

To a good extent, the European is our creation. He cannot be what he is unless we are what we are. We empower him by the nature of our own behavior and attitudes as a people. And that the white man’s so-called power is to a great extent based upon the nature of the relationship he has with the black man. Ultimately has to do with the relationship between people. We talk about the white man as having power. It is a world that has been created by the kind of consciousness we have permitted to be instilled in us as a people. Therefore, man’s consciousness is a creative act, and the kind of consciousness you have will determine the kind of world you create.Ĭonsequently, when you look at the world we live in as African people, we must recognize to a great extent it is not a world of our own creation. In other words, the addictive consciousness brought into the world a new foreground and put other things into the background.

They lost old friends, broke with old families. They picked up new friends, new relations and whole new ways of acting. For instance, you see people who become addicted to crack or something, entering into a whole world and social system that before they became addicted, they hardly noticed. Social situations that you might not have even recognized until you entered into a new level of consciousness. So do not look at consciousness as some abstraction.Īnd notice if you change your consciousness or change your values and orientation, you enter into a different world. We need to organize our consciousness and our personalities and our culture and see them as instruments of power, and use them as instruments of power to transform our situation. And we have the power, ladies and gentlemen. And consequently then, we must interpret what we are about in terms of power.


You need power to act, to behave in the world. We’ve been made to think that power is sinful, and that to pursue it is a sinful pursuit.īut you cannot exist without power. To a great extent, the problems that we are confronted with today as African people and African people in America flows from our powerlessness, or our inappropriate use of power. Because, ultimately, this is what this whole struggle is about: Power. We’re going to talk about African-centered consciousness, personality and culture as instruments of power.
