And the math ain’t mathing.

To understand what that moment meant in my house, you have to meet my family. My mom immigrated to the States, from Jamaica, with her mom and brothers when she was a child. My dad’s family immigrated to the U.S. from Liberia. To a great extent, they left everything behind so their future family could have more options. And by options, they meant stable ones. Good ones. Specifically, the kind that come with a benefits package and a title your aunties can brag about at church.

My siblings got the memo, of course. My sister went into accounting, and my brother studied urban planning before graduating and transitioning into campus ministry. And then there was me. The film student.

Subscribe now

I was serious about it, though! I wanted to write screenplays. I’ve always loved storytelling—the power of it, the way you can build a world and walk someone through it. It wasn’t a phase or just a placeholder while I figured out something more practical.

By junior year, most of my Honors College friends had dropped out to build nonprofits or chase their own thing. I was still in it, still studying film, and on track to graduate with that degree.I’d been doing photography since high school, and by college, it started opening doors I didn’t expect. Friends would ask me to shoot content for them, and then I’d end up looking at their nonprofits’ social channels and thinking, “This could be so much better.” So I’d help. I started studying graphic design, paid advertising, and the basics of marketing in my free time. Then I’d tweak their pages, put together posts, and think about how to actually get people to pay attention. And I was weirdly good at it.

I still graduated with my film degree. No marketing coursework, no business classes, and nothing on my transcript that said “this person knows how to build a brand!” aside from a few freelance clients I’d picked up along the way. But I knew, and I wanted to chase it.

Except I had no idea how to actually… chase it. I was painfully aware of the fact that I didn’t have the internships everyone else seemed to stack up by junior year. And my mom, as much as she loved me, couldn’t coach me through this side of corporate America. I didn’t know what a “sponsor” was. I barely understood mentorship as a concept beyond something vague that successful people mentioned in interviews.

So for about ten years, I just… figured it out. I took roles that didn’t make sense on paper, said yes to things I shouldn’t have, and said no to things that scared me even when I knew they were right. I also made mistakes that people with better guidance would’ve sidestepped entirely. It was messy and inefficient, and it worked, eventually.

But the whole time, I was carrying a feeling I couldn’t quite name yet. “Imposter syndrome” is the shorthand, but for me it had layers. When you’re first-gen, it’s not as simple as wondering, “Ddo I belong in this room?” It’s more like, “Did”did I waste the sacrifices my parents made to get me here?” It’s also looking around at colleagues who had mentors and family connections and summer internships at 14, and realizing you started the race a mile behind everyone else.

And then there was the family of it all. I was the youngest, but I was also the “good kid,” which sounds like a compliment.

It’s not.

It means you’re the one everyone expects to get it right. You set a standard nobody asked you to set, and now you can’t drop it. When your career path is the one that makes the least sense to the people who love you most, that pressure compounds. Every holiday, and every family gathering, there’s a version of “Sso, what exactly do you do again?” that lands differently when you know your parents gave up everything for you to have a clear answer to that question.

But I figured it out. Now in my thirties, I own a marketing agency. I have a podcast and newsletters and a book. I’m all-in on entrepreneurship, and I love it. Even the hard days and challenging moments. I love the work, I love the team I’ve built, and I love that I get to wake up every day and do creative work that actually means something to me. I’m not out here grinding miserably and romanticizing hustle culture. This is the life I wanted.

And it’s because I love it that I can see it for what it is: a choice. One of many, but not the only one, and not always the right choice.

So I’m sure you think I’d be one of those people on your timeline telling you to quit your job and “just bet on yourself!!”.

I’m not.

I spent years in corporate environments where people kept trying to fix the parts of me that didn’t fit their ‘template.’ I was too direct. Then I was too quiet. I couldn’t pick a lane. And honestly, some of that feedback was fair. I did need to get better at advocating for myself and articulating my impact. But a lot of it had nothing to do with growth. My personality just made someone uncomfortable, or maybe my communication style didn’t match what they were used to seeing.

The hardest thing I had to learn was how to tell the difference between “I need to grow” and “I need to go.” Those are two very different problems, and confusing them cost me years.

But that realization didn’t mean corporate was the enemy. It meant I was in the wrong seat. That distinction really matters, especially because the internet loves to skip right past it. Everyone loves the leap. They love the “I walked out of the office, launched my business, and never looked back” story. But not everyone wants the leap. Some people want a slower shift. Some people want more clarity before they move. And some people don’t want to move at all. Maybe they love their work, or love being able to unplug on the weekends. Or maybe they just enjoy having benefits and a steady paycheck (so valid, truly).

I think a 9-5 can be beautiful. I think there’s absolutely nothing wrong with working for someone else, if the work fills you up and you still have energy left to live your actual life.

The internet has this obsession with entrepreneurship as the only legitimate path, and I think it’s doing real damage, especially to Black women who would thrive in a structured environment if they just gave themselves permission to want that. It just has to be the right environment.

Quitting your job is risky. So is staying in one that drains you. Juggling a side hustle and a 9-5 could burn you out. So could going all-in on entrepreneurship with no safety net. There’s risk everywhere. That’s not the issue. The issue is pretending one path is automatically safer or more worthy than the others.

Along the way, I realized that the question I had to answer for myself wasn’t “should I start a business or stay in corporate?” It was “do I even know what I want? Or am I chasing what I think I’m supposed to want?”

That took years to untangle. I had to stop measuring my career against people who had completely different starting points and safety nets. I had to accept that nonlinear doesn’t mean broken.

In my 20s, I defined success as a CMO title and a corner office at some flashy company. Now, all I want is a business and a life I don’t feel like I need an escape from. A few years ago, I would’ve thought that sounded boring. Now I think it might be the most ambitious dream I’ve ever pursued.

But at some point I chose to accept that I only had 0.1% of this figured out, and then I realized that other people felt the same way. The book that came out of that process surprised me. I thought I was writing a strategy guide, and instead I ended up writing about imposter syndrome, identity, and what happens when you stop letting other people’s definitions of success run your life. Turns out that was the book I needed to write. Maybe because it was the one I needed to read ten years ago.

I still have days where imposter syndrome shows up and I have to remind myself I earned what I have. I still catch myself comparing my path to people who had a decade of mentorship before they ever sent a cold email. But I don’t let that run the show anymore. I’ve learned to sit with the discomfort of being different and keep building anyway.

You don’t have to blow up your life to build one that fits. Sometimes the most radical thing you can do is stay , and make it yours.

Leave a comment

Brianna Doe is the Founder & CEO of Verbatim, a top-ranked influencer marketing agency based in Phoenix, Arizona, and the co-creator of Let Her Cook, a growing media platform for ambitious women founders and creatives. Known for her smart, relatable perspective on leadership and digital culture, Brianna has been recognized as the #1 Influencer Marketing CEO in Phoenix and has led strategy for over 30 top LinkedIn creators through her role at Wishly Group. Through her platforms, Let Her Cook, and This Could’ve Been an Email, she’s cultivated an audience of over 244K followers and 100K newsletter subscribers, reaching professionals and creatives nationwide. Her debut book, The Unapologetic Professional, challenges readers to define success on their own terms.

Hey y’all,

Wow. Y’all ain’t playing no games! We received over 150 submissions for our pitch call, and the wild part? The form is still open for another 5 days. Girl, get in there. But y’all know we only publish one story a week, right? 😅 I would love to publish as many as possible, but alas, it’s just not possible. If you submitted and don’t get accepted, please know it’s most likely due to lack of space on the editorial calendar. We’ll be working our way through these over the next few weeks, and I know there’s heat in here—can’t wait to get into it.

Also, for those following along on the self-publishing journey, we hit our pre-order goal!! Black Women in Bloom has sold over 100 copies, and we’re on the way to our next goal of 200! You can still get in on the pre-order here! I paused Self-Pub Diaries for now because it wasn’t clear if people were actually interested in that content, but let me know if you want to learn how we hit the first 100. I’m sharing more of the behind the scenes on IG and Threads these days.

Anyway, enough of me yappin’. If you’re in NYC, I’m peak jealous of the legendary summer you’re about to have. Go SPORTS!

This Week’s Story

An exploration we don’t shy away from at Carefree is how Black women are experiencing faith, spirituality, and religion. Whether staunchly committed to a certain religion or foregoing faith altogether, many of us have grappled with what it means to believe in some form or another. In this week’s essay, writer Patience Mutsetse analyzes her struggles with being a Black Christian woman trying to find community in a religion that seems fervently smug in making sure women remain disempowered.

Enjoy the read!

Take care,

Anayo Awuzie
EIC of Carefree Mag

On Finding My Tribe As a Black Christian Woman in the Digital Age

by Patience Mutsetse

Being a reserved woman is one thing, but being a young Black introverted Christian woman is an entirely different experience. As a young Black woman of faith and a firm believer of women’s empowerment, I’ve spent over a decade navigating the complexities of patriarchal church structures. Often, I’ve felt like I didn’t quite fit into traditional church spaces.

Growing up in church as an introverted Black girl, l was one of the quietest in all my Sunday school classes. I was adored by most of my teachers, probably because by nature l was docile and well-behaved. Every Sunday, I showed up with my homework complete, quietly settled in class, and always passed my tests. There was no crazy group of friends who could negatively influence my behavior. l never interrupted any of my teachers with class clownery or posed difficult questions for the sake of debating them.

Subscribe now

Given the family I was born into, my behavior was normal. It was expected of me. I was raised by a very gentle, respectful, and collected woman. My grandmother was a typical Christian; she had more acquaintances than friends, and she was never a fan of gossip, small talk, or drama. She highly regarded church as the ultimate place for prayer, worship, and word with no additives.

I grew up just the same—a young lady who rarely spoke about or questioned anything out of my capacity. I was comfortable leading that life until l became a young adult. With age comes a different level of maturity, one that forces you to be more critical and analytical about social issues. l began to question things I didn’t understand instead of blindly accepting them. I began to notice the status of women in church. There were barely any women on the pulpit, let alone any who would speak to issues affecting women.

I had read and heard several stories about the mighty women of God in the Bible. Countless times during Sunday School class, we were tasked with narrating the stories of Deborah, Ruth, Esther, Mary, and other typical anecdotes of women who didn’t let their personal experiences or beliefs define or determine their status in society. Women who positively impacted the social, cultural, economic, and political trajectories of their families and broader communities.

But in my contemporary church, l could barely correlate fearless women like a Deborah or a Ruth to any of the female leaders in our congregation, less a couple of vibrant women l had met here and there. Their fire for God could be easily tamed by their belief of where a woman ought to remain in a patriarchal society. My idea of a powerful, charismatic, and anointed female pastor was preconceived by white televangelists such as Joyce Meyer.

I began to long for sermons by Christian ministers for the Christian girlies. Sermons that could make me feel seen and heard as a woman seeking God in a modern world of billions of souls. Platforms that could make me believe l was not demonic for being passionate about the empowerment of women in church. When l stumbled onto YouTube clips like, “Women with Issues and Tissues,” it made me understand the depth of the void that was within me.

Subscribe now

There are a myriad of issues Black women in the church face, like the shame associated with the pressure to marry and stigma surrounding prolonged singleness, or feelings of inadequacy related to infertility, barrenness, or pregnancy loss, or low self-esteem resulting from racialized beauty standards and stereotypes. We can also talk about expectations to be the “strong Black woman,” underrepresentation in church leadership and decision-making roles, the marginalization of Black women’s voices in theological discussions and ministry contexts and lack of mentorship, visibility and representation in leadership and teaching roles. Just to name a few.

The irony is that Black women are often the spiritual backbone of many congregations. Black women are often among the most faithful and active members of the church, leading prayer groups, teaching children, organizing events, sustaining congregations through service, and frequently outnumbering men in attendance. Despite their unwavering commitment and labor, many remain relegated to secondary roles, excluded from key leadership and decision-making spaces. Consequently, most of us are often inhibited from fully operating in our respective ministries because of sexism, misogynoir and institutional barriers that continue to limit our participation and influence.

My first entry point into my long search for a tribe of empowered Black Christian women was the movie War Room. Priscilla Shirer, the lead actress, became the first woman to answer my questions about the validity of seeing Black women lead in the Christian community. We need to see more women on the pulpit, for more women to boldly assume their respective positions in the body of Christ.

My lack of connection with the gatekeepers of patriarchy in my contemporary context has left me frustrated by the exclusion of women in matters that concern them. However, female preachers, like Priscilla Shirer, have been a light and have introduced a whole circle of Christian women into my purview. One being Sarah Jakes Roberts, a child marriage survivor, teen mom, divorcee, and s pastor who speaks with a fierce understanding of women’s daily struggles. Sermons like “Girl Get Up” by Roberts became foundational to my confidence in my identity as a Christian woman.

Our current digital era has introduced me to a whole tribe of Christian girlies. Through YouTube, Instagram, and TikTok, I’ve met women who are defying the odds for Christian women to be recognized, respected, and represented through the work, perspectives, and insights they share online. Communities like Women Evolve and To My Sisters Podcast helped me find a sense of belonging and connection among like-minded Black and Christian women. These digital spaces have provided a safe haven to discuss taboo topics, create meaningful relationships, and reconnect with myself.

Women Evolve, hosted by Pastor Sarah Jakes Roberts, has tackled critical topics around how, as women, we can claim our power and our worth; their work has made it possible to reconnect with the essence of who l am in Christ. These sermons have brought light to the integral role of uplifting women for the sake of the Kingdom of God. To My Sisters Podcast, hosted by Renee lmafidon & Courtney Danielle Jesse Boateng, has delved deep into controversial issues that are often overlooked in church. Topics such as Decentering Men, Being Strong & Soft, and Navigating Female Friendships in Christ have created room to explore taboo topics. These meaningful conversations have been a source of inspiration, liberation, and encouragement to be authentic and unapologetic in our walk of faith.

Also, the recent enactment of Sarah Jakes Roberts as the Senior Pastor of The Potter’s House is a practical reminder of how this word is being applied in real life. Women are being recognized not just as resourceful tools in church, but as powerful leaders and stewards of the word. These communities have made an incredible contribution to the deconstruction and decolonization of women’s disempowerment in church, and in my faith as a woman.

The gift of a tribe that deeply resonates with your core values and beliefs as an individual is such an underrated blessing within the Christian community. For the longest time, traditional church setups limited our ability to express ourselves as believers. Before, l used to shun away from engaging in sensitive discussions, however, online Christian sisterhood circles are redefining faith, community, and women’s empowerment for young Black women like me. Now I boldly walk in my identity and claim my faith proudly and without shame.

Leave a comment

Patie is a passionate social worker with a Bachelor of Social Work Honours Degree from the University of Zimbabwe. She is a feminist leader, creating safe spaces for women to engage in transformational conversations, and a feminist writer whose work has been published in Open Democracy, The Spill Mag, Essence Girls United, Amaka Studio, and Business Insider. She is a spoken word performer and multi-award-winning poet whose work has been featured in Tsonga Mukololo Publications (One Project), Vasikana Project (Menstrual Health Poetry Competition), and YouthHubAfrica (Youth Voices on Ending FGM).

Don’t Run

by Traci Saulsberry

“Don’t run!”

The words raced out of me with an urgency that surprised me. I was on a panel at a wellness convention.

I had just been asked, “What’s one thing you’d tell women on a journey to self-discovery?” and it slipped from my mouth like a rally cry. Like a mother trying to stop a toddler from running into the street after a shiny ball.

“Stop! Don’t run!”

The audience was quiet at first.

Then a woman in the back slowly clapped. “Yes, yes” she said, a cry lodged within the words. And then, a sort of congregation of claps and murmurs began to fill the room. Like Sunday morning. A word tied up in the thicket now released.

I hadn’t realized how many of us felt the urge to escape our own lives in order to find ourselves.

So when I sat down to write to you, the first and only thing I could think to say was, “Don’t run!”

Subscribe now

If you are looking for yourself, trying to find out who you are, what you are looking for is right where you are.

Sound the alarms, ring the bell, give me a bullhorn. Because the alternative is loud and I need to be louder. The fantasy self-discovery story where youescape to a faraway land and find yourself (and potentially in love with a tall, dark, and handsome man…) is compelling. It’s wistful, cinematic and…

It’s not the answer.

Don’t run from your home to some island or city to try to find yourself. I’ll be the one to tell you—you aren’t there.

I watched the same movies—I mean, Taye Diggs and turquoise water, who could resist? I read the same books glamorizing Bali and endless pasta. I’m not saying they lied; I’m certain there is good food, love, and revelations on that distant island we yearn to jet off to. There’s peace, and everything you are fleeing at home definitely will be a lot quieter when you get to said getaway.

But one day the trip is over.

The lover reveals themself to be a human like everywhere else on the planet. And the food is probably amazing, but it can only fill you up so much before you remember you’re still you.

I know because I wanted to do the same. Like a game of dominos, my life collapsed. My high-powered job, my relationship, and life as I’d known it were gone. Who are you when everything you built around you falls away? It felt as if I were suddenly no one. Extinct. I had the escapist dream. I thought about leaving my hometown and starting over. But real life interjected. I couldn’t go anywhere. I had a son with a life here and bills and responsibilities that demanded I stay right where I was.

I remember thinking, angsty and frustrated, “What?” So I can’t find myself now? I have to sit in this monotony of what I know, which now feels like quick sand.

And life said back to me, Yep, don’t run. Stay right where you are.

So I stayed home and I faced the big questions circling my collapse. Who am I? What do I do next?

Who am I?

I sat with my journal on the edge of my bed and asked myself questions I’d never stopped long enough to consider. Even the little things, like what my favorite color is and what I like to do on the weekend.

Subscribe now

As I learned about the small parts of myself, I went deeper. What do I want for my life? What makes me happy? As I uncovered my answers, I began to root for myself, for the woman with the dreams I’d never really known.

I wanted to find more of her in the place where I’d never bothered to know her: at home. So I traversed my hometown like it was some foreign land I’d never experienced. Why don’t we romanticize what we already have?

I did things at home I’d always been too scared or too skeptical to do. I drove down the street from my house, and I stood face-to-face with an actual horse, a majestic beast named Red, and learned what conviction in my own words felt like. I saw an aura man who took my picture, and I watched as a rainbow enveloped me on a small Polaroid. I took a pottery class around the corner from my house, tasted wine at a local shop, and ate at every restaurant in my city. I took walks along the same streets I’d once felt lost within. I made peace with the places that almost broke me. I looked at sunsets like they were scoops of melted sherbet and picked flowers to make my own bouquet. Who said the grass is greener than anywhere but home?

I stopped falling in and out of love with a boy and into love with myself. I even bought myself a ring to seal the commitment, to love myself through all of those vows we offer others.

Most of all, at home I faced everything I wanted to escape. And it still felt pretty damn whimsical and cinematic.

So you know what? I’ll write the new fantasy, we will, for how to find ourselves—right where we are.

Because the truth is… everything you need is within you. And you are already you. You just have to find her and then love the you that you find.

So, don’t run, stay home.

And I’m not saying this like some anxious mother who doesn’t want you to leave for college or go out at night with the fast boy. The world outside of where you are isn’t scary—it’s expansive and worth exploring. You won’t find yourself somewhere else or in someone else.

I’m saying it as a girl who ran for years and one day finally stayed home only to find that what she was looking for all along was always right inside of her. Because at the end of the day, you always have to come home to yourself.

Don’t run.

Your life is waiting for you to remember who you are. Oh, I can only imagine what clarity is on the other side of that knowing and the kind of comfort awaiting you at home.

Leave a comment

Traci Saulsberry is a writer, leadership coach, and senior communications executive. At twenty-seven, she became one of the youngest Black executives at NBC, beginning a fourteen-year tenure shaping high-level entertainment narratives before building and leading the communications team at Peacock. Today, Traci is a host and narrator for Calm, the world’s leading meditation app, where she guides series on workplace wellbeing and professional growth. As a leadership coach and keynote speaker, she focuses on helping individuals find and own their voice—particularly while navigating spaces where they are underrepresented. She also serves as an adjunct professor at Syracuse University’s Newhouse School.

Her debut book, This Is How You Love Her (Abrams Press), is a fiercely candid, funny, and sometimes heartbreaking blend of memoir and self-help on vulnerability, identity, and reclaiming your life. It is set to release on August 4th and is available for pre-order now wherever books are sold.

Hey y’all,

It’s tiiiiiiiiiiiime (Mariah Carey voice)!

We’re officially open for submissions and actively taking your story pitches! If you’ve pitched at some point in the past few months and didn’t hear back, please feel free to pitch again—ya girl has been booked & busy! Thank you for your patience as I navigated a whole book launch and the next phase of this precious space we’ve cultivated.

Carefree is known for publishing personal essays from Black women on life, love, and adventure, and that won’t ever change, but I’m excited to share that this year we are open to more diverse storytelling formats including interviews highlighting Black women doing/starting/creating cool things, cultural criticism on topics Black women care about, and, on a limited basis, poetry & short fiction submissions.

More info on what we’re looking for from your story pitches below…

Preorder Your Copy

Carefree POV

We’re looking for stories with strong voice, clear perspective, and thoughtful, intentional storytelling. We’re especially interested in writing that blends personal insight with cultural criticism and stories that reflect how Black women across the globe are navigating their worlds.

Take a look at our archives and top posts to understand the kind of work we publish. We value slow, immersive narratives and publish one piece weekly on life, love, and adventure. Typical word count is 1,000–1,800 words.

We only accept pitches from Black womxn.

Stories We’re Looking For

• Experiences that shaped you in ways you didn’t expect, like:

  • Giving up career

  • Being childfree

  • Exploring a different faith

  • Entering a male-dominated field

  • Being ambitious and then prioritizing rest

• The contrarian reframe: what Black women are tired of being told

  • If there’s a piece of advice, a stereotype, or a script that Black women are sold on and you’ve decided you’re done with it, pitch us. Some ideas: respectability politics, the wellness industry’s relationship with Black women, expectations around faith, body discourse (in any direction)

• Sex, dating, and the specifics of it

  • Pleasure: what felt good and why

  • Shame: where yours came from, how it shows up now

  • Specific nights, specific people, real consequences

  • Dating and all its nuances

  • Bi, queer, ace, kinky, in-transition stories

  • Sex in your 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s

  • The exit from purity culture

• The personal-cultural essay—anchored to a Black woman who’s in the conversation

  • If a Black woman in pop culture has done something—a tour, a verse, a controversy, a return, or a refusal and it cracked something open in you, pitch us. We want the piece that starts with her and ends with you.

    We’re open to ideas, but right now we’re paying attention to SZA, Megan, Cardi, Solange, Issa, Ayo, Tyla, Coco, Halle, Tems, , Beyoncé. And whoever else is poppin’.

• Original poetry (to be featured in a monthly poetry collection from Black women)

What We Don’t Accept

• Fully written drafts of stories (unless short fiction or poetry)

• Stories already published in other publications (it can be on the same topic, but if more than 100 words of the story are identical, we will have to pass)

• Stories that center white people

• Stories written or edited with AI

How to pitch

Keep it under 300 words. Lead with the scene or the line that made you want to write the essay.

• What happened

• Why you’re the only person who can write this piece

• A rough word count (most of ours run 1,000–1,800 words)

• A few links to other work, if you have them

• Check out my “Share Your Work” masterclass on exactly how to pitch editors (not just Carefree!)

Send pitches here. This form will close June 20th.

Ready to pitch? Step right up, we’re waiting for you.

Take care,

Anayo Awuzie
EIC of Carefree Media

Black Women in Bloom is officially 30 book sales away from our preorder goal! Pre-orders are so important for Black indie authors, and I can’t do this without y’all! The limited edition coffee table book features 30+ stories from Black women across the globe on their stories of healing, risk, and self-reclamation. Paired with gorgeous artwork, it will add a beautiful, stylish touch to your home.

Preorder Your Copy

Hey y’all,

May is Mental Health Awareness Month, and in honor of that, I’m bringing back a story from the archives that we haven’t seen spoken about often within our community.

As Black women, we tend to get labeled as strong, continuously capable, resilient, and “magical.” We don’t feel pain, and we don’t suffer. At least, that’s what they want to believe about us. But we are soft, we hurt, we yearn, we have bads, just like everyone else. It is only recently in the past decade that we collectively began learning how to speak up amongst one another without shame about our mental health, and in this week’s essay, Janell Brower speaks up about the turmoil in dealing with bipolar disorder as a Black woman.

Take care,

Anayo Awuzie
EIC of Carefree Mag

I Love Me, I Love Me Not

by Janell Brower

As a child, I would walk into every room with this teetering feeling in my heart. I’d say it all the time, “I feel like I’m rocking back and forth in my mind, teetering between sanity and insanity.” I didn’t know why. Often, my thoughts revolved around one main belief—something was inherently wrong with me. 

This was the cracked lens I saw everything through.

Over time, I became a people-pleaser, thinking that fixing the needs of others would satisfy my own. Yet, my efforts simply made me even more unstable, splitting my mind between several opinions that constantly changed. And the opinions about me were many. Without my choosing, I seemed to be one person showing up as multiple versions of myself, none of which ever quite fit into any space. I was caught between too many intersections, which felt like living between two different worlds at the same time. 

I always found it interesting how both worlds could carry on together unnoticed by most. How you believe you look strange to outside observers while being completely scared to look others in the eye. How you hope for a bright future in a world that only shapes futures for people who are ‘light’ enough to succeed in the world. 

In predominantly white institutions, I was too Black. In Black and brown spaces, I was too dark-skinned and quiet. To men, I wasn’t pretty enough or skinny enough to be a desirable woman. To women, I wasn’t feminine enough to be straight. I was always too much or not enough to be accepted and loved. 

Yet still, I didn’t stop trying to love. Though my heart felt as fragile as picking petals off a flower, I believed finding real love was the key to finding stability—to finding safety.

Subscribe now

Several years down the line, I discovered there was another thing I was too much of—too mentally unstable. At the age of 24, I was diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder, which also meant that I spent the prior 23 years of my life completely unaware of this fact. It turned out the teeter I felt in my heart was truly found in my mind, introducing an entirely new level of instability. 

Questions like, ‘Am I uncontrollable?’ spiraled in my mind. I wondered if my teeter was ever going to fade. Before, it was simply tied to my inability to fit into crowds or wear the right clothing. Things that, though aggravatingly unnecessary at times, could be changed. But this? This is ingrained. This mental illness is a chemical imbalance that I can’t simply remove with a pair of heels or a touch of makeup. This tied my instability to a disease I would have for the rest of my life.

This tied my cracked lens forever to my eyes.

However, my new diagnosis did bring pockets of relief. The last 23 years have been difficult. But they weren’t this way because I lacked anything externally. To the outside eye, I was a straight-A student full of potential. I would passionately play the guitar on Sunday mornings and fill people with sweet sensations of love and joy. I was the friend who stayed up late on the phone, shouldering the cries of recent heartbreaks we all saw from a mile away. I cooked and cleaned and never complained, always understood, and never refrained. From the outside, the last 23 years weren’t hard at all. They showed too many reasons why I should’ve been grateful. 

Yet, underneath that gratitude I should’ve had, I was cracking under a pressure I couldn’t withstand. 

If you had an eye to look inside, you’d see there was a different drive behind my kindness. You’d see how every desire to wipe away my tears came with the desperation to be seen by you. You’d see how each perfect grade was the bar set in place to determine my value. If you were allowed to come over to my house, maybe you’d see something that took me years to realize—my mother was also bipolar. And, while she may have chosen to hide her diagnosis to avoid the scrutinizing eyes of others, her choice partially trapped me in a world that only saw their stares.

How could I avoid them? I was raised in a household where things were only seen in black and white. Upon walking outside, my eyes saw the world through the same hue. I paid attention to the slight changes in body language, for I knew they indicated the possibility of anger or disappointment. I made sure to give more of myself than any other person gave, for I wanted to push against the fear of people withdrawing themselves at any given moment. I deliberately loved people who triggered me, even if I had to rationalize their instability as something they couldn’t help. As something they were only doing because they loved me. 

From the inside, the last 23 years were hard for me. That lens was crystal clear. After I was diagnosed, I found relief from years of carrying things I thought were my fault. They weren’t.

Leave a comment

Born in Michigan, raised in Philadelphia, Janell Brower is a freelance copywriter who strives to help people who struggle with mental illness find the support they need. For fun, she loves playing jazz guitar, writing out her streams of consciousness, and listening to the stories of those who are willing to share.

I had one of those serendipitious Saturdays where it felt like Solange was singing “Binz” for me personally. My sole mission? Lock down a location for the Black Women in Bloom book launch party. After a brunch kiki with my girls at our favorite cafe in Oakland, we were off. First, an art gallery in Old Oakland with a bonus outdoor patio; then, a Black woman’s apothecary that smelled of shea and lavender; and last, Kinfolx, the most poppin’ coffee shop for Black creatives. I had been emailing them for months to no avail—I was determined to make this happen.

We spotted the owner, busy in conversation, so we hung back. Then out of nowhere we ran into our friend Mike, the creator of Umber Magazine. My girl and I used to host a podcast, and he was a former guest. We caught up, got a preview of his latest issue, and I told him about my book. We’re now setting up time so I can pick his brain. He also said he regularly hosts events at Kinfolx. How Sway??

Mike leaves, and I spot the owner, finally free, getting water for his dog. I run over to intercept. I thank Mike for his good juju because the owner said yes!

To celebrate, we met up with a few more friends for drinks at Lucy Blue where, to our surprise, it was a Kentucky Derby-themed evening, and the aunties pulled up in their BEST. They had a fashion show, raffles, and, of course, hit the Tamia step a few times. I love Black people. What a great day.

This Week’s Story

May 6, 2026 is World Maternal Mental Health Day. Motherhood is one of those ‘hoods that you never really understand until you join it. In this week’s essay, South African writer Gugu Khumalo is navigating life as a 24-year-old single mom who is still finding time for adventure while she learns how to co-exist with her new son. She’s trading in tequila and cigarettes for sippy cups and baby burps. But what she’s lost in 20s debauchery, she’s gained so much more in her new bestie.

Take care,

Anayo Awuzie
EIC of Carefree Media

P.S. - We’re inching our way closer to hitting our June pre-order goal for Black Women in Bloom 🌸 This one is for all of us on our blooming journeys—a mirror and window into the lives of Black women across the diaspora.

Get Your Copy

I’m Letting My Inner-Child Do All The Parenting

by Gugu Khumalo

As the story goes for many little girls, I have always dreamed of becoming a mother. From bathing and clothing my baby dolls to babysitting my nephews and nieces—being a parent has always been in the cards for me. I imagined being a mother in my late 20s or early 30s with a house in the suburbs, a thriving career, and a loving partner.

My early 20s were a time of exploration. I had the classic college experience filled with great friendships, adventures, one too many drunken nights, and even a great love or two. After graduating, I took the year off to finish my novel.

But then something unexpected happened. I found myself pregnant, and my plans, my dreams, and my world flipped upside down. My envisioned career trajectory had barely taken off; I was far from my goal of a house in the suburbs, and my love life had gone up in flames. It wasn’t the situation I had imagined I'd be in when I got pregnant, but despite everything, I decided to proceed with the pregnancy.

I waded through my pregnancy under a veil of secrecy and fear, mortified at the thought of anyone finding out. Somehow, to my benefit or detriment, I still looked very small, just as if I had gained a couple of kilos. My hips widened, and my less-than-A-cup breasts bloomed to a conservative C, but there was no visible bump. As the time for his arrival neared. He felt heavier, but even though I had only gained minimal weight, looking back, it wasn't the pregnancy but rather the anxiety and guilt weighing down on me.

It seemed fitting; nothing about my pregnancy was the way I expected it to be.

I never did finish that novel.

Subscribe now

His arrival.

Like falling asleep, he arrived slowly, gently, and then all at once. Labor lasted 20 hours, a wait that felt as long as the pregnancy itself. I had planned a natural birth with minimal intervention, complete with a big bouncy ball to de-stress, a warm bath, and no major drugs.

Around hour 18, the rug was pulled out from under me. The doctors told me he went into fetal distress, and to this day I’m not too sure what that means. I was taken from my initial room and thrust into a theatre adorned with glaring lights and a lingering clinical smell. The midwives in teddy bear scrubs were replaced with doctors in putrid green scrubs, and the soft and soothing voices of female midwives were replaced by various men speaking in robot-like technical jargon. And then, at 10:01, my baby was brought into the world via c-section. I begged the doctors to let me hold him or even see him. He was brought into one room, and I was carted into another. Is this normal? I thought to myself.

After an eternity later, they brought him back to me, scrubbed clean of all the vernix and afterbirth. He looked like one of those reborn dolls I longed for as a little girl—and he was all mine.

Home

I hate to say it, but for the first couple of days, he didn’t actually feel like mine. Instead, it felt like I was babysitting for a good friend. It wasn't until the two of us were truly left alone that it hit me like a ton of bricks. Holy shit, I’m 24, unmarried, a single parent, and I haven’t even found my “purpose.” The thoughts were spiraling like the Anxiety emotion in Inside Out 2.

While I felt unsure about the rest of my life and what it would look like, I accepted that my Zion was all that I had, and I was all he had. I wanted nothing more than to be a good mother to him. The only problem? I had no idea how to do that. The life I had come to know in my 20s did not seem to be featured in any of the parenting books.

Now

It was clear that the relationship that produced my son wouldn’t end in the white wedding dress fantasy I’d always dreamt of. I had some hope for a semblance of a functional co-parenting arrangement, a situation that would afford me a free day or two to have a moment to myself, socialize, and venture out into the world of self-improvement. Sadly, that wasn’t the case. So I made motherhood work for me.

I have thrown most of the advice, tips, and tidbits I’ve collected on parenthood out of the window. I have stopped trying to force myself into a box that I do not fit into. Don’t get me wrong, I wanted to be a mother and was excited to start my life with my baby, but I feel I still had so much that I either had not finished or had not done in my 20-something adventures.

I could not leave the years of adventure and exploration my 20s promised to bring to sit on the backburner. I refused to shrink myself to try and be an unrealistic, idealized version of a mother that I had never known. And so, I’ve decided to live out my roaring twenties unapologetically while raising him.

He’s become a roommate of sorts. While I take care of the house, we enjoy each other's company over pudding and GRWM videos during the week. On Fridays, we may watch a movie—a cool glass of rosé for me and a tepid sippy cup of milk for him. While out shopping, he sits in his stroller and babbles at my mini skirts and crop tops, offering critique where it’s due.

We even went on a road trip together, albeit a short one. And like the best kind of friends, we split our time between each other's interests: quad biking and hiking for me and a petting zoo and sensory play date for him. It felt like a girls’ trip, without the excessive boozy nights and incessant flirting.

I’ve also started a ritual every month to try at least two things—something old and something new. For instance, when ordering a drink, I would order a margarita, something old, and an obnoxiously named (often expensive) drink, something new. I love this new practice and will be keeping it up.

While I miss my rambunctious 3-day ragers filled with cartons of cigarettes and tequila, I would like to think they aren’t completely gone, just replaced with a calmer and more tame sundowner or brunch. Since I’m not spending as much money on shots, I can now afford to splurge on car service and go to nicer places that I would never have thought of in my pre-baby days.

My friends have kept me going through all of this. Most of them are enjoying their 20’s, waiting to have kids later on in their lives, and then there are the empowered few who have already made the decision to be childfree. Despite their different feelings about becoming mothers, they have become a village of sorts in their own right.

As I journey through this new adventure that I’m only a year and some change into, my son and I make the rules up as we go—we’ll be just fine.

Leave a comment

Gugu is a writer based in Johannesburg. She is interested in how internet culture and real life intersect and also has a (somewhat unhealthy) obsession with achieving the ultimate low-waste lifestyle.

Welcome to the self-publishing diaries, where I share behind-the-scenes of my journey publishing Carefree Magazine’s first-ever coffee table book, Black Women In Bloom—now available for preorder!

Preorder Now

It’s been a whirlwind since my last diary. We were two weeks away from the preorder going live, and I was drowning in the backend of WordPress and WooCommerce, cursing myself for not choosing the easy road in life and building on Squarespace. Note to everyone reading: skip WordPress, use Squarespace. Unless you like frustration and confusion, then do you.

A few things have happened since then:

• I announced the preorder!

• I realized I can’t ship to Africa until December (sad)

• I learned that I’m going to have to yap my ass off about this book every day if I want to make sales 😅

• We’ve sold 60 copies—insane! I have a goal to sell 100 by June, and it’s really looking possible for this Black editor.

• I solidified 3 out of the 6 book tour stops, aka Bloom Sessions (fill out the survey to let me know which city to head to!)

• All the months spent nitpicking at the cover were worth it. Because the number one thing I’ve been hearing since we dropped them?

Making a Cover Your Audience Loves

Whoever said “don’t judge a book by its cover” told a boldface lie. More than anything, your cover is the make or break between someone buying your book off the sheer strength of its beauty or giving it the New York once-over and moving on.

The cover for Black Women in Bloom went through several makeovers, facelifts, and revision surgeries before we landed on the gorgeous final versions that I just can’t stop staring at.

Getting Started

I didn't have an exact vision, but I knew the vibe—lush, premium, artful, colorful. Something I would want on my coffee table. And I trusted that intuition through every iteration until we got here.

When I first met my designer, we had a very transparent conversation about Black books and how many of them tend to either explicitly feature a Black person or more discreetly feature a figure with Black-adjacent features (think of a side profile silhouette of a woman’s face but with kinky curly hair). Although in the traditional publishing world, there is a history of whitewashing characters on covers, it does seem that some of the more popular authors get to proudly feature Black characters on the front to much fanfare. And indie publishers get to do whatever they want *hair flip.*

As we did research, our hunch proved true: FUBU coffee table books either have “Black” in the title, a Black person as the central figure, or both. But of course, I wanted to be hard headed and go against the grain.

The book is explicitly for Black women; hell, it’s called Black Women in Bloom. I thought the title was doing all the work to signal to the intended audience and, therefore, we wouldn’t need to include a Black woman on the cover.

Our earlier ideas focused more on being artful, illustrative, and floral.

But it wasn’t feeling like THE cover. I love the one on the left for a poster (and may still do that), but it was feeling a bit too abstract. I backtracked on everything we spoke about, going against the grain and blah blah, and asked Aquila to try one with a Black woman on the cover. I also asked for another one with a flower—but this time an image and not an illustration.

Which brought us here:

I ruminated on these for an embarrassingly long time. I asked friends, acquaintances, cousins twice removed, people I passed by on the street during my hot girl walks, and in an unprecedentedly boomer move, I even asked Facebook.

Research is crucial. And not just looking things up online, but actually talking to your target audience to gather qualitative insights is a major key for landing on something they’ll enjoy. As I mentioned in hot girl book marketing, engaging in Black girl communities I was already part of to get the real scoop was a gamechanger. Lo and behold, the Facebook girlys taught me something…

While my close friends all loved the flower cover, in survey after survey with Black woman readers, the cover with the Black woman was the clear fav.

That result wasn’t surprising. Our earlier research on Black figures on covers showed the same thing: we want to see ourselves. We don’t want any confusion about who a book is meant for. This anthology is celebrating Black women’s voices, and we need to be abundantly clear about that. Putting a Black woman on the cover is a low-hanging fruit way of communicating, "This shit is for us,” and every time I shared these two with people, it’s ultimately the cover that won out.

We kept experimenting with color variations on that cover while also refining the flower version, since a strong subset of people were still drawn to the lotus design. This took weeks of back and forth.

And in the end, we ended up with these beauties:

Offering both covers ended up being such a great decision. Even though there was a smaller subset of people who loved the lotus cover, those people ADORED the lotus cover. It would have been a shame not to have it as an option, so it is a “limited edition cover” with only 100 copies available. I’m very curious to see what the sales show in a few months.

Thanks for reading my self-publishing diaries! Any questions or topics you want covered? Drop them in the comments!

Hey yall,

A few days ago, I spent the evening at Miracle Theater in the middle of downtown Inglewood screaming, “I AIN’T SORRY!!” in a crowded theater full of theys, gays, and gals to celebrate the 10-year anniversary of Beyonce’s Peabody Award-winning visual album, Lemonade.

I was immediately transported back to 2016 when, through the best way she knew how, Beyoncé revealed through a succinct 12-track unbosoming that Jay-Z had in fact betrayed her, that even she can be cheated on. We laughed, we cried, we danced. If you haven’t seen the film, it’s on YouTube, treat yourself to some ART.

That was on Friday.

By Saturday, I, along with thousands of other Black women, had taken up our proverbial torches, ready to ride at dawn over the news that Klay Thompson had cheated on Meg Thee Stallion. I thought about Lemonade and how no one is safe. There is no “perfect woman” who manages to do all the right things and therefore escapes the male urge to suppress, to betray, and to harm the Black woman. Beyond infidelity, we’ve lost so many of us at the hands of Black men recently: Cerina Fairfax, Tammy McCollum, Nancy Meteyer, Davonta Curtis, and the list goes on. When will we be considered worthy of protection by the men who claim to be the “protectors”?

This Week’s Story

Given all of this, what truly warms my heart is how Black women have turned inward to find peace. Collectively, Black women have become each other’s protection, uplifters, and solace. This week’s anonymous essay calls for us to seek out what lives on the other side of perfectionism, on the other side of constantly doing for others who don’t do for us.

Take care,

Anayo Awuzie
EIC of Carefree Mag

P.S. We’re halfway to the June goal of 100 preorders for Black Women In Bloom 🎉 Help us reach this goal by preordering your copy here today!

SELF-ish

by Anonymous. In partnership with Namaste by Jay

Selfish. “Selfish” is such an icky word. It leaves a bitter taste in your mouth when you say it aloud. We grow up learning lessons of altruism. Don’t eat the last cookie because someone else might want it. Always share your toys because that is what nice girls do. Try not to brag because it is off-putting to others. Soften your strength to be more palatable for the people around you. We come into the world by ourselves, but we are quickly conditioned to be community-minded and family-focused. And don’t get me wrong, those are great values to uphold; just not at the expense of our joy and authenticity.

Subscribe now

As women, we are conditioned to provide for others in our household. Little girls receive Easy-Bake ovens, crafting stations, sewing kits, baby dolls, miniature kitchens, dollhouses, and much more for Christmases and birthdays. So many of our girl-oriented toys taught us to be resourceful, and they quietly instilled the need to be useful for everybody else. As we age, we continue to put others above ourselves. We constantly strive to fit molds to please everyone around us.

But what do we do for ourselves? There’s a continual conversation about self-love, but the message doesn’t penetrate our communal psyche. Our society stigmatizes women who put themselves before others. We uplift the narrative of the self-sacrificing matriarch, even at the expense of our grandmothers, mothers, aunts, sisters, cousins, friends, neighbors, and daughters.

Generations of women never had an opportunity to experience their own happiness. Their endless work provided us with the foundations for our current lives. As we look to honor their efforts, we must recognize that they deserved rest. They deserved new clothing, home-cooked meals (that they didn’t make themselves), walks on the beach, cocktails with friends, and love that did not require pain. How can we make it easier for the women in our lives currently? How can we water our gardens to better support our communities and families? We must learn to love and focus on ourselves in order to radiate that love onto those around us.

Subscribe now

Earlier today, I googled journal prompts to help pass the time. As I was casually scrolling through the list of questions I found on a blog, a random blurb in the middle of the list caught my eye: "List your greatest accomplishments in life.” I decided to do it, and it surprisingly made me really happy. A smile crept across my face, and for a second, I felt like a mini-Michelle Obama. The exercise gave me a moment to brag about myself to myself, and I needed that sort of self-love right now.

For about 15 minutes, I rattled off a list of important life events: becoming a big sister at two years old, being honored as Line Leader in kindergarten, passing my typing test in elementary school, getting my driver’s license, joining my sorority, graduating from college, moving across the country by myself, moving back across the country by myself when I realized that was not God’s calling for my life, being admitted to law school, getting a scholarship to law school. Every single blessing in my life came from God. He has shown me abundant grace and prosperity, and I am eternally grateful. But upon further reflection, I realized that I was not striving for excellence—I was striving for approval. Those hard nights taught me discipline, but I never stopped to question the “why” behind them. I never asked myself if my hard work was making ME happy.

I’ve had more time than usual to have unlimited and unfiltered access to myself. There are no distractions other than YouTube workouts and planning nightly dinners. God put me on pause, and I’m spending my time wrestling with how He wants me to grow.

These conversations with God are especially difficult due to my discomfort with uncertain transitions. One glaringly obvious point of growth is to learn to appreciate myself in the liminal space. What am I supposed to do with myself during the seconds that pass between “congratulations” and “good jobs?” What have I done that I am proud of that no one else can see? All of a sudden, I can’t think of anything. I realize that I still feel a sense of accomplishment from my achievements, but I am hungry for self-fulfillment when looking at my future goals.

Instead of losing weight in order to mold myself into an Instagram model body, I am learning to look at my body as a symbol of resilience, strength, and love.

Instead of focusing on how to make my hair “pretty,” I want to learn what makes my hair “happy” so it can thrive.

Instead of softening myself for others, I want to establish boundaries that will provide deeper and more textured relationships with my family and friends.

As I move from my gap year to my first year of law school, I want to be intentional with my time and energy. He placed a calling over my life to advocate for Black and Brown women and girls around the world. I cannot do that if I am constantly burned out and waiting for approval from other people. God is in control, and He never gives us more than we can handle.

God loves me, and He set forth a path for my life. I need to trust His plans and go forward lovingly in order to properly honor the women who came before me and create a better life for my future daughters, nieces, and granddaughters.

Leave a comment

What. A. Week!

I’m still beaming and on a high from a little announcement I made, nothing major, oh, you know….

Get Your Copy Today

Carefree Mag’s first coffee table book is available for preorder! After the news dropped last Monday, I immediately went into “OK, what do I do now?!” mode and didn’t stop to smell the roses (ironic) of what we had actually just done. We are self-publishing a coffee table book that people can support and now preorder! It is a soul-deep body of work, a labor of love, my brainchild absolutely not possible without the many writers and contributors right here from the Carefree crew ❤️

If it wasn’t for my best friend giving me a pep talk so uplifting it would impress the East Compton Clovers, I probably would still be gliding over the magnitude of this moment. This is something 12-year-old me has always wanted to do. She’d be proud, she’d be in awe, she’d realize she was ✨that girl✨ all along. I’ll share more about how it’s going in Friday’s Self-Pub Diaries, but for now, I’m deeply grateful to all who have supported so far! It means the world. For all the Black women in bloom, this one’s for us.

This Week’s Story

I have a sore spot for stories about Black women moving abroad, charting their own path in a new country, and excitedly telling the tale. Maybe it’s because, as I say so often, it is how I began to chart my path in this world. Let’s head over to Berlin to meet this week’s writer, Avalon Pernell, who is discovering the intersectionality of her Black womanhood in a German context.

Take care,

Anayo Awuzie
EIC of Carefree Magazine

Adventures Unknown: Sometimes You Must Leave To Grow

by Avalon Pernell

Nothing prepared me for the blank stares that greeted me when I told my family and friends I was moving back to Europe. 

Are you sure? 

You enjoyed your study abroad that much? 

Why would you want to leave the US?

I tucked these concerns in the deep recesses of my brain, releasing them only as I set foot into Brandenburg Airport. The air felt less heavy in Germany—more open to opportunities and swirling with excitement. 

I felt a weight lift from my shoulders as I arrived in Berlin. In the coming weeks, I would recognize this was what safety felt like. Here I felt free. 

Moving abroad forced me to begin teasing out what it meant to be Black and a woman in the 21st century. For most of my life, I focused on my first identity, the words of my parents echoing in my ears of how I need to be “twice as good to make it half as far.” Life abroad provided an opportunity to learn what it meant to define Blackness outside of this American context. 

This quest led me to research Afro-German identity formation in Berlin. I had previously studied abroad in the city during college; I enjoyed my experience so much that I felt compelled to return. A stroll along the four stations and 22 streets contained in the African quarter of the Berlin-Wedding neighborhood revealed a vibrant community of businesses, restaurants, and creatives trying to make it in Germany’s capital.

From Bantou Village, a local Afro-German-owned restaurant, to Each One Teach One, a community education and empowerment project, the African diaspora remained vibrant in Berlin. Yet, interspersed with the life created by Black-owned businesses and organizations in Berlin’s north district, Wedding, are whispers of Germany’s short, but brutal colonial past.

I soon realized that like Berlin, caught between its past and present, I was caught between my intersectional identities—Black, but also woman and American. But as I would quickly learn, I did not know how to define myself outside of those boxes. I was not able to fully grasp my experience as a Black woman until I juxtaposed it with my time in Germany. 

From the neighborhood ice cream maker who always greeted me with a smile and a hearty "Eins oder zwei Kugeln Heute?”1 to impromptu conversations with German grandmothers on the latest Deutsche Bahn2 delay. Here, daily conversations recognized my full personhood. Here, I wasn’t defined by education or career path. Instead, I could redefine myself to recognize the “and” instead of only acknowledging the "or." Yes, I could be an ambitious career woman or the neutral peacemaker between parties, but I was also a friend, a listening ear, a creative. Here, I was not required to choose which identities to bring to the table—all were welcome. 

Subscribe now

Navigating these intersecting identities in Germany helped me realize that being Black means a universal acknowledgment of what we share. It means the gentle nods of recognition from Black mothers and grandfathers when passing kebab stands and hair shops on the street.

Graffiti-littered walls and stolen glances between my people on a train sharing whole conversations of “Did you see that?” and “I see you" without a word being spoken. It’s the young Black child running up to compliment my coily afro. It’s invitations to share meals where spices and flavors weave effortlessly into the dish, nearly meeting the caliber of your mom’s home cooking in a world now many miles away.  

It’s reminders of the things that bind us together across the diaspora. It’s afternoon laughter shared with your next-door neighbor after a long day’s work. 

Through conversations, I remembered that there is no one correct way to be Black. In 2025, the United States experienced negative net migration, with more people leaving the country than arriving for the first time in 90 years3, and somewhere between 4 and 9 million Americans living abroad. There are no current estimates of how many Black women are part of this movement, but I imagine my experience is not an exception to the rule. 

Still, purchasing a flight didn’t promise an end to the proverbial baggage I carried from college into adulthood. You can’t run away from anxiety or outwork loneliness. According to the National Institute on Minority Health Disparities, African Americans are 20% more likely to face serious psychological distress than their white counterparts4. And Black women are half as likely as their white counterparts to seek help and mental health care. 

Life abroad is not perfect, and living in Germany is not without its problems. There were plenty of days filled with me complaining to my roommate and filling my journal with tear-streaked entries about longing for a genuine community. But hope peeked out its head in laughter, providing tinged conversations with the local baker and late-night conversations with new friends at corner stores. Joy glimmered through shared smiles with neighbors walking their dogs in the morning and joke-filled catch-up sessions with next-door neighbors. And happiness found me with spontaneous candlelit date nights and budding inside jokes among friends. 

For me, it meant ignoring the chance of failure and signing up for Pilates teacher training. What may seem like an easy choice for others required me to remember that no single career defined me. My existence required acknowledgment of the multitudes. I could be a journalist and a Pilates instructor and perhaps in the future, more. 

An abundant life means recognizing your “no” is just as impactful as your “yes.” Often we adopt several roles to ease the lives of others: superwoman, peacekeeper, homemaker. These roles can sometimes mislead us into believing that we must always be hemmed into these identities to provide value to those around us. But actively choosing to hang up the superwoman cape and quit mythologizing sacrifice can allow you to retake control of your narrative. You are more than what you can offer others. 

Your next step may require you to recognize how you can transform your life by choosing to ignore the peanut gallery and trust your intuition to carve out the best path for yourself.

Leave a comment

Avalon Pernell is a journalist based in Berlin. As the recipient of a Fulbright Young Journalist grant, she spent the ‘23-’24 academic year researching Black and Brown founders charting success in Berlin’s startup scene studying the sometimes unconventional ways Berlin’s minority communities fund their ideas. She graduated from Washington and Lee University with journalism and German degrees.

One or two scoops today?

Y’all, she’s live 🥹🌸

Black Women in Bloom is officially open for pre-order in the U.S! Whether you’ve been rocking since 2020 or just joined yesterday, THANK YOU FOR BEING THE BEST PART OF CAREFREE! Mama, we made it!

To my lovely paid subscribers: just for you, use code CAREFREESTAR for 20% off your Black Women In Bloom order. This code can only be use…

Read more

Y’all, she’s live 🥹🌸

Black Women in Bloom is officially open for pre-order in the U.S! Whether you’ve been rocking since 2020 or just joined yesterday, THANK YOU FOR BEING THE BEST PART OF CAREFREE! Mama, we made it!

Pre-Order Now

— What’s inside —

• A beautifully laid-out hardcover coffee table book designed by French artist, Aquila Cheikh

• Printed on 128 gsm premium-grade art paper

• 30+ original essays on life, love, and adventure from Black women writers around the world

• Original photography and illustration, all by Black women artists including Delita Martin and Donatella Jackson

• Book signed by yours truly (only available during pre-order and ​Bloom Sessions​)

• A pouch of flower seeds, so when the book ends, your bloom season continues

• An 8x10 art print from Black Women In Bloom 🌸 (only available during pre-order)

There are two cover options because Aquila created covers that were so gorgeous I couldn’t decide. While they are both limited edition, the lotus version is exclusive. Only 100 copies exist, and it will not be sold anywhere in stores. Once it’s gone, it’s gone!

But wait, there’s more

Aquila and I also designed merch! A “Blooming Era” tote bag to carry this gorgeous book to the park, the cafe, or any of your Black girl adventures. And, the community bouquet t-shirt. This design is special; each flower was contributed by one of the writers in the book, and there is space for you to contribute yours. Black women, you are getting your flowers today TUH!

Bundle it all up and get 10% off.

Pre-Order Now

Thank you for being here since before it was real. Now go get your copy. 🌸 Gentle reminder that this is a pre-order; physical copies will begin shipping later this summer.

While you wait, how about some tunes to get you into the blooming spirit? Get into the Black Women In Bloom playlist.

With so much love,

Anayo Awuzie

EIC of Carefree Mag

P.S. Forward this email, post it, or text it to your friend who is in the middle of her becoming. She needs to know it exists.

Hey yall,

One of the best parts about traveling is meeting new people. And if you’re single—meeting new lovers. However, when you’re in a new country, most people are looking for a good time and not a long time of commitment past the 3-day bachelor/bachelorette party they’re in town for.

A friend of mine recently met a guy abroad who had her sprung, but as we all know, those moments of lust while traveling are fleeting and happen in a specific time and place. After she left, she asked him how they could continue their relationship but he let her know he wasn’t interested in anything serious. She was devastated, but as we’ll see in this week’s story, having higher expectations for people than they have for you is a recipe for disaster.

This Week’s Story

Adventures Unknown is all about embracing the unknown of being Black and abroad. Writer Ajani Inez is back, and this time with a travel diary on her journey through Colombia with a new…friend 👀 It gets juicy!

Take care,

Anayo Awuzie
EIC of Carefree Mag

P.S. - I’m revealing the cover(s) for Black Women In Bloom TOMORROW! I CANNOT WAIT to show them to you and get your thoughts. I don’t want to spam y’all so I’ll have to figure out if I should send an email (on a Tuesday, I know, crazy) or in a Carefree Mag subscriber note. It will definitely be on Instagram so make sure you’re following us there! So excited!!

Adventures Unknown: A Missed Connection in Medellin

by Ajani Inez

After spending a couple of days in vibrant Medellin, I desired new adventures. The owner of the small hostel I was staying in recommended Familia Verde Eco Hostel in the mountains of San Carlos, Colombia. Coincidentally, I had noticed this same hostel advertised on the locker cabinets when I first arrived.

Excited, I packed and went to the north terminal for my next adventure.

Subscribe now

During the seven-hour bus ride, I wondered who I was about to meet. Was my intuition preparing me for a special encounter, or was my loneliness playing tricks on me? I dismissed the thought and arrived at the eco-hostel around 7 pm. The sensation of sinking into a soft, comfortable bed was pure bliss. I unpacked my belongings, settled in before my hostel-mates arrived, and decided to roll up a joint. As I prepared to light it, a figure emerged from the darkness and sat across from me on a small wooden chair. It was too dark to see his features clearly, but my curiosity was piqued. I offered him a puff of my joint. I was curious to know if he was the person in my thoughts on the bus. 

The next morning, I took a good look at this mystery guy. Initially, his energy didn't fully resonate with me, but I was intrigued and I wanted to explore further. He was cute, slightly taller than me, and though he had a receding hairline, it wasn't a dealbreaker.

He had that adventurous aura—right up my alley. Over the next few days, I learned he was French and a Scorpio. As a Virgo with a Scorpio moon, I have a soft spot for water signs in general. I found out that the owner of the hostel in Medellin had recommended the eco-hostel to both of us. What a crazy coincidence, or perhaps this was the beginning of a divine orchestration? 

Pre-Order Black Women In Bloom

The more time we spent around each other, the more I enjoyed his presence. We flirtatiously interacted in the kitchen while he cooked, and offered me some of his delicious dishes. He was speaking directly to my love language. During another moment while we were alone in the dorm, he played the guitar while I sang along and even showcased some of my rap skills. It was a magical, intimate moment that I didn't want to end. I'm not sure if he had any clue about the way I felt, but I wasn't ready to reveal my budding crush on him just yet.

After a week of being immersed in the beauty of the eco-hostel, I had to make a decision. He casually mentioned that there were hot springs nearby, tucked away in the heart of Colombia. Uncertainty washed over me as I debated whether I should stay put or embrace the unknown alongside him. I mustered the courage to ask him if I could join him on his journey; he responded with a resounding “yes.” And a radiant smile with warmth echoing in his voice along with it.

After the springs, we returned to Medellin, the place where both of our journeys had begun at some point. Here I was, immersed in an adventure beyond my wildest dreams, traveling alongside a charming man I had met during my journey abroad. He understood my needs—anticipating when I required nourishment, personal space, or quality time. This level of attunement continued throughout our journey together, and it deeply resonated with me. Being seen and understood in these ways spoke volumes to my heart. It was a love language of its own, and I was open to receiving it.

I knew he found me attractive, but he wasn’t ready to verbalize it yet. I longed to leap over the table and passionately kiss him, which would inevitably lead us to have sex. I was having vivid fantasies in the recesses of my mind. The two of us traveling across the globe and passionately falling in love, before eventually settling down on a tranquil countryside plot—it felt like a script crafted just for us.

It could all have been so simple, except that we were accompanied by two other female travelers. He was overly friendly with one of the girls, and I couldn't help but think, Why aren't you showering me with attention? Why aren't you making it obvious that you're into me? I started to become suspicious, but I shrugged off the discomfort. We would soon arrive in Medellin and I was eagerly anticipating our arrival; we could finally be alone without the distractions of these other girls as they had their own plans. 

Once back in Medellin, I had his undivided attention again…but one of the girls from the eco-hostel showed up a day later. They ended up going out to dinner, and it was clear she was attracted to him. The next day, he admitted she had tried to initiate something intimate. 

Is he trying to make me jealous? The next night we went out for dinner, and although it was romantic, I needed to know his intentions as I didn't want to waste my time. So, I asked him. His response? He was in an open relationship and already had a "Mexican girlfriend" back in Mexico, but he was open to having more girlfriends from different parts of the world. I kept my chin up, but it was disheartening to learn that there was already someone else. My impulsive fantasies came crashing to a halt...

I knew that if I were on my own, I wouldn't be having such thrilling experiences. Although it was disappointing, I surrendered to the unknown and letting the spirit of adventure guide me. 

The hot springs were even more pituresque than I had imagined—lush greenery, vibrant flowers, and waterfalls peering through the backdrop. It felt like stepping into a romantic paradise. However, the romantic vibes weren't exactly between him and me. I know I shouldn't let myself get caught up in the emotions, but when you sense someone's attraction towards you, even if they don't explicitly express it, it's hard not to crave more. This is my attachment trauma response. I found myself slipping into one of my pouty moods, longing for more attention. 

I wandered down to the steam room nestled below one of the thermal pools to take a moment for prayer. It felt like I was at a sacred sweat lodge. I wasn't content being with someone I had feelings for, someone I desired a deeper connection with, but who wasn't emotionally available. I longed for someone who could be fully present and dedicated to me, alone, especially in such an intimate and breathtaking place. 

I reached out to the universe, earnestly requesting that if he wasn't meant for me, he would be removed from my life, allowing me the space to attract the perfect partner who could meet my needs. Emotions welled up within me as I already sensed his swift departure from my life, and I wanted to cherish these final moments before the inevitable shift.

We embarked on one final journey together here in Colombia, traveling a few hours north from Santa Rosa Cabal to a charming little town called Salento. After a day or so, I told him I wanted us to part ways. I could see the devastation in his eyes. I opened up about my crush, expressing how with each passing day, I yearned to explore the depths of our connection. I no longer felt secure, and I was no longer willing to engage in my old codependent patterns to shield myself from the fact that he wasn't the right fit for me. I chose to operate from a place of empowerment rather than seeking comfort. 

The funny, yet telling, part of it all was his response. He simply said, "I think you're really cool, and I admire how you help people." It was a moment that made me simultaneously want to cry and burst into laughter. Couldn't he take this moment more seriously? I didn’t engage any further and sought comfort in a refreshing shower to wash away the embarrassment. I said my goodbyes. He kindly offered to carry my bags to the bus station and we shared one last embrace before I boarded the bus. 

"I hope to see you again, and maybe you can meet Bridgette," he said.

"No thank you," I replied with a polite smile.

A couple of weeks later, I made my way to Bucaramanga, known as the extreme water sports capital of Colombia. On my way to the hostel, I got lost, so I cut through a church courtyard to reach my destination. And sitting on a lone bench, there he was, smoking a cigarette.

My guard was up. There I was face-to-face with the person I had walked away from weeks before. I could sense his happiness in seeing me again, but I couldn't reciprocate. I waited for him to stand up and at least hug me, but all he could do was look at me and smile. That was okay. I casually mentioned that I needed to find my hostel and continued on my way. I knew he was in the same city as me, and a part of me hoped he would reach out. Maybe I had set my expectations too high. In any case, he never did reach out. 

By the time I departed from Bucaramanga, he had become nothing more than a fleeting fragment of my journey toward healing and self-discovery. 

Leave a comment

Coming up next week…

Arriving in Dibulla Colombia, I could sense that something was off right from the moment I set off on the journey to my new home for the next couple of weeks. The whole trip to the new place was filled with complications, inconveniences, and little obstacles here and there leaving me puzzled but still unaware of the forthcoming chaos. It was as if the universe was sending warnings, but I remained oblivious to the messages.

I had hoped for a tranquil retreat after everything I had just experienced. Little did I know that the climax of my journey was about to unfold, leaving me on the edge of heartbreak and aching for resolution. The collision of cultures and emotions was about to plunge me into a whirlwind of desire, secrets, and shattered dreams.

Enjoyed this week's storyletter? Tap the heart & share it! 😍

Share on Twitter   | Share on Facebook  | Share via email | View past stories

Ajani Inez is a multidisciplinary healer and guide supporting individuals on their healing journey from the lasting effects of childhood trauma. Through her professions as a tarot reader, Kambo practitioner, and writer, she encourages individuals to recognize and restore healthy physical, mental, emotional, social, intellectual, and spiritual factors within themselves. 

Welcome to the self-publishing diaries, where I share behind-the-scenes of my journey publishing Carefree Magazine’s first-ever coffee table book, Black Women In Bloom. Which, by the way, if you click this button, you can join our official waitlist to be notified of our launch in 2 weeks! Ahhhh!

Join The Waitlist

So let’s talk marketing, shall we?

This is the part of the process I’ve been the least excited about (said every author ever). Which is hilarious because I literally work in marketing by day. I know exactly what to do, and yet, I just…don’t really want to. Not when there’s all this other exciting stuff to do, like editorial! design! book tour planning! I’m genuinely in love with what I’m creating and know it will have an impact, but since I know what goes on behind the scenes and why the algorithm pushes some people and not others, it still feels like I have to perform.

This idea of constantly, relentlessly, endlessly, and—possibly to others—annoyingly selling myself just feels so…cringe. But we’ve all decided this is the year we’re done caring about people seeing us trying, right?

I’m doing my best to share in a way that feels natural to me, but my brain can only hold so much at one time, so I’m compromising. I have a strategy, and I have my topics, but I create as it feels natural to me within those bounds, I share it, and I move on. That is the only way I’ll be able to keep moving.

Anywho, speaking of strategy, here’s how I’ve been thinking about marketing the book:

🌸 Creating a universe for the book to live in

No matter what kind of book you’re writing—from poetry to self-help to YA fiction to an anthology—it can have its own universe. Black Women In Bloom lives inside Carefree’s world but is slightly different. You may have noticed, but when talking about the book, I’m using specific language like “seeds to water” and “blooming on your own terms.” I have a designated emoji (🌸) that I use 90% of the time when talking about the book, and the fonts/colors/logos are totally different. This helps anchor a possible reader in a clear, distinguishable branding format. They’ll know when they see certain colors, language, or design, I’m talking about the book.

In 2026, an Edelman Brand Trust Barometer supplement focusing exclusively on visual identity surveyed 14,000 consumers across 11 countries and found that 73% of consumers trust a brand more when it has a consistent visual identity. The writers, showrunners, and other creatives who create worlds are more likely to create a fandom.

🌸 Defining audience personas

When you think about your book being shared, who is the person you’d love to see share it? The person that makes you feel like your book reached the right people? Not a celebrity, just a regular degular person. This is your target audience, or your ideal book reader. You may be thinking, well, my ideal reader isn’t in my current audience, and that’s okay, friend! You’ll want to create a “target audience persona” so you know exactly who you want to attract.

I have three audience personas: Jas from Brooklyn (my core audience), Amara from London/Lagos (my diaspora readers), and Zara from Atlanta (my gen-z audience). I’m not going to go too in-depth on them in this post, but I know a lot about them, like:

• where they live

• how old they are,

• their interests,

• their job,

• their education level, etc.

For BWIB, I’m piggybacking off of Carefree’s audience but also creating a whole new persona that (1) isn’t subscribed to Carefree; they’re brand new, (2) may not be as into online reading but love physical books, and (3) love Blackity Black interior design and aesthetic decor like coffee table books.

🌸 Where Do They Kick It?

Now the fun part (maybe): once you have your persona (or personas), think about where they hang out. Are they a niche community that can only be found in the deepest of subreddits? Maybe they’re on Facebook? Maybe they’re not online and can mainly be found in IRL meetups (I can see this for certain outdoorsy people). Think about what conferences, social platforms, events, and communities they might be in and GO THERE.

What do you do when you’re there? ENGAGE LIKE A NORMAL PERSON. You wouldn’t just stroll into someone’s living room and tape an ad to their forehead now, would you?

You’d get to know the people, engage in conversation, make some friends, and maybe help them make dinner, then when the moment is right—you’d share. The other great thing about creating personas is they give you a head start if you plan to run ads to market your book. You can target the interests you wrote down for your persona and get much better results.

Leave a comment

🌸 Within your world, create your book’s content pillars

I’ve created a few content pillars to help me stay consistent with creating and not have to create from scratch.

Subscribe now

Read more

Join The Waitlist

Hey y’all,

I’m writing this on my way back from Japan, a country I’ve wanted to travel to since I was 12 and has sat unseen on the top of my bucket list since. I don’t know why it took this long to make it happen, I originally booked the trip in 2020, but we all know how that went. But for the past two weeks I’ve been gallivanting through Tokyo to Kyoto to Osaka and back. My itinerary will be up on my travel stack soon. A dream realized. A prayer answered.

prayer
noun

1. a solemn request for help or expression of thanks addressed to God or an object of worship.

I prayed to see these Japanese streets, just like I’ve prayed for friends who are caring for a sick parent, or for a job promotion, or for peace on Earth. That’s the beauty of it, you can pray in a million different ways and know that your prayer is planting a small seed of hope that it can happen. It connects me to the spiritual realm and at the very least, grounds me in my faith. I prayed for times like this, to see Tokyo in all of it’s glory and I’m blessed to have been able to experience it.

This Week’s Story

In this week’s story, we hear from Nigerian-American writer Chioma Gathoga-Ogbuike on her journey to reclaiming prayer on her terms. Not under the guise of religion, but under her own sacred, self-defined view of spirituality. I don’t know how many of you are religious or believe in a higher power, but whether it’s practicing gratitude or getting on your knees to call on God, we all tend to pray in our own way. Just know that you’re allowed to define your spiritual path, it’s not up to anyone else.

Let me know how you feel about this one by sharing or tapping the heart button below!

Take care,

Anayo Awuzie
EIC of Carefree

As a Former Church Girl, I’m Reclaiming Prayer

by Chioma Gathoga-Ogbuike

This piece is a testimonial meant to share a personal journey to building a relationship with prayer, but it is not intended to shame or condemn anyone or any practice. 

At 23, I discovered, finally and gradually, the power of prayer—a newfound yet constant love that has brought me deeper into myself, closer to my childhood spirit, closer to self-sustaining wholeness and oneness; I have finally begun to see myself. 

But I didn’t always see myself. In fact, at one point in my life, I had given up on prayer altogether.

Subscribe now

I was baptized at the age of three, and for most of my childhood, I was raised in the practice of both the Christian and Catholic religions upheld by my Nigerian relatives.

In his life, my father, the rebellious & spirited, new-age yet still old-school Rastafarian, was rather vocal about the philosophical and material difficulties he had with this same organized religion. He was born and raised in this culture, in alignment with the beliefs of The Church. He then grew up to liberate himself from these religious expectations and yet, still coordinated and facilitated the baptisms of his only two children anyway. 

As a child, it became clear to me early on that the faith that reared me would never accept me. I was not even ten years old the first time I learned of religious community members back home organizing to burn people alive if they were found out or suspected to be gay.

It was this interpretation of God that first misled me to believe that something was wrong with me. I believed there was a flaw in my creation, and that being myself would never be acceptable. Still, I did not give up on building a relationship with spirituality. My childhood and teenage years were devastating—cold, bleak, and violent. For as long as I can remember, I have always needed something bigger than myself to believe in, to drive me to keep going, to remind me I cannot give up, to affirm that I am supposed to be here. 

By the time I was 18, I wanted nothing more than to be devoted to another Church; a different denomination altogether. One that I believed would better represent my experience growing up as an African-American woman. In The Church where I was baptized, I hardly ever saw anyone that looked like me or families like mine. I hoped this difference would be what I had been missing all along. To my deepest dismay, it wasn’t. As much as I yearned for community, there was still no home for me to be my full self. Only fractions of myself were welcomed. I had to exist quietly and as small as possible. 

My spirit never could remedy the degree of perfectionism that was expected of me, in order for my devotion to be validated in the eyes of God as told by the Church. There is a culture of purification via dehumanization that is often rooted in certain religious beliefs or practices. This violence has made religion unsafe for so many people, of so many backgrounds.

Many of these customs, under the guise of devotion, have been weaponized in countless ways to justify the violence of racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia, and so much more. People across generations have been violated, traumatized, and discarded physically, spiritually, and mentally in the name of religion. 

For years, I found myself stuck in the cognitive dissonance between knowing that I do not fit in and the pain of yearning to belong, still. 

This tumultuous relationship to religion fueled the internalization of inadequacy. I was a natural-born reject, The Church confirmed it. In addition to that, I came of age terrified to be who I am, to be myself. 

Subscribe now

The loneliness paired with the inadequacy led to years of self-deprecation. Years of shrinking. Years of being personally lost. The self-deprecation was so interwoven into my identity, my inner voice, that I had no idea where it ended and where the real me began; it was all one and the same. I carried myself as if I was not worthy of love and did not deserve to be included in things that are good. 

As I began to forge my path into adulthood, managing my survival meant breaking free of all of that.

As I came into my own, I consciously and subconsciously distanced myself from all things and agents I believed to be associated with The Church. I dismissed all things religious and spiritual as being the sole property of the Church and unrealistic for my life, including prayer. It was here that I began to lean into allowing myself to be every part of who I am. At the time, I thought I was finally liberating myself.

Still, for so long I found myself lost and displaced in my spirituality. I viewed spirituality as only being possible by way of The Church. The danger of normalizing only one or a few forms of spiritual and religious practice is that so many are subsequently forced to condemn themselves for that which makes them human or be cast out of spaces of spirituality altogether, with no other examples of what can be possible.

Not until I was alone in the big little world of New Orleans at 22, away from all I had ever known, external expectations, ideas, and prescriptions of me, that I had the space to be open to healing the metaphysical voids inside me.

Depressing desperation, gaping wounds, and utter confusion led me to what must have been rock bottom. In a place where I knew no one and nothing, I navigated feeling more alone in the world than I had ever felt in my life. To break me wide open, and open I became.

Initially intending to be a journey into self-healing, self-nourishment, self-validation, and self-care, the practice of identifying and uplifting gratitude opened a new and unexpected door for me. Through this door, I discovered the practice of prayer as self-preservation. It was practicing the identification and expression of gratitude that soon brought me into my own ancestral education and exploration. For it is indisputable fact that many came before me in order for my current existence here in this world to be possible. The preservation of the lineage that made it possible for me to be here is not coincidental but Godly. 

My practice began with baby steps. Gradually as it became stronger, my love for myself and everyone around me grew immensely. Protection and discernment have come to me comprehensively the more I pour patience and consistency into learning more about my spiritual practice.

My life was never the same once I realized that my spiritual practice is special because it is personal because it is mine. 

Recently, I discovered the stories of my lineage; of my grandfather’s relationship to religion. Across his lifetime, he was a trusted leader and advisor to his community in our village, Akama Oghe in Enugu State, Nigeria. He believed so fiercely in his roots and the traditional culture of his people that he firmly resisted the pressures to assimilate to the British colonization of Nigeria by adopting Christianity. He would eventually convert, but only five years before my own baptism. My grandfather’s faith is derived from the preservation of Odinani, our Igbo spiritual tradition annihilated by colonialism and racism.

A reminder that we were never meant to fit in from the start. 

Prayer is limitless. It is larger than any one practice because it is a practice of spirituality, which overlaps immensely in many forms and denominations of religious tradition but does not belong solely to any one organized religion. 

For me, my practice currently includes daily prayer which is sometimes in the form of journaling, sometimes in the form of naming my burdens aloud, and sometimes celebrating my gratitude—whatever I feel. 

Also in my spiritual toolbox: 

1. burning 7-day candles, 

2. mixing herbs at home, 

3. spiritual lunar-aligned baths, 

4. singing or dancing to music or whatever moves me, 

5. self-forgiveness and in time granting forgiveness to others,

6. keeping my crystals close,

7. meditating on the love and power within my lineage.

The biggest lesson has been that spirituality demands freedom, demands that you learn to liberate yourself. When the space for exploration is allowed, prayer can serve as the most powerful and grounding practice instilling balance in the presence of chaos. Prayer can cultivate peace and patience, uplift joy even amidst misery, and can manifest goals and dreams both big and small. Prayer can be the ultimate reminder of personal power and purpose; aligning you with the gifts already within you.

Prayer brings you back home to yourself. Sometimes there’s discomfort but that’s a great indicator. You can begin by expressing yourself the way you know best, by practicing stillness, or by praising the breath that moves through you. Prayer is as powerful and as simple as tapping in, choosing love, and forgiving yourself. 

Something that anchors me when things feel hazy or elusive on this journey of life, is to remember all of the resistance, fight, and sacrifice that made way for my existence. This is when I remember the duty I have to liberate myself is actually much bigger than me, and I am reinspired every time.

Leave a comment

Chioma is a writer, creator, womanist, advocate. B.A. Women, Gender Sexuality Studies and Afro-American Studies —University of Massachusetts Amherst. Reproductive Health, Rights, and Justice certified. 

Enjoyed this week's storyletter? Tap the heart & share it! 😍

There are days when I think about the version of myself who started Carefree Magazine over five years ago and realize she was asking a question I didn’t yet have the language for.

When do Black women get to just be?

It’s 2013. I was working a deadend media job and living in New York, which was then my dream city, and was getting ready to work my way up the ladder in what I thought was my dream career as a fashion editor.

I worked for a Black-owned media company, of which there were only a few at the time. I worked at the company that formerly owned the notorious Bossip and Madame Noire, and while I was excited to be reporting on Black fashion and telling the underreported stories of Black designers (I pitched a column called Up & Coming where we covered models, designers, and stylists and people who were yet to be discovered but were on the rise), dozens of listicles and slideshows later, I realized this wasn’t storytelling—it was clickbait.

Subscribe now

Amongst a host of other reasons, including me asking for a raise and getting shut down because New York City had mandated a minimum wage increase from $7.25 to $8, I decided to quit. Between the snow, the craziness I had to deal with daily upon stepping foot outside of my apartment, and me being broke as hell, I let my New York fashion dream quietly fade away.

Back in my childhood bedroom, I plotted. Even though I had left the media world, I still felt like I had unfinished business. It was 2015, and the hashtag #CarefreeBlackGirl, popularized by , began to trend. I felt so seen—finally a space for the girls who loved both SZA and System of a Down, who loved maximalism but also Marie Kondo, who didn’t quite fit the criteria of Black excellence or let endless displays of trauma kill their joy.

I started an IG page to post inspo, just reposts of carefree Black girls I saw online. I kept thinking of all the carefree Black women I knew at the time and how no one knew how cool they were. Black filmmakers, skaters, artists, whimsical girls, corporate girls, nomads, girls walking a non-linear life path. I had the idea in 2015. I ran the IG page and hosted a few writing workshops, but I didn’t really get the balls to launch the call for submissions for the magazine until 2020.

I was hungry for stories that lived in the middle. The in-between space. The space between Black excellence and Black suffering. For most of us, that’s where our lives actually happen. I wanted stories about falling in love with someone you probably shouldn’t have. Moving to a new city and realizing you don’t know who you are there yet. Stories of starting over at 32, 40, or whenever the world tells you it’s too late.

And we’ve been telling those stories, week by week, for the past 5 years. Personal essays from Black women around the world about life, love, identity, mistakes, adventure, and the quiet moments that shape who we become. But can I be honest? While I knew these stories had impact—the beautiful comments and emails I received from all of you told me as much—I didn’t quite know what my end goal was. After four years of publishing, I had no idea what to do next.

I went looking for answers: I asked friends, I searched high and low online for information (or validation?), and I even applied and got into a prestigious Black women's business accelerator. Some told me to scale into a conference (not a bad idea, but no), some told me to start putting stories behind a paywall (I would never), and some told me to charge the community for access to the community (but then what is community?!). It wasn’t until I was venting to a mentor that I learned what to do next.

Subscribe now

I bared my soul to them, boo-hoo crying and all about how everyone wants me to turn Carefree into a business and how I just don’t feel like that’s my calling. They said:

You are an advocate and you’re building a mission-based business. You have a vision for how you see the world, and you want to create community around that vision. It’s a vision that drives a better world for the community you care about—you’re on a mission so you don’t need to care about P&L’s and maximizing profit, but you need to care about impacting your community.

That changed my entire perception of what I’m doing here, and immediately, I knew that we needed a book. It had been a seed of an idea, but my mentor woke it up. If I’m an advocate, then I need to do just that. I took a closer look, and again and again, I noticed a thread running through these stories. As Black women, we’re leaving versions of ourselves behind and learning how to trust our voices. In these stories, I see women stepping into themselves in a way that feels both terrifying and freeing. I see Black women in bloom. These stories are not just individual tales; they’re a collective guide to Black womanhood. A bouquet of evidence of life lived, a garden of women ready to pass the watering can to feed the next woman’s soil.

This is my mission, and it’s what I’ve been working towards week by week. A five-year journey realized. Black Women In Bloom is the natural narrative next chapter of Carefree Magazine. It is my same belief in storytelling and the same belief that Black women deserve to see themselves reflected in their full humanity.

I say all this to say the work you’re doing is never for naught; at some point the cycle will make its way back around, and you’ll realize what you were working towards all along.

How to Water Seeds of An Idea 🌸

1. Protect the idea long enough for it to take root. In the early stages, ideas are fragile. Too many opinions too soon can crush them before they’ve had a chance to grow. I was searching high and low for answers and kept looking to others to tell me what to do, when I had the idea that felt most true to me all along.

2. Do the small, consistent work. Seeds don’t grow because you water them once. They grow because you return to them over and over again. Ideas arre the same. While sharing these stories every week had impact, I had moments of not knowing the end goal. Little did I know, I was sowing the seeds of something much larger, and I’m excited for these stories to have an ever bigger impact.

3. Start inviting the right ingredients in. None of us can grow alone, and that’s certainly the case for seeds. After an idea starts to take shape, start surrounding it with the right environment—writers, collaborators, readers, partners who understand the spirit of what you’re building. Keyword: understand, because nothing kills a seed faster than the wrong ecosystem.

Leave a comment

Take care,

Anayo Awuzie,
EIC of Carefree Media

P.S. - Thanks for reading the self-pub diaries! Let me know in the comments if there’s anything you want me to cover about my process of self-publishing. See you next week!

Join The Waitlist

Hey y’all,

I know this story letter is strictly for the gals, but can I talk about Michael B. Jordan for a second?

I’ve been a fan of MBJ for a looong time. I didn’t catch him in The Wire, but from Fruitvale Station onward, I think I’ve watched at least 80% of his movies (and probably most of Ryan Coogler’s too).

Last night, he won the Oscar for Best Leading Actor. Let Threads tell it, if he didn’t win last night, it would be the final (read: millionth) confirmation that #OscarsSoWhite and a dog whistle turned megaphone of their active prevention of Black talent shining at the awards. But he won, and Sinners won four other awards (excluding Best Director, which is problematic but for someone else to write about).

I couldn’t help but think of all the people (re: haters) who, at some point between Creed 2 and Black Panther, decided that he was corny and a terrible actor; why does he keep trying? Which led me to thinking about timing. There’s a journey we all go on when we decide to push past the cringe, imposter syndrome, and perception of what others might think and go for our biggest desires, dreams, and goals. On that journey, people are going to see us trying—old bosses, ex-best friends, flames that have burned out—everyone. Some will cheer us on, some will be unmoved, and some will straight up think to themselves, “It’s not working; why do they keep trying?”

But get this: absolutely nobody, NOBODY, can stop you when God says something is yours. You just have to walk forward on the path and have faith that at some point, it will be yours. There has always been something about MBJ’s journey that let me know he was walking in his purpose and one day he would get rewarded for it. Last night was a BIG confirmation: his FIRST Oscar nomination and FIRST Oscar win. Not that we need the award shows to validate our work; he was already reaping the rewards, but this one, this one hits different. He was called corny, lame, and a bad actor as he tried his way all the way up, and today, those same people are rooting for his success. Go figure.

Also, THIS!

Leave a comment

This Week’s Story

We’re pulling from the #CarefreeArchives and bringing back an important piece from writer and blogger Princess Avianne Charles. She explains how Black women have to carefully navigate the world based on social constructs meant to keep us boxed in, and to our detriment. Black women are gaslit and manipulated into silencing our voices through society and family structure. Most would prefer Black women to remain quiet rather than speak their truth in these times, but I love to see that we’re continuing to get louder than ever.

Take care,

Anayo Awuzie
EIC of Carefree Media

Befriending My Anger

by Princess Avianne Charles

What I feel means more than the definitions others try to place on it.

Irrational emotions, unreasonable hostility—the idea of the angry Black woman has universally plagued how Black women carry themselves. Society associates whiteness with fragility and innocence while labeling Black identities as aggressive. Even when we are justifiably angry, our emotions are stigmatized and invalidated to satisfy the apathy of others. Instead, they should serve as an alarm: a signal for improvement, contentment, or even dissatisfaction. My emotions, particularly my anger, alert me when I am in an environment or an interaction I deserve better than to be in.

Subscribe now

The process of grappling with this wasn’t easy, nor did it occur in a linear fashion. Coming to terms with my anger has led to several tribulations but reinforced values that I, at times, ignored. Recently, with the profound dismantling of social, environmental, and systemic settings politically, my anger has become more prevalent. My constant displeasure was at odds with my emotional and mental well-being. Returning to the stereotypical values placed on me as a Black woman, even I fell victim to believing them, guiltily critiquing my emotions to make room for others.

In order to readjust my thought patterns, I needed to understand the “angry Black woman” stereotype. Historically, Black women have been labeled as angry and irrational, incapable of expressing ourselves in the realm of joy, contentment, or anything outside of aggressive behavior. Our tone, mannerisms, and behaviors are policed based on the idea that our feelings are exaggerated and invalid. Amidst misogynoir, racism, sexism, and many other forms of harm and prejudices, we’re expected to maintain a calm and pleasant demeanor in response to bad treatment. Harm towards us continues, while we face a series of risks in every setting and are often held accountable for others’ actions.

Even worse, our likelihood of experiencing harm increases depending on our intersectional identities, such as our sexuality, size, complexion, class status, and much more. Classism, colorism, fatphobia, and anti-LGBTQIA sentiments, amongst other prejudices, create even more threats to our safety and well-being. We are left to endure, often without resolution or support, the social, structural, and systemic issues that pose significant threats to us.

Becoming aware of the increased risks we as Black women are susceptible to created a level of distress that I was unfamiliar with before. Having my emotions policed restricted my ability to understand them thoroughly, as society, not me, got the final say. But the “Angry Black Woman” label oversensationalizes the humanness of anger or rage or any similar emotion. It created barriers I couldn’t cross, altering how I express myself and respond to ongoing injustices. In turn, the skewed perspective of anger left me unable to handle situations effectively.

The concerns of Black women are usually treated as an afterthought—or ignored entirely. I’ve become aware of insidious patterns in my interactions with former friends, colleagues, and even strangers—experiences that stir emotions no one should have to carry. The interpersonal experiences I met both on- and offline motivated me to suppress further, avoiding any means of dealing with my anger. Although Black women are more likely to use social media than our peers, we are 84% more likely to be abused on social media than white women, according to a 2018 Amnesty International study.

We love being online for the connection, joy, and community, but at the same time, being online creates further animosity towards Black women, and we have fewer available spaces to authentically be ourselves without backlash. According to a 2026 report by , 38% of respondents rated digital spaces as “unsafe” or “very unsafe,” highlighting that a significant portion of Black women feel vulnerable in open digital spaces. Social media platforms became less of a safe space and, instead, another avenue for me to be misunderstood. As I allowed my anger to permeate my daily thoughts, it became impossible for me to actually confront situations in a productive way.

Eventually, I found clarity, ironically through my emotions. It was an unpleasant process, but I learned to identify with my feelings. Understanding how to utilize my anger allowed me to understand the multi-faceted complexities of other people. How others act has nothing to do with me and can stem from various factors—their cultural background, upbringing, socialization, what they ate that day, and more. I’ve now realized the importance of self-evaluation. When my anger arises, I ask myself, does this have anything to do with me personally?

I’ve learned that while I was unable to control the actions of others, I could be in control of my own. It’s my response to a situation that determines what happens, including establishing boundaries with others. I can grant myself the opportunity to unlearn what others define me as and create an identity of my own.

I’ve learned to befriend my anger, and I utilize various outlets to express it healthily, mainly through artistic expression like writing. Understanding my emotions also meant I had to find outlets to release them. It’s essential to our survival to express and let go of emotions that no longer serve us. In a world that governs Black women’s feelings, how can we be guided to discover healthy ways of expressing them? To find suitable mediums, we need the room to see our anger as a valid emotion, one that, like any other, will be followed by a change in our response, behavior, and treatment.

My anger is a layered, complex emotion, more than how society portrays it. My anger evokes a call for better, intolerance of the intolerable, and a natural response to negative actions. I’ve learned how to communicate and confront harmful behaviors and reflect on what evoked the emotion in the first place. I have re-established boundaries and have a deeper awareness of the continuous experiences Black women face daily. Befriending my anger was also an opportunity for sensitization, which is necessary for social settings.

I came to terms with an emotion with negative connotations in the Black diaspora. As a Black woman, I am more than contempt, disappointment, dissatisfaction, sadness, or anger. Even though these emotions can relate to wrongful behaviors I am responsible for, I am allowed the room for introspection to process them. This process should occur not through a prejudiced lens but by an emotionally intelligent one, understanding that I, like anyone else, deserve to assert my emotions on my terms.

Leave a comment

Princess Avianne Charles is a Trinidadian writer and blogger. With experience in occupational safety and health, she promotes safer spaces and advocates for human rights both in and out of the workplace.

Enjoyed this week’s storyletter? Tap the heart & share it! 😍

Share on Twitter | Share on Facebook | Share via email | View past stories

Welcome to the self-publishing diaries 🌸 where I share the behind-the-scenes of my journey publishing Carefree Magazine’s first-ever coffee table book anthology, Black Women in Bloom (this link takes you to our official waitlist!).

So first off, I have no idea what I’m doing. Well, I didn’t. Still don’t, but I’m learning quickly. I knew self-publishing a book wouldn’t be easy, but I knew I would learn a lot. I knew I would stretch. I knew I would meet new people. I knew it would attract me to aligned opportunities. But what I legit didn’t know is how fun it would be!

There is this freedom to create and execute on a vision born purely from my brain that feels so fluid and giving me so much joy. It’s been a while since I’ve been in a flow state this many times, but I’ve been feeling like I’m on an episode of Spongebob the way time be flying.

With the Carefree newsletter, there is a format I follow and stick to. Once the essays are edited, everything else is plug and play. But this? I’m letting go of the template. The cover design was supposed to be finished a month ago, but we just got it done last week; that’s okay. I don’t have the product page built yet for our pre-order opening in three weeks; that’s okay. I have a list of things to do and people to help me do it, but otherwise I’m vibing and following my intuition.

Subscribe now

I’ve been consulting with (and still am) so many dope people who’ve already gone on this journey like , , K.C. Mills, and , to name a few, and I’ll share some of the advice they gave me as well as what I’ve been up to.

Over the next few weeks until the launch date, I’ll be one part yapping about my progress and one part offering a (hopefully somewhat) helpful guide to how to navigate self-publishing an anthology. I’m learning and executing at the same time, so take what’s helpful and leave the rest. This letter is all about your first 3-4 months. I already had a platform, so I skipped a lot of steps (starting an email list, deciding on the book name & vibe, sourcing essays), but here is what my first few months looked like:

Month 1

1. Told everyone I know that I’m publishing a book. Literally everyone. I ran the ideas by friends, subscribers, random neighbors—everybody and they mama heard about this book. It’s a seed that was planted while I was in a business accelerator, realizing that I didn’t want to grow Carefree in the ways they were suggesting (conference! paid subscriptions! ads!), but at one point “book” dropped in my mind (looking at you God) and it all just made sense. Telling people made it real, and it also helped with accountability. You want to do this? You need people constantly asking you for updates so you can feel the fear of potentially not having any. If not by your own sheer will, peer pressure will demand you get it done.

2. Assembled a team who could fill in the gaps. When I first talked to Rachel (Word of Mouth), who recently put out her own anthology called Search Work, she mentioned she had a team of volunteers helping her with editing. A lightbulb went off; I thought I’d be doing this on my own. But she said the work involved gathering, editing, proofreading, and communicating with the writers alone is a multi-person operation, so she brought in editors from her community to help. I immediately did the same. I wrangled up my talented friends to delegate operations, editorial, PR, web development, social/marketing, and everything else. We meet weekly, and without them I wouldn’t have made half the progress I’ve made.

Month 2

1. Hired a designer & had a kickoff call. You want to get this done sooner than later, especially if the designer is doing the full editorial layout. If they’re just designing the cover, you have some wiggle room. Shoutout to my assistant for finding the most aligned designer for this project. She’s based in France and has been such a delight to work with. I initially thought it was going to be me and Canva thugging it out, but with the vision I had—premium, artsy, maximalist, Black girl fly shit—I needed a professional. I cannot wait for the cover reveal in a few weeks, she did her big one.

2. Started lightly posting about the book on social. Specifically on Threads, IG, and TT. The Black girl online book community runs deep. I started posting there to dip my toe in the pool and experiment with my book promotion social strategy. After 6 months of posting, we’ve honed in on Threads, Substack, and IG as the main channels for book discovery.

3. Finalized the chapters and the essays to be featured in the book. A biiiig deal! From there, we kicked off proofreading since most of the essays had been edited already.

4. Talking and meeting with erybody and they mama. I started networking with authors, Black-owned brands, BookTok, other aspiring anthology curators. It was all worth it. So many collaborations and partnerships are on the horizon just from me talking to people.

Month 3

1. Sent out contributor agreements. And immediately one of the writers pulled out of the project (FML) because I didn’t do my due diligence to learn the difference between full ownership and non-exclusive licensing agreements. I’ll write about this in another letter, but do NOT play about the contributor agreements. They protect everyone, especially if you’re planning to offer something other than monetary compensation for their work.

2. Began planning the book tour, aka Bloom Sessions, and finalized the tour stops. ATL, Dallas, LA, The Bay, Philly & NYC—see you soon!

3. Reached out to artists to feature their artwork and also held a pitch call.

4. Worked with my developer to build the waitlist and pre-order site.

5. Started shopping around for book printers and debated pricing for too long. This probably also deserves its own newsletter, but I reached out to a bunch of printers and essentially compared quotes. I then calculated what I would need to charge to make my money back and ultimately went with the printer who allowed me to sell a realistic amount without needing to charge an arm and a leg.

Month 4

1. Began putting together a pitch deck for funding/sponsorship. I’m still putting the final touches on the deck, but I absolutely believe this project is in alignment with some brands and organizations’ funding needs. My goal is $50,000 in funding to make the book and Bloom Session programming happen.

2. Landed on the story flow within the book. As in, I know which essay opens the book, which ones open & close each chapter, and the last essay.

3. Reached out to bookstores for in-person book events.

4. Bought an ISBN number. I debated this for awhile. I didn’t want to get an ISBN, but a chat with a book PR girly convinced me otherwise. The ISBN allows bookstores to be able to search your book and sell it. Originally, I wanted to just sell it on my own, but I want to give this book a fighting chance of extending past my reach and an ISBN will help me do that. It was $125 for one, and you’ll need one for each book format.

5. Found a printer! More on that later.

6. Decided on merchandise to go along with the launch.

Depending on your launch date, you might do more or less in your first few months. This list could’ve been 100x longer, but then Substack would show me that stupid message that says you're near your email length limit, so I’m keeping it to the highlights. I’m proud of the work we’ve done so far, and even without knowing what I’m doing, I’m doing it!

Thanks for tuning in to my self-publishing diaries! Any questions? Drop them in the comments!

Leave a comment

I have a likkle flex. I save a ton of recipes, hair inspo pics, quotes, and ideas on Pinterest and IG but rarely circle back to them. Well, yesterday I ventured through the cobwebs of my collections, landed on a seemingly easy hairstyle, and tried it. It took me 10 minutes, cost $8, and had me feeling like baby girl and that girl at the same damn time.

I was going for Afro-modern chic, and dare I say, I did that.

Ok, enough about my hair, YALL! Let me tell you something—self-publishing a coffee table book, coordinating over 50 contributors, and managing an entire editorial, distribution, marketing, and PR operation simultaneously?! No joke. It’s been a lot, but it’s been so rewarding. I’m seriously having a ball, and it’s been a minute since I’ve hit flow state so consistently.

We’ve made so much progress on Black Women In Bloom, and we’re on track to publish this spring! We have a team, we have a cover (ahhh! it’s stunning, promise), and we have a pre-order date. While I can’t share either of those just yet (but will very soon), please believe my Carefree crew will be the first to know.

Some temporary changes…

Mondays

I’ll still be publishing on Mondays as always, but while the editorial layout for the book is underway for the next month or so, I’ll be bringing back oldies but goodies from the Carefree Mag archives!

We’ve grown a lot since some of these stories were published, and by my count, most of you weren’t here to read them. I’ll be shining a new light on these stories, which will also give me some space to finish the editorial process before I announce this year’s call for submissions (also coming soon). Two birds, one scone.

Fridays

I’ll be sending out an additional newsletter just for Black Women In Bloom and the behind-the-scenes of the process. I’ve started doing this a bit on our IG, and it seems to be resonating. You’re already subscribed to the new Friday letter. But if you’re not interested, all good; just follow these instructions to unsubscribe from that specific section (you’ll still be subscribed to Carefree). We’re doing it!

Without further ado, this week’s goodie comes from Eva Waitherero who is having anxiety about turning 30.

Take care,

Anayo Awuzie
EIC of Carefree Mag

I Turned 30 And Started Questioning Everything

by Eve Waitherero

For almost all of my life, I’ve felt an intense, suffocating pressure to achieve everything I want before my youth slips away. Thirty™ was my deadline to have my career, finances, and love life “figured out."

As the eldest child, I have always carried this weight to be the first to tick everything off the list and set a great example for my younger siblings. Right before my 28th birthday, I remember standing in my kitchen sobbing and having a mini panic attack. I had suddenly “woken up” to the realization that I was exiting my twenties. I legit remember calling my mother to ask her about my date of birth and to confirm whether I was truly turning 28—it was that bad.

Fast-forward two years later, and this time around I was damn sure that I was indeed turning the mammoth age of 30™. I recalled my panic attack at 28 and decided to give myself a pep talk to avoid letting my brain bully me into a funk—my efforts were futile. There I was on Tuesday morning, the 10th of August, waking up to “Happy Birthday” texts that I didn’t bother to reply to until later that evening. I got ready and went to work as usual, and that’s when it suddenly hit me: I felt alone and unaccomplished. I wanted more out of my life, and I didn’t understand why I wasn’t where I wanted to be. I just sat at my desk contemplating every life choice I’d ever made.

Subscribe now

Why does everyone make such a big fuss about this age? I’ve always had this vision of my life at 30™ but it looks much different from the life I’m living right now. This was not the dirty thirty that I had pictured for years on end full of dancing, booze, and a wild one-week girls’ trip to Bali. Instead, it was a day filled with stress, introspection, and anxiety. I now realize this wave of uncertainty I was facing was due to an influx of subliminal messaging I became aware of. Society says buy a house, have a husband, a baby, and a thriving career all by the age of 30™. And if you’re not in some incredibly stable place in your life or still figuring things out, then you must be failing.

My mind was racing; I don’t have a lot of friends, I am not married, I don’t have kids, I am not a world-renowned makeup artist, nor have I brought world peace; heck, I don’t even know what legacy I want to leave. I just couldn’t shake off this idea of the fact that I am “getting old”, yet not feeling “adult enough” due to not achieving these so-called milestones. Suddenly, my thoughts were interrupted by a call from my best friend. I contemplated ignoring it but after a few rings, I picked up the call to her enthusiastically singing the “Happy Birthday” song, and that’s when the waterworks started.

I could barely get a word out to thank her for the warm wishes, so I just hung up to avoid having that “what’s wrong” conversation. And truly, I wouldn’t even know where to start.

I knew at this point my work productivity had hit rock bottom, so I decided to head home. To my surprise, my mom and sister were there holding a six-pound birthday cake with the big 30™ written out in frosting on top. “Why does everyone seem so excited about my big day more than I am?” That was the first thought that crossed my mind, followed by, “Did they have to put the 30 on the cake?”

As I blew out the candles, I felt the three decades of my life flash before my eyes. Until now, I have floated along quite happily, never slowing down to think of my mortality. As I age, so too are the people around me that I love, and I know that I will inevitably have to deal with loss in terms of death. The three strands of silver hair (yes, I counted them) that I see whenever I look at myself in the mirror have now become a constant reminder of my limited time on this planet.

Subscribe now

I know it’s all in my head, and I shouldn’t compare my life to others. Success is subjective, and we all have different paths. Yet, I look around and it seems like I’m surrounded by peers who are achieving so much more with their lives. I can’t help but feel like I’m lagging, desperately trying to play catch-up as best as I can. I know that it’s up to me to decide which milestones I value and which ones I’ve just been told to value based on the number of years I’ve been around. I know all of this, but it doesn’t make this looming feeling any less real. It’s been three months now into this new decade, and I still have my moments of freaking out, but I’m slowly coming to the realization that there is no right way to be an adult.

Not knowing what I am doing, feeling anxious, and learning as I go—all of that is yet another constant in life that should be discussed more in my social circles. Everyone’s story is unique. And as I settle into this new decade, I am reminding myself daily that I have the opportunity to call the shots on the unique story of my life. I am still coming to terms with this new age. I haven’t got everything figured out yet; however, here are some truths that have and are making me feel a lot more relaxed about life.

1. Remembering to separate my feelings from facts: I am very introverted, an INFJ to be specific, and I knew if I spent the rest of my birthday thinking of all the things I have not accomplished, it would be a slippery slope from there. Before I called it a night, I took a pen and paper and listed down some of the things I have been able to accomplish, both big and small. This is a helpful way to separate feelings from facts, and it helped me realize just how much I have to celebrate.

2. Nobody has it all figured out: I always thought that the older I got, the more clarity I would have in understanding this thing called life. In my teens and early twenties, adults always looked like they had everything figured out. But as I became that adult, I slowly began to realize that this isn’t always true. I am doing the best I can with what I know now. There is no need to place unnecessary stress on myself by believing that I should have everything set in stone by a certain time.

3. Realizing that growing old is a privilege: This has helped me get out of the my-life-is-over-and-I’m-running-out-of-time phase. Instead, it has empowered me to embrace the fact that this could just be the beginning of a new chapter in my story. Each day is a gift, and the more I moan about turning another year, the less likely I will be able to appreciate every minute I’ve got on this earth.

4. Create personal milestones: I choose to do things on my own timetable and focus on myself and the goals that I want to accomplish. I choose to believe that my life will unfold the way it’s supposed to. We are all aware of society’s conventional markers of success and accomplishment, especially for women. It’s easy to feel a lot of pressure to get married, or have a serious partner, to think about having children, etc., but I’ve learned to take all of it with a grain of salt and to question whether these so-called markers represent the ultimate goal of life. There is no perfect time to get married or have kids, and this is certainly not a path for everyone.

I gave myself the space to feel all the feels about turning the big 3-0™ without letting it overpower me. It’s not too late for me, and nothing can stop me from doing what I want to do. Taking stock of my life has made me realize how happy I actually am. I have my own business and a career that I am passionate about, and amazing friends and family around me, I am a proud cat mom, and I’m in a relationship with someone I love. My 30th birthday might not have been the “success” that I had imagined, but it is still a milestone worth celebrating.

Leave a comment

Eve Waitherero is a freelance writer who is passionate about storytelling. She is also a professional makeup artist who is unapologetically obsessed with all things beauty!

I’ve been really enjoying these author conversations! Last week I sat down with , economist and author of The Double Tax, to talk about colorism: where it lives in pop culture, how it shapes our relationships, and the very real economic toll it takes on Black women. Here’s the quick recap and some seeds for you to water. And of course, watch the full conversation for all the goods.

Subscribe now

The Tide Is Shifting

From Nyma Tang’s makeup reviews to Olandria becoming the unambiguous, unequivocally Black it-girl, Anna and I traced the slow, steady stepping stones that brought us to what seems like a moment in the sun for dark-skinned Black women. This moment is the result of years of Black women carving out space for ourselves and each other. That said, Anna was quick to add: we’re not done. Diversity in beauty still has a long way to go.

Seeds To Water 🌸

• Document the shift. People will try to gaslight you into forgetting how far we’ve come. Write it down.

• Unlearning is ongoing work. It requires self-reflection and accountability.

• Honor the pioneers. No “moment” happens in a vacuum. The Jackie Ainas, Nyma Tangs, and Missy Elliotts of the world made today possible.

Colorism Has a Price Tag

Anna came with receipts. Research—including economist Derrick Hamilton’s work—shows lighter-skinned Black women are more likely to be hired, earn more, and be married. Darker-skinned Black women face bias in the labor market, the marriage market, and even in lending. The assumptions tied to darker skin tones (less intelligent, less trustworthy) are wrong, and costly to us all.

Seeds To Water 🌸

• Name it as discrimination. Colorism isn’t a preference; it’s bias with real consequences.

• “Preference” doesn’t exist in a vacuum. It’s shaped by media, history, and power.

• Follow the money. When you have the power to hire, cast, or spotlight, look at who you’re putting on.

Lift As You Climb, Or We All Stay Stuck

Our fates are tethered. When light-skinned Black women open the door and bring darker-skinned women through, we all win. Use your platform to bring others up, and you don’t lose anything; you just make the pie bigger. At the 15% Pledge event, we examined who gets photographed, spotlighted, and positioned as the face of “Black excellence.” Even in spaces meant to advance Black businesses, proximity to Eurocentric beauty standards still quietly shapes visibility. She also closed with this: colorism loses its power when we stop orienting everything around the white gaze. Build for us now.

Seeds To Water 🌸

• Give your flowers publicly. Credit the people who paved your path. That acknowledgment is how we build a culture that keeps lifting.

• Release the white gaze. If every move is filtered through “how will white people perceive this,” you lose — and so does your legacy.

Leave a comment

Reflection Questions ✨

• Where have you internalized colorism, consciously or not? Think about who you follow, hire, feature, or date.

• In what areas of your life are you still performing for the white gaze, and what would it look like to release it?

Thanks for tuning in to Carefree Convos! Feel free to reflect and drop your thoughts in the comments!