Help Moe Return To Howard U

In addition to selling my artwork, I have set up a GoFundMe Campaign to help raise money so that I can continue pursuing my education and graduate from Howard University in Washington, D.C.

here is the link to my campaign: GoFundMe

My art has been a HUGE part of my healing and growth through this season in my life. If you are able to donate or even purchase art, that would mean the world to me and I would be forever grateful. (100% of the commissions goes toward helping me pay down my balance so that I can continue pursuing my degree @HU) 

Below you can read a more about my current situation.

Hello, my name is Simone Dominique Essix. I am twenty-one years old from Michigan. At Howard University I was pursuing a Bachelors of Arts degree in Media Management. Currently, my dream of continuing my education at Howard University is deferred, but it is far from forgotten. The beginning of the Fall 2014 semester marked the start of my second year, as a sophomore, at Howard University. Although, at the end of my freshman year I missed the GPA requirement that would allow me to keep my scholarship, through hard work and saving I managed to return to the university and had plans on achieving my goals and exceeding expectations I set for myself. Unfortunately, I was completely blocked from returning to school for the Spring 2015 semester. I was unable to register for the classes I needed to complete my sophomore year due to a major financial hold on my student account. 

Alone, I was unable to generate enough money or even secure a loan that would grant me the opportunity to finish the year strong. At a very young age my father made it very clear to me that he would not be able to financially contribute to fund my college pursuits and conversely encouraged me to invest in my education, athletics, and the arts so that I may secure scholarship money. Even though I knew my father’s position and how he felt about loans, I still pleaded with both my parents to see if they would consider being a cosigner on a student loan so that I could finish out the semester. I even sought the help of my grandparents. To no avail, everyone that I asked either could not help me financially to continue pursuing my educational goals, or made the decision not to.

Initially, not being able to go back to Howard to continue my education put me in a very dark place. Before this financial difficulty in my sophomore year, I struggled personally after I lost my freshman year scholarship. This major setback in my life made me feel like I failed myself again. For the past six months I had endured feelings of failure, anxiety, depression, lack of faith and confidence in myself. Eventually I realized bad things do happen, set backs occur, but I had to make the decision for myself to pull myself out of the past and negative thoughts surrounding me so that I could change myself and the outcome of my life moving forward in life. The negative things that I was experiencing kept manifesting in my life because I didn’t allow myself to properly come to terms with my mistakes. I was irrationally punishing myself for my mistakes and constantly living in the past trying to understand what I did wrong and how I could have avoided all of this. At the beginning of my healing process, I tried to move forward without acceptance and acknowledgment of those life changing experiences. Without those two crucial ingredients of my journey I found myself moving and making habitual decisions like I always had, out of fear, which yielded the same results.  Fortunately, I am growing and have learned how to move past these self imposed negative feelings so that I can continue working toward my goals and dreams without fear and negativity stifling my growth...