"It is not a sin to be proud of who you are. It is your birth-right to love yourself.” - Cree Summer

We all remember Cree Summer in her role as the conscious loving, free-spirited, flower child Freddie Brooks of the Cosby Spin-off “A Different World”, starring Lisa Bonet, but she is so much more than just a character on a T.V show. She's a sister, a friend, a Goddess, an artist, a dreamer, and Cree shares with us some of the things about life, sisterhood, and creativity that brings her the most joy in her world. Of course as I spoke with Cree for the first time, I consciously looked for that baby cartoon voice that she is famously known for, but although I could hear bits of those innocent characters that made me smile each time, I heard in the forefront a well acquired woman who has a lot to say and observe about the world we we live in.

She reminisced with us about growing up as a young girl on the Red Pheasant Reservation in Saskatchewan, Canada, where Cree and her family lived in a home her father built with his hands from mud, they had no running water, and no electricity. She built up visions with us of the sacred and sentimental singing and dancing held on the reserve such as the pow-pow songs and dance, the fancy shawl, and the jingle dress, which she loved the most as a little girl; and burning sweet grass for both joyous and sorrowful moments, and even though she left the reservation at age seven, she still holds on to many of these sacred rituals and carries them with her today, such as burning sweet grass and singing peyote songs to her god-children. She does however wish she could attend more pow-wows she says! We asked Cree, what sort of things she likes to do to keep up her health and her inner peace, and dancing was at the top of her list. “Dancing For Our Lives is what my girlfriends and I call it”, and she loves to belly dance “I dance like my life depended on it, it may look ridiculous, but it feels miraculous”. She also enjoys laughter, she says it's good for the abs. She loves the sauna, and exercises everyday, “I must break a sweat everyday, I love to exhaust myself... I think if I could be something else, I would be an athlete, I am so inspired by their discipline...I love it, I think it is so respectful”

Sisterhood is something that Cree can say that there is no lack of in her life, along with her fellow best friend & Pirate Sister, Lilakoi Moon, aka Lisa Bonet, Cree has found a sisterhood that many of us are still on the path to find. In describing what she cherishes the most about Lilakoi/Lisa, she says: “There is a bizarre sort of innocence to our friendship, when you get into your 30's, out of childhood, we unfortunately loose our innocence, but there is something about giggling with her and her quirky bizarre sense of humor that is innocent. No matter how much she has lost, or learned, or been through, she doesn't have as many scars. She is a real innocent like being, so there is something about sharing with her. We play a lot, we are always peeled over laughing and being silly, and I think it is the innocence in our friendship that makes me love her so deeply. She is also a mother to me. She is the best cook I have ever met, she has impeccable fashion taste, to me a fashion icon, and a great healer. She is a yogini, and have been practicing yoga for almost 20 years, and in so many ways, when I fall down, she is the first one to fill me up with good food and making medicine...mothering me...she mothers me. “So I think she's the queen of utopia (she says in her baby voice).”

Cree has had her fair share of life experiences, and when we asked her what lessons that she has learned about life, that she would want another woman to carry with her, she began to tell us about her father, Don Francks, who is now 74, who was a very involved activist and also on one of the very first Green Peace Boats called the “Rainbow Warrior”. He told her that when he looks back on his life, he wishes that he had done more than be an activist, but wishes he was a better father and a better husband, which inspired Cree to say:

“one thing that I am starting to digest as a woman, is that it is really easy to be ambitious in the big world, it's easy to be ambitious in your career or at your job, or with whatever foundation you've dedicated yourself to , but to be ambitious, diligent and committed in your intimate life, meaning your everyday walk through the grocery store, your interaction with your neighbors, how you treat your brothers and sisters, and your mother and father, or your husband and wife, that is a real challenge, to walk in that world with the ambition to be a beautiful and passionate being, thats one of the aspects that we take for granted when we are being seduced by the big world. So I guess what one of the biggest lessons is to ask your self “who are you going to be? What are you going to contribute to the planet in your intimate world?”

“One thing that I have learned is that there is only one way to get to the planet, and that's between my legs, and that wills a lot of power, and I think that is one of the reasons that women are so stressed, because we are so blatantly the governors of the planet.” She says that there is so much propaganda that women have to battle with, and she looks at all the billboards when in the car and looks at her god-daughters and just thinks “good luck little mama”, she says: “there is so much info on who we should be, what we should look like, and how we should feel about ourselves, so the most important thing to remember as a women is to remember how powerful we are, when your'e that powerful the world is going o tell you different, it is not a bad thing to feel powerful, and it is not a sin to be proud of who you are. It is your birth-right to love yourself.”

Cree's Most Memorable Moment: Turning 30 in Madrid, where she opened for Lenny Kravitz in a bull ring, with her two best friends, Tamara Taylor and Lilakoi Moon(Lisa Bonet) there, and having Macy Gray buy her a birthday cake. “I felt like the belle of the universe.” another favorite moment was when she was asked to write the forward for Frank Zappa's songbook “Apostrophe For Overnight Sensation.”

Favorite Quotes: “When you see danger coming, sing to it”-Arabic saying, “I am a dreamer, but I'm not the only one” -John Lennon, and “I'm saving the bass boy for Omaha” -Janis Joplin.

8 Things She Would Like To Achieve & Have In Life:

A one woman rock n roll show,

A cartoon about little girls who are pirates,

“To get knocked up”

To live on an island, hopefully Hawaii

To have a French Bulldog,

To be blessed enough to make records forever.

To fall in love like she never has before.

To Finish a book she's been reading called “Infinite Jest” by David Foster...(which she humorously lets us in on the fact that she's been trying to finish for a year now).

How She Expresses & Finds Her Creativity: “I write in my kitchen, and I have about 5 cds, a stack of poetry books, because I always read poetry prior and after writing, there is something about poetry that expands my context for writing, it lets me know what words mean, or what the words have the potential to mean, a couple of photos, a little wine and I smoke cigarettes profusely, thats how I like to create.” She also loves to dance, and is inspired on bike rides and by authentic conversations, but she says she gets some of her most creative inspiration from the women in her life. “I know some of the most talented people in the world according to me.”

Her Mission In Life: “I would like to have a clear conscious, I think that if you can exist on this planet for the full duration of your time here, then lay down with a clear conscious, then I think that means you have probably contributed something sweet to the world. Sometimes people never ask what their mission in life is, there are a lot of people who are not even moved to know what their mission is, they just bump around like bumper cars, but we should still have compassion for them, because there bumper cars may hit us in just the right way if we need them to. I think everyone has a mission whether they know it or not, and I think that their mission will be fulfilled whether they are conscious of it or not. I just don't believe in mistakes, no matter how painful it is sometimes.”

We asked Cree what her friends appreciate about her the most, and she says: “that I'm not afraid to be ridiculous, that I am not concerned about what I look like, and I don't mean as far as vanity goes, I will go to great lengths to make them laugh”, and also the fact that she cries for the world. “I have tears for anyone who needs them” she says.