Sis, They’re Playing Chess, Not Spades: Why We Need to Build Black Now (and for the Next 100 Years)
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Hey Friend!
In this manifesto, we are not reacting. We are not scrambling. We are not clutching our pearls in the group chat over the latest political chaos. We are seeing the system for what it is: a long game. A slow, methodical power play that doesn’t just seek to win today’s headlines—it’s building the world our grandchildren will be forced to live in. And while they play chess, too many of us have been given Uno cards and told to “just stay woke.”
Today, we’re flipping the board. We’re laying down the blueprint for legacy moves—ones that prioritize Black women, community power, and self-sustaining systems that don’t wait for permission. We’ll talk about what’s happening politically behind the curtain, why it’s designed to last beyond the next election cycle, and how we can reimagine Black futures that are soft, sacred, and sovereign.
Let’s Talk About the Long Game (a.k.a. They Ain’t Just Vibing in Office)
Here’s the real gag: conservative lawmakers are not thinking about 2025. They’re thinking about 2055. And while we’re out here trying to survive today’s madness, they’re writing legislation that will echo for generations.
These laws? They’re not just “bad policies”—they’re infrastructure. They are setting up systems that will hold even after they’ve left office. It’s legacy building, but in the most diabolical way. They’re stacking courts, stripping civil rights, controlling education, rewriting history, and eroding body autonomy with the cold efficiency of someone setting up a trust fund for white supremacy.
Every bill, every judicial appointment, every “moral panic” is a seed planted. And when it blooms, it’s not chaos—it’s the garden they’ve been watering for decades.
Meanwhile, in the Group Chat…
We’ve got rage, we’ve got passion, we’ve got memes. And listen—rage is holy. But rage without strategy is a treadmill to burnout.
What we’re missing is the same foresight. The same commitment to build not just for the moment, but for the movement. And that’s where we come in. Because Black women? We don’t just respond to crises—we build civilizations. Literally.
So let’s stop waiting on the next election to save us. Let’s stop thinking that changing the puppet will dismantle the stage. Instead, let’s build our own damn theatre, run by us, starring us, funded by us, and protected by a legacy that no law can erase.
We’ve Done It Before. We Can Do It Again.
Let’s have a seat at the ancestral table real quick.
Black Wall Street.
Rosewood.
Seneca Village.
The Free Black Communities of the 1800s.
These weren’t accidents. These were intentional ecosystems—Black economies, schools, hospitals, newspapers, food systems, and spiritual sanctuaries created by us, for us. They weren’t just resisting the system—they were ignoring it. They said, “Y’all do you, we gon’ do us—and do it better.”
Yes, many were burned, bombed, and buried. But the spirit of those spaces? Still alive. Still calling us to rebuild. This time with better strategies, stronger networks, digital tools, and sacred intentionality.
So What Do We Build Now?
We build with intention. We build to last. We build with Black women at the center—not as an afterthought, but as the architects.
Here’s the blueprint:
1. Educational Autonomy
We can’t keep relying on systems that erase us to educate us. Period. If they’re banning books, we build libraries. If they rewrite history, we record our own.
Let’s start community education pods, online schools, and mother-daughter learning circles. Let’s teach financial literacy, African history, healing justice, agriculture, trade skills, and ancestral wisdom. Let’s normalize weekend “teach-ins” as much as brunch.
2. Health and Body Sovereignty
If they’re coming for our wombs, our choices, and our right to be believed in a doctor’s office—we counter with our own.
Black midwives. Black doulas. Black OB/GYNs. Holistic herbalists. Elders who know healing not just from books but from bloodline. Let’s build wellness co-ops, birth networks, and sacred body spaces that know what we need because we’re the blueprint.
3. Food Independence
Food deserts? We’ll turn them into food jungles. We need urban farms, garden collectives, mobile produce markets, seed banks, and herbal apothecaries.
We reclaim food not just as fuel, but as medicine. As memory. As resistance. Because no movement survives without nourishment, and no community thrives without sovereignty over its plate.
4. Economic Ecosystems
Forget the bag. We’re building banks. We need group economics, micro-loans, community funds, and “buy Black” not just as a hashtag—but a practice.
Imagine a world where your dollar stays in your community for 30 days, not 30 seconds. Where our businesses circulate money, hire our people, and pour into each other like an endless blessing bowl.
You want generational wealth? You better build generational infrastructure.
5. Land & Housing Security
They’re making laws. We make land moves.
We need to be buying land—together. Starting intentional communities. Buying abandoned lots. Turning foreclosed homes into co-ops. Building tiny house villages.
If they’re pricing us out, we carve our way back in. Because land is power, and legacy is location, location, location.
The Soft Revolution: Sacred, Slow, and Strategic
Let’s be clear—this ain’t about hustling harder. This isn’t about burnout. This is about slowness as resistance. About sacred intention as survival.
Sugar & Sable is built on this principle: that softness is not a luxury, it’s a weapon. That sacredness is not a vibe, it’s a blueprint.
We are the culture. The caretakers. The creators. But now it’s time to become the constructors. Not of just businesses or brands, but of futures. Futures that are soft, slow, and self-determined.
TL;DR (But Please Don’t)
Republicans are playing the long game. Their laws are not just about now—they’re setting up a future to benefit them even after they’re gone.
We need to shift from reaction to strategy.
We’ve built self-sustaining communities before. We can do it again.
Our future must be rooted in: education, health, food, economic power, and land.
Black women must be the architects. The blueprint. The bank. The blessing.
What You Can Do This Week:
Share this manifesto with three Black women who are builders.
Make a list of skills in your circle—who can teach? Who can grow food? Who knows finance? Build the village.
Identify one thing your community could create together. A garden? A book club? A weekly class for teens? Start small, think long.
Host a potluck strategy session. Yes, with biscuits.
Final Word:
They’re planning for the world their grandchildren will inherit. So let’s do the same. Only, let’s make it Blacker, softer, more sacred, and built to outlast every law not made with us in mind.
We’re not just surviving. We’re constructing liberation. And baby, it’s got velvet curtains, the smell of shea butter, and Wi-Fi powered by ancestors.
Live Pleasurably,
(For the overthinkers, the second-guessers, and the ‘I should have figured this out by now’ crowd.)
You don’t need another strategy. You need to stop second-guessing yourself. Let’s clear the noise.
WTF is not a coaching session. It’s not me handing you a step-by-step blueprint. It’s me helping you untangle the thoughts that are keeping you stuck, so you can finally hear your own damn clarity. LEARN MORE >
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