Helping others through prayer

East Meadow Air Force vet publishes book

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First in a two-part series about East Meadow’s women veterans.

Whenever Brandi Jefferson-Motley watched the morning national news in her Maryland home in 2013, a sense of dread and sorrow hung over her for the rest of the day.

“I’m a very emotional person,” Jefferson-Motley, 40, said. “So I absorb other people’s emotions. And seeing all of the sadness and [the] horrible state that our country and world was in, I wanted to help uplift people.”

So on July 29, 2013, Jefferson-Motley began sending weekly Monday motivational emails to a small group of friends and family members. And last week, as she sat at her dinner table in East Meadow’s Mitchel Homes — townhouses for military personnel — a smile spread across her face as she looked down at her first book, a compilation of those emails, which became blog entries, titled “Your Soul’s Navigational GPS: Daily Encouragement for Your Journey Through God’s Words, Personal Testimonies, and Songs.”


Her journey

Jefferson-Motley was born in Manhattan to an Air Force veteran father, Arthur Jefferson, and his wife. When Brandi was 17, she moved upstate with her mother.

“I had a strained relationship with my father,” she said. “But I guess he was always in the back of my head, because I ended up enlisting in the Air Force.”

At 17, she enrolled at St. John’s University and moved to Queens. But she struggled to find herself. “I felt like I was being someone that everyone else wanted me to be,” she recalled. “I felt lost and confused.”

Back upstate, Jefferson-Motley eventually found her way to a Syracuse Air Force recruiter’s office, where, in October 1995, she was sworn in and officially enlisted, without telling her mother and stepfather.

“My mom was angry,” she said with a laugh. “Oh, she was so, so mad! But it was something that I had to do for myself.”

She completed basic training at Joint Base San Antonio Lackland, in Texas, and was eventually stationed in Joint Base Andrews, Md., as a cryptologic language analyst for the National Security Agency from February 1997 until her discharge as a senior airman on Dec. 31, 2002.

“When 9/11 happened, I was really scared,” she said. “I was pregnant at the time with my daughter, and I felt so vulnerable. I was shocked. I kept asking, ‘What do you mean, I can’t walk past the twin towers anymore? Why would anyone hurt so many people?’ It was during that time that I visited my inner, personal ground zero.”

Jefferson-Motley said that her relationship with God was strengthened on Sept. 11, 2001. She prayed for the wounded, she prayed for the souls whose lives were taken away, and she prayed for the nation.

Finding comfort in God

She and Christopher Motley were married in May 2012. The following year, Jefferson-Motley’s Monday motivational emails became a hit among her friends — so much so that she turned them into daily emails, which later turned into a blog, “Encouragement for your Journey.”

On July 29, 2016, at the encouragement of her friends; her husband; her son, Alexander; and her daughters, Ariana and Amina, she decided to go through all 646 blog entries, pick the best 365 and compile them into a book, which ran to 542 pages. Each blog entry is filled with verses from the Bible and personal entries that fit each specific biblical theme.

She also included a suggested song of meditation with each entry. “You can ask my husband — I’m always listening to new music,” Jefferson-Motley said. “I communicate with people through music, and it’s a platform that just brings people together in harmony.”

The book, which was published by Good Success Publishing in Upper Marlboro, Md. two months ago, is intended to be read one blog entry at a time for a year, but its author insists that faith has no expiration date. “If someone needs uplifting for 365 days a year, this book will, hopefully, do that,” she said. “But if someone wants to be uplifted for the rest of their lives, each entry will always apply no matter what emotion someone is going through or what time of their lives they are at.”

Christopher painted the book’s cover, an image of a deep green hill, a blue river and a bright white light rising from the horizon, bringing with it a purple sky. Jefferson-Motley said that Christopher’s support, as well as his artistic skills, helped her complete the book.

“My son bought a copy with his own money,” she laughed. “And my oldest daughter told me the other day that she read an entry in our prayer room. It really warms my heart that my children appreciate this book.”

The book, she said, has opened many doors for her. She has become a contributing writer for Today’s Purpose Woman magazine. She was featured on the national blog “Breadcrumbs of Faith,” and was a special guest on “Miz CEO Radio Show,” broadcast on iHeartRadio, on June 16.

“I have so much faith in the Lord,” Jefferson-Motley said. “He has given me so many blessings. I know that I’m doing what God wants me to do now. I hope to bring happiness to anyone who crosses my path.”