Come one, come all!
The Metropolitan Washington Public Health Association (MWPHA) is hosting their annual meeting, “Healthy Women, the Cornerstone of Strong Societies” on Wednesday, May 16, 2012 from 8am-4pm.
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NEW EVENT — Mother’s Day 2012 “Love, Mom” Brunch featuring HEART Spokesperson, Ms. Joi-Marie McKenzie @DCFab!
Hey Divas! Check out this new weekend challenge from womenshealthmag:
Weekend Challenge: WALL SITS
This week, we’re mixing it up. Remember doing Wall Sits in elementary school gym? They’re back. Get into position this weekend and see how long you can hold this challenging move. Seriously. Hold on until your muscles are screaming! Note your time—we’ll be asking for it on Monday morning. So…ARE YOU IN?
BREAKING: Joi Marie McKenzie, of The Fab Empire, Heads Divas, MPH 2012 Heart Health Campaign
Divas, MPH-DC is thrilled to announce our 2012 heart health campaign, Love Yourself with All Your H.E.A.R.T. (Health Education, Action, Resources, and Training). We are equally excited to introduce you to our 2012 H.E.A.R.T. campaign spokeswoman, Ms. Joi-Marie McKenzie, acclaimed writer, producer, and creator of the award-winning website The Fab Empire.
The 2012 H.E.A.R.T. campaign is built around a one year calendar of engaging, educational, and community centered outreach activities in the DC-metropolitan area. The campaign kicks off on National Wear Red Day with the first in a series of Heart Truth awareness initiatives, I <3 Her Heart: Wear Red for the Heart You Love. Women - and men - all over the country will wear the color red in honor of the heart of a woman they love. We will post, tweet, and blog their photos along with key facts and risk factors all day! In true Fab! Diva style, Joi-Marie (@DCFab on Twitter and Joi Marie on Facebook) - all decked out in red - is leading us in this initiative in honor of the heart of her mother, and fellow women’s wellness advocate, Bishop Vashti Murphy McKenzie (@VashtiMcKenzie on Twitter).
We ask that you, too, share your picture in red with Divas, MPH on Twitter using the #hearttruth hashtag, via Facebook, or by email at heart@divasmph.org. Then take it a step further, get engaged, share facts, and learn the risk factors for yourself or for the heart of a woman YOU love. Stay connected to Divas, MPH (@DivasMPH on Twitter and Divas, MPH on Facebook) and our heart health ambassador, Joi-Marie McKenzie throughout the year for the latest in heart health news, and more initiatives and activities in the DC-metropolitan area including the 2012 Love, Mom Mother’s Day Brunch this May, the 10-week education & fitness summer series, and the community-wide day of service in November.
Be happy. Be HEART healthy. Be well.
Divas, MPH
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About Divas, MPH
Divas, MPH is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization committed to educating, empowering, and mobilizing women to create healthier communities. Divas, MPH seeks to encourage and enable women to take an active interest in achieving and maintaining total health and wellness—mind, body, and soul—for themselves, their families, and their communities through innovative and socially savvy community activities and classes, media campaigns, and events series’. Current work is based in the Washington, DC, Atlanta, Georgia, metropolitan areas and the Harlem section of New York City, but the organization continues to search for opportunities to expand its outreach. For more on Divas, MPH visit www.divasmph.org.
About Joi-Marie
Joi-Marie McKenzie is the creator of The Fab Empire, an award-winning Web site site that covers society, politics, celebrities and local events in Baltimore, Boston, New York and Washington, D.C. McKenzie, with her team of contributors and photographers, has successfully created a brand that speaks to the needs of young urban professionals. McKenzie also serves as a producer of entertainment content for ABC News Radio. Previously, she has freelanced for publications including The Afro American Newspaper, Clutch Magazine, NBC New York and NBC Washington. For more on Joi-Marie McKenzie visit www.joimarie.com.
Spiritual Truth Thursday: A Cheerful Heart
It always seems easy to tell my friends and loved ones not to worry, but I often have a hard time taking my own advice. There are many things that we as women deal with on a regular basis that lead to worry, doubt, and fear. Our finances, relationships, children, moving to a new city (Shout out to Diva Tee ), job security, school, and especially healthcare. Just look at all the women’s health issues that have been in the news this week — the Pfizer birth control recall and Susan G. Komen pulling their funding from Planned Parenthood. When we worry it’s hard to have a positive outlook on life. The more negative we become the more we worry. Sometimes we even worry ourselves heart sick. Anxiety leads to a heavy heart which can lead to depression and increase your risk of heart disease. So when life seems to get you down, it’s important to seek sources of encouragement. “An anxious heart weighs a man down, but a kind word cheers him up” – Proverbs 12:25.
The scripture provides us with a simple step to a cheerful heart…hear a kind word! We can receive a kind word from reading scriptures, during a vent session with our girlfriends, or even from talking with family. You may even need to speak a kind word to yourself! Wake up in the morning and take a look in the mirror and say, Be Amazing Today, I’m fearfully and wonderfully made, I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me, I am Beautiful, and I will Be Bold Today! These simple kind words can begin to ease your fears and fill your heart with hope. It takes a cheerful heart for when trials come your way to be able to remain strong and rest on God’s promises. Having a cheerful heart will help you to be bold and take risks! A cheerful heart is medicine to your soul.
Are you heart sick today? Read some of your favorite scriptures or affirmations and call up your bestie, booski, bff, boo, your boyfriend, your mama, or Jesus (who is always on the mainline) and let them pour into you words of encouragement to cheer up your heart!
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Join Divas, MPH in our 2012 digital media campaign, I <3 Her Heart: Wear Red for the Heart You Love, this Friday, February 3, 2012 for National Wear Red Day. Take a picture of yourself in red, for the heart of a woman you love, and share it one of the following ways: post to Divas, MPH on Facebook, tweet to @DivasMPH using the #HeartTruth hashtag, or email to heart@divasmph.org.
Divas EJ
[Motivation Monday] An Enduring Heart
Do you remember the childhood story The Little Engine That Could? If not, let me refresh your memory!
The Little Engine That Could by Watty Piper
A little steam engine had a long train of cars to pull.
She went along very well till she came to a steep hill. But then, no matter how hard she tried, she could not move the long train of cars.
She pulled and she pulled. She puffed and she puffed. She backed and started off again. Choo! Choo!
But no! the cars would not go up the hill.
At last she left the train and started up the track alone. Do you think she had stopped working? No, indeed! She was going for help.
“Surely I can find someone to help me,” she thought.
Over the hill and up the track went the little steam engine. Choo, choo! Choo, choo! Choo, choo! Choo!
Pretty soon she saw a big steam engine standing on a side track. He looked very big and strong. Running alongside, she looked up and said:
“Will you help me over the hill with my train of cars? It is so long and heavy I can’t get it over.”
The big steam engine looked down at the little steam engine. The he said:
“Don’t you see that I am through my day’s work? I have been rubbed and scoured ready for my next run. No, I cannot help you,”
The little steam engine was sorry, but she went on, Choo, choo! Choo, choo! Choo, choo! Choo, choo!
Soon she came to a second big steam engine standing on a side track. He was puffing and puffing, as if he were tired.
“That big steam engine may help me,” thought the little steam engine. She ran alongside and asked:
“Will you help me bring my train of cars over the hill? It is so long and so heavy that I can’t get it over.”
The second big steam engine answered:
“I have just come in from a long, long run. Don’t you see how tired I am? Can’t you get some other engine to help you this time?
“I’ll try,” said the little steam engine, and off she went. Choo, choo! Choo, choo! Choo, choo!
After a while she came to a little steam engine just like herself. She ran alongside and said:
“Will you help me over the hill with my train of cars? It is so long and so heavy that I can’t get it over.”
“Yes, indeed!” said this little steam engine. “I’ll be glad to help you, if I can.”
So the little steam engines started back to where the train of cars had been standing. Both little steam engines went to the head of the train, one behind the other.
Puff, puff! Chug, choo! Off they started!
Slowly the cars began to move. Slowly they climbed the steep hill. As they climbed, each little steam engine began to sing:
“I-think-I-can! I-think-I-can! I-think-I-can! I-think-I-can! I-think-I-can! I-think-I-can! I think I can - I think I can - I think I can I think I can—”
And they did! Very soon they were over the hill and going down the other side.
Now they were on the plain again; and the little steam engine could pull her train herself. So she thanked the little engine who had come to help her, and said good-by.
And she went merrily on her way, singing:
“I-thought-I-could! I-thought-I-could! I-thought-I-could! I-thought-I-could! I thought i could - I thought I could - I thought I could - I thought I could - I thought I could - I thought I could I thought I could —”
THE END
If you believe it, you can achieve it! This story is a true testament that positive thinking coupled with an enduring heart (i.e. persistence, refusing to give up, etc.) can make what seems to be impossible possible.
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Join Divas, MPH in our 2012 digital media campaign, I <3 Her Heart: Wear Red for the Heart You Love, this Friday, February 3, 2012 for National Wear Red Day. Take a picture of yourself in red, for the heart of a woman you love, and share it one of the following ways: post to Divas, MPH on Facebook, tweet to @DivasMPH using the #HeartTruth hashtag, or email to heart@divasmph.org.
~Diva T
Get Courageous DC Divas!
[Motivation Monday] Blackjack
Today’s post is courtesy of Diva T
Walk through the casino long enough and you will hear someone screaming, Blackjack, denoting that the player has an Ace and a Jack totaling the magic number 21.
Research shows the number 21 is also considered the magic number when you are trying to make a habit/change stick. At the end of 2011 or the very beginning of 2012, most of us made a statement, set resolution or goal, or established a habit or change that we wanted to make a part of our daily lives.
Well, believe it or not, it is the 23rd day of January and it’s time to see if you can scream “Blackjack”! We want to hear from you!
And, if you haven’t gotten to a point where you can scream “Blackjack”, there are always the next 21 days. YOU CAN DO IT!
- What resolution, goal, habit or change did you set out to achieve at the beginning of the year?
- Have you done that “thing” for the first 21 days of the year? If yes, how have you been able to stay on track?
Why “women’s health” is your health (whether you’re a woman or not).
Folks sometimes ask us what the impetus for Divas, MPH was. And why we only focus on serving a segment of the population (in our case women, and mostly, women of color).
To read our story you can click here, but the crux of it is that by (positively) impacting and (ultimately) improving the health status, literacy, and access to prevention and care of young women, we are also impacting the larger community - men, women, babies, whoever. (Just a little further downstream).
The idea really came from some of our early work in preconception health education. The basic premise of preconception care is that if young women adopt healthy behaviors early on, far before they even think about conceiving a child, they will greatly improve their chances of having a healthy baby. They will, oftentimes, also influence and impact the general wellness of their partner.
That’s significant.
So we took it a step further. If a young women can impact her own health, that of her potential baby, and her family — they why not her friends, parents, coworkers. Why not her entire sphere of influence. How amazing is that? Especially, in this day and age more and more women have the power to be influencers in an even greater way than ever before.
So yes (as most of us know) mom, sister, or grandma still usually prepares meals for the family, makes choices on what to purchase from the grocery store, makes doctors appointments for everyone in the household, keeps the house clean, and often influences the behavior of her family.
But that same young woman is now doing all that — plus MORE — she is tweeting about her 5k run, posting a picture of a freshly prepared summer salad to instagram, or joining a yoga group on facebook. And by doing that she is expanding her sphere of influence from 3-4 people to 3-4 hundred, thousand even!
The other side of that is, if this young woman is not aware of risks associated with smoking, or the benefits of folic acid, or where she can get a free HIV test every six months, then her influence may be used to spread the wrong type of information.
[Enter Divas, MPH.]
Our goal is to EDUCATE women and expose them to healthy lifestyle options, so that they feel EMPOWERED to act as change agents and EFFECTIVEly influence others. And you don’t have to have an “MPH” to join Divas, MPH — any woman when armed with the right tools can be a Diva Making her People Healthier.
You too, Diva, can be more, do more, and live more for yourself, your family, and your community. Visit us at www.divasmph.org to learn how!
Be educated. Be empowered. Be effective. Just be.
[Motivation Monday] A No Is Just An Opportunity For A Different Yes
Do you know anyone who likes rejection? I don’t!
However, I do know that some people know how to handle rejection better than others. I will admit that I am not one of those people. In my mind, every rejection I experience I somehow turn into a personal attack against “Me” — What did I do wrong? What could I have done better? Am I not good enough? These are all thoughts that run through my mind.
Recently, I was reading an article from the November 2011 issue of Essence Magazine entitled Bound for Better by Minister O.J. Toks. The premise of the article was that “Rejection isn’t a wall that blocks your path — it’s an arrow that directs it.” What I learned from the article that helped me and I hope helps you is that sometimes the reason why we are rejected may not have anything to do with us or something we lack. Minister Tok shared three main reasons for rejection that I want to share with you today:
- People reject us when we exceed their expectations.
- People reject us when the timing is off.
- People reject us when we don’t meet their expectations.
To effectively manage rejection Minister Toks reminds us — “Being rejected isn’t the end of the road. It’s a means to an end, helping to reveal your purpose. Armed with this knowledge, you understand that God is closing one door to redirect you to a better door, one that leads to your best life.”
Reading this article helped changed my negative perspective on rejection. During my time of reflection on this topic, this statement came to me and now is the basis of my perspective on rejection — Rejection is not a “No”, it’s an opportunity for a different “Yes”.
So the next time you experience rejection don’t focus on what you loss or what you lacked, focus on the fact that the experience was just an opportunity for you to receive a different ”Yes” that will allow you to continue to help you fulfill your purpose and continue moving towards your destiny.
Be Happy. Be Healthy. Be Open To Rejection.
~Diva T
