*Alexa, play Solange - "Mad".
From Atatiana Jefferson to Botham Jean, it seems like news headlines seem to get more and more unbelievable and at this point, sis is tired. Sis is me. I am sis.
As a Black woman living in modern America, the truth can be hard to swallow. Luckily, hip hop artist-turned comedian Amanda Seales is here to shell it out in small doses.
Famously known as the woman who got Becky with the Bad Attitude all the way together during one of her comedy shows in January, Amanda isn't new to being a multi-hyphenate force of nature, she's true to it. The Inglewood-born mogul-in-the-making initially made her debut on network television in 1994, and two decades and an HBO special later, she's here to let the industry know that she's just getting started.
On Tuesday, the 38-year-old Insecure actress released her first book Small Doses: Potent Truths for Everyday Use, a compilation of illustrations, photos, and essays that offers self-help from a "hip" perspective and promises to help you find your truth and laugh your ass off at the same damn time.
In honor of Amanda's latest drop, here are 5 potent truths from the starlet that are sure to give you your weekly dose of realness:
You Won't Be Everyone's Cup Of Tea & That's OK
Some people are just dedicated to misunderstanding you. It just is, and for a number of reasons that may not have anything to do with what you're saying.
A Clapback Isn’t Always Necessary
In a previous interview with The Breakfast Club, Amanda revealed the reason why she decided to take a short hiatus from social media to focus on her mental health.
"I took a social media break because I realized I had not adjusted how I was interacting with social media, even though my social media had shifted. I went from having 40,000 followers in like June of 2017 to almost a million by March. I was still operating the same way, trying to interact with everybody, clapping back. And I'm like this is not healthy."
According to Amanda, despite her consistent quest for justice in the media world, she ultimately realized that not every comment deserves a response, a note that we should all take when it comes to both our personal and professional lives.
"That's when I shifted and I decided I need to be more about calling people in, instead of calling people out. I need to be more conscious about how I speak about things and trying to be more positive. And that's just my life in general."
You Are The Table, Sis
"The more that I learned about myself and what I bring to the table, it made it clearer for me to chart what courses I should be going. I talk a lot about your worth versus your market value and that dichotomy is so important for a lot of us coming up in business because it saves you a lot of stress."
"For a long time, I didn't have a balance in terms of my worth and my market value; I was just a very talented person who hadn't done any work that truly demonstrated my talent. I had to make a conscious decision to change the type of work that I'm doing...I needed to change the type of spaces that I'm speaking in. It's not as much about strategy than if something feels right."
Self-Doubt Is Part Of The Journey
Last year, xoNecole caught up with Amanda at the ESSENCE Black Women In Hollywood Awards, where she shared the truth about making it out on top in a saturated industry; for Amanda, the key was having stamina in the midst of self-doubt.
"This game is so much about stamina. It's not just about talent. A lot of us got talent, it's definitely not about being cute. We are all cute. The game-changer is who can last, through the trials, tribulations, the self-doubt, the fails. The misdirects, you think you are going in this direction and it's like 'uh ha! Got you b-tch.' That's really where you find out who has it."
Truth Hurts, But It's Necessary.
"You may not like how I'm saying something, but you know what the f*ck I'm saying. I don't speak no sh*t unless I know. Free speech doesn't mean freedom to talk out your ass without being checked. And I don't talk out my ass. I know what I'm talking about it. I didn't shade you. The facts shaded you."
Featured image by Instagram/@AmandaSeales.
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Skylar sees things differently. At the time, she was shooting content on her iPhone. Temi came into the picture with a new perspective, an understanding of tech, and, eventually, a camera. “He doesn't give himself enough credit,” Skylar says. “He wasn't just my tripod. He wasn't just standing behind the camera and going ‘click.’ He was giving advice. He was giving me insight to how I could look at things from a different perspective. And I was like, 'Oh, he’s an artist.' I think it was maybe a heartbeat of that kind of energy of like, ‘Baby, can you take this picture?’ And it turned so quickly into, we're partners. We can work together in a way where we're advancing each other's creative thinking.”
The pair often says they’re two sides of the same coin. Skylar is an Aquarius. She attended art school, paints, and loves poetry. She’s more than happy to let the couple’s management firm and agency, Kensington Grey, handle their admin work. And, she loves to sleep in. Temi, on the other hand, wakes up early. He’s a Virgo. He loves a to-do list and regularly checks in on the couple’s brand partnerships spreadsheet to make sure everything is on track.
Because his storytelling was steeped in his love of technology, he didn’t always think of himself as a creative person. “Where I [am] the dreamer who wants to pluck things out of the sky and spend all day with my head in the clouds, Temi [is] so good at grounding me and helping me figure out how to make things make sense on paper. We just work together in such a complimentary way,” Skylar says.
It’s been more than six years since Brooklyn-based couple Temi and Skylar started dating, and nearly four since they cemented their working relationship. On TikTok and Instagram, the couple’s travel, fashion, and home content regularly rack up hundreds of thousands of views. They’ve worked with brands such as Coach, Aesop, Away, and Liquid IV, bringing their vibrant perspectives to every campaign they execute. Still, nearly two years since both Temi and Skylar committed to full-time content creation and creative directing, the couple says their romantic connection remains their priority.
“We told each other we would much rather go back to full-time jobs and preserve our relationship than to be full-time freelancers, barely getting a night's rest [and] barely kissing each other because we're so busy shooting,” Skylar says.
Working from home can make it hard to separate work from personal life for any entrepreneur. It can be even more challenging when your business partner is also your lover. Temi and Skylar had already used couples therapy as a tool to help them effectively communicate with one another. When they ran into challenges while working together, their therapist helped them set physical boundaries to help combat the issues.
"We told each other we would much rather go back to full-time jobs and preserve our relationship than to be full-time freelancers, barely getting a night's rest [and] barely kissing each other because we're so busy shooting."
“It actually took us doing very specific physical things to create boundaries between work and play in our relationship,” Skylar says. “So, for instance, we will only have conversations about work when we're out of bed or we're at the table or in the office. Initially, when we started, we had to light a candle to say that, 'Okay, this is a space where we're connecting, we’re not talking about work.' We needed really hard boundaries at the top. And then it became a little bit more organic.”
The boundaries have been crucial to implement, especially because the couple began working together so naturally. When the pair first met, Skylar was NY-based a social strategist for BuzzFeed and was using content creation to drive business to her lingerie company. She was shooting her own content. Temi was working for Microsoft in D.C. He’d recently traded in his DJing equipment for a camera. “I've always loved taking pictures,” he says. “Even when I was a kid, my African mother would wake me up at 3:00 a.m. [during a] party, and be like, 'Come take the family picture.'”
Growing up, Temi says he watched his parents support each other and be the true definition of partners. He knew he wanted the same for his own relationship. But, the couple also wanted to make sure they were being financially responsible. The pair didn’t quit their traditional jobs until they’d saved up two years' worth of their cost of living. And, Temi received his Master of Business Administration from New York University with the knowledge that it could either help him advance in his corporate career or be applicable to his business with Skylar.
Temi and SkylarCj Hart @hartbreakToday, they say their working relationship is more of a “quiet dance.” They still implement some of the boundaries they learned in therapy, but they also lean into their natural strengths and deep love for one another. When we speak, Temi has planned a date for the couple to see Princess Mononoke in 4K IMAX and added it to their Notion so they can factor it into their busy schedules. “I fully plan to date for the rest of my life,” he says.
Skylar says the couple doesn’t just wait for date nights to check in with one another, though. This often happens in the mornings, after Temi has made her peppermint tea and poured himself a cup of coffee. When they ask each other how they slept, she says, it’s not just a “nicety.” It’s a genuine question meant to foster connection.
“A lot of it happens during the day in the midst of work. We'll stop and we'll hug. Or we’ll slow dance in the kitchen,” she says. “Sometimes it's hard to set a whole date night when you have 7,000 things going on. So, we must grasp these moments and check in when we can. And I think it's become so organic to us that I actually didn't even realize how often we do it. But all day long, we're like, 'Are you good? I felt like your energy shifted,' because we're best friends, we just know. We just feel it happen.”
What’s better than being in love? Building wealth while doing it. Watch Making Cents here for real stories of couples who make money moves together.
Featured image by Cj Hart @hartbreak