What is success? What does it mean to be successful? Is it in the milestones, the recognition, the financial gains, the assets? Everyone wants everlasting success but what is also housed in every success story are sacrifices, doubt, failure, and questions. Questions of whether success benefits those around them as well as themselves, whether success would have arrived sooner if chosen another path, or whether the success experienced is even success at all.

How would you define success when you are hailed as being one in your community? Is that something to celebrate or reason to feel some guilt because you represent the few and not the many? When you are successful, you willingly donate your expertise, time, and money to friends and loved ones without expecting anything in return, is that a cost or a benefit? Can it be both?

Can success extend life expectancies? Does life get any easier? Does it worsen? Is it more tiresome being Black and successful? This is Episode VII and these are the ‘Trials with Triumph’.