I have been reading for self-improvement since 1989 when I was taking Black Studies courses at Penn State University. Black Studies taught me concepts like paradigm shifts, reframing and ultimately personal transformation. After this experience I continued to seek answers to life's struggles and dilemmas by reading. Staying true to my academic roots, after college I continue to read history, literary fiction, political and cultural books.

I don't think I truly believed in the actual self-help genre for a long time even after I purchased my first self-help books during the early 1990s.  That is until I discovered Iyanla Vanzant's One Day My Soul Just Opened Up: 40 Days and 40 Nights Toward Spiritual Strength and Personal Growth in 1999.  Later that year I was initiated as a Sacred Woman by Queen Afua, author of Heal Thyself: For Health and Longevity and Sacred Woman: A Guide to Healing the Feminine Body, Mind, and Spirit . 

Another book that changed my mind about self-help was a parenting book I read in 2000.  Unfortunately I can't recall the name of it, but it taught me how to care for, entertain and teach my toddler while I was pregnant with a second child.  The book was a life saver. Gradually I became hooked on self-help.  I read one right after the other, sometimes two or three at a time in a variety of areas-parenting, self-actualization, job satisfaction, conduct of life etc.

In 2005, I was named the Life Coaching editor for Bellaonline.  Since then I've read and reviewed hundreds of self-help books and interviewed dozens of life coaches and other experts.  My goal is to teach myself and others how-through self-help-we can adopt new habits, change our way of thinking and arrange our lives for success.

 Please visit my blog for more information.