About

                                                       From Vision to Sacred Vocation                                                              Sista’ Joy                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               
The Child and the Tree:  A Vision That Never Left

I was just four years old—barefoot in my backyard, sitting on the ground with my little hands deep in the earth, shaping mud pies beneath the open sky. I was crying because it was my brother’s first day of school. He was only a year older than I, and we were inseparable—playmates, adventurers, the heartbeat of each other’s joy. I couldn’t understand why I couldn’t go with him.

My small world felt suddenly empty, but then something extraordinary happened. A deep and peaceful stillness settled over me, like a blanket of light. I felt it before I saw it—the loving presence of divine spirits unseen, a holy gathering around me. I stopped crying and looked up through tear-blurred eyes… and saw myself in a vision just ahead of me. I was no longer a little girl. I was grown, clothed in white, and standing beneath a great and mighty tree whose leaves shimmered with a vibrant, living green. Before me sat a multitude of people—men, women, children—all with radiant smiles and a soft glow around their heads. They sat cross-legged on the earth, their eyes filled with love and light, listening. And I… I was speaking—not just with words, but with my hands, my heart, and the silent language of the soul. Then the vision vanished.

That vision returned to me many times through my adult years. Once, a man who worked at a mall near my home approached me, describing the same image—me, in white, teaching beneath a massive tree, surrounded by glowing souls. He had dreamed it. And I wept. Another time, I was near a field of tulips, singing and praising God as the sun was setting. The tulips began to sway and shimmer, their faces turning upward like children smiling in the wind. I knew then—this was no fantasy. It was a message.

Through the years, revelations came slowly, gently. I was told that the tree in my vision was the Tree of Life, and the leaves I saw—so green, so abundant—were for the healing of humanity. My calling was not a job, nor a title, but a mission of the soul: to help others find peace, healing, and the divine strength already planted within them.

​The Refining Fire: From Illusion to Inner Liberation​​
The path to fulfilling a sacred calling is rarely smooth. I spent many years chasing the promise of peace in all the wrong places. Like many who grow up in poverty, I believed that money, status, and the “right” relationship would save me. That belief led me into the darkest chapter of my life. In 1967, at just 19 years old, I married a stranger—a 32-year-old medical doctor I had only gone on one date with. He was starting his residency in Neurosurgery. That was all I needed to hear. I believed if I married him, I would escape the struggle of my upbringing. My mother warned me with a heavy heart. “This man has very cold eyes,” she said. “If you change your mind, you can come home. I’ll help you go to college and get your degree. You don’t have to do this.” But I didn’t listen.

I cried through the entire wedding ceremony, too afraid to speak my truth.​We moved to Philadelphia the next day, and my life became a prison. He was cold, manipulative, and emotionally abusive. He brought women into our home and made me serve them. I was isolated, naive, and spiritually numb. In 1972, we returned to Chicago and moved into a penthouse apartment in the Gold Coast. He was now a practicing Neurosurgeon, and we lived well. From the outside, it looked like luxury. Inside, I was crumbling.​​I returned to college, determined to find something of my own, but the pain grew unbearable. I began to contemplate taking my own life.

Then, one afternoon, I went to the sundeck of our building, hoping for some peace. A kind Greek woman sat down beside me. She was from my hometown in West Virginia, and she was a Psychologist. It was God's Divine Timing to Save My Life! ​She saw through my pain and offered me her card. “Come see me,” she said, “I want to help you.”And she did. She saved my life. I know it was God's hand that had interceded. It was a Miracle! I never saw this woman again.

She helped me realize that I had a choice. That I could say no. That I could leave. I made a plan, and after one final episode with that man, I walked away. I never looked back.​That dark valley became the turning point of my life. I began to heal. I began to listen again to the divine voice within. I remembered the Tree. I remembered the Light. And from that remembering, Manifest I AM began to take root—not as a business, but as a sacred mission.​

The Spiritual Awakening: Where the Light First Entered
But even before the valley and the fire, the Light had come to me early, through the voices of two extraordinary spiritual teachers who helped awaken my soul and shape my understanding of divine truth. One of those voices was Rev. T. L. Barrett, a great minister, vocalist, and visionary whose weekly radio broadcast in Chicago stirred something deep within me when I was in my early twenties.

He taught metaphysics, universal truth, and New Thought Christianity at a time when few dared to speak of such things, and I tuned in every week, hungry for the wisdom he shared. I even became a member of his congregation for a time, and years later, he and his church honored me with a title that still lives in my spirit—“Miracle-Minded Master.” That moment was not just an award; it was a confirmation. A sacred reflection of what I knew to be true: that I had been called to walk a path of miracles, led by the Divine I AM within.

Around that same time, I also began attending services at Christ Universal Temple, where I sat under the anointed voice of Rev. Dr. Johnnie Colemon, one of the most powerful New Thought teachers of our time. She didn’t just preach; she taught us how to live a better life. Her message was always direct, always filled with fire and faith: “It works if you work it.” And I did. I studied, practiced, and applied the teachings of these two great ministers and spiritual teachers for over 20 years. Their words became the spiritual soil in which my soul took root. From their wisdom, I found my voice. I found my purpose. I found the unshakable truth that the Divine lives within me… and you.

Anointed to Lead: A Mission Born from Fire and Faith
​After earning my degree, I stepped into public service—no longer as a broken woman seeking approval, but as a vessel of God’s power. I was appointed the youngest Commissioner in the history of the third-largest governmental body in the state of Illinois, an institution with a long and complex history and a reputation for corruption. We managed an eight-hundred-million-dollar budget, serving over 5.5 million people across Chicago and 114 surrounding communities.

I stood as a woman of color, a woman of faith, and the lone voice of truth, outnumbered eight to one. But I was never alone.​ I watched the Power of God take command in that boardroom. I saw injustice overthrown. I watched deception fall. And I stood in awe as newspapers placed my name on their front pages week after week—not for scandal, but for strength. They called me the reincarnation of Queen Zenobia, the Warrior Queen of Palmyra, and the modern-day Joan of Arc. But I knew—I was simply a servant of the Most High.

When I left politics, I stepped into a new kind of ministry. In Washington, D.C., I began preaching and singing in the streets—uplifting the homeless, the forgotten, the weary. And when I returned to Chicago, my ministry went underground—literally. For fourteen years, I preached, taught, and sang in the subways, bringing light to the shadows beneath the city. This is the well from which Manifest I AM was born.

Today, I coach not from theory, but from truth. I teach not from textbooks, but from testimony. I help people regardless of their race, creed, culture, or sexual identification—remember the serenity, strength, and sacredness already planted within them. The Tree of Life, which I saw as a child, still lives in me. And the green leaves I saw? They are the healing I now offer to others.

This is my calling. This is my joy. This is my offering to the world. Most of all, what I've come to know is that an individualized Divine Presence of God, I AM, dwells within the heart of each one of us. It is a tiny, unlit flame that can either be put out by denying or neglecting your light and taking the path of darkness, or by fanning the light until it becomes a roaring flame that will bring light to you and the world. We must learn more about our Divine Presence of God I AM within ourselves and how to reach our higher self and our Divinity. We must learn and use the Power of Love - Divine Love because Divine Love is Our Scepter of Power. Let us lift it high and bring the Light of God that Never Fails to overcome that which binds us in our human selves.