Welcome to my blog. Thank you for reading.
I’m sure that many of you are asking the same questions that I have asked at times, ” Who are you and why should I read your blog???”
I’m just a woman trying to learn how to live the life of my dreams, and I’m aware that after reading my writings you might think I’m arrogant, or silly, or just downright stupid. For a long time, the thought of not being accepted has stopped me from doing the one thing that I love to do most: write.
You know what I realized, though? One day I’m going to die. Maybe tomorrow. Maybe ninety years from now. And nothing anyone thought about anything I did will matter. What will matter is whether I lived my life doing what I thought was best.
So I think it’s best that I write this blog…
Where This Comes From
In about January 2010, after yet another break-up with a man I thought I was going to marry, I had a major breakdown. Nothing in my life made sense any more. I didn’t know what to do or where to go for help. I was crying every day. Over something. Over nothing… I felt like I was just floating in the middle of a vast ocean.
I really don’t know how I made it through that time, but about a year later, in January 2011, I realized that I had made it through the hardest year of my life without dying and so I decided that it might be worth the effort to learn how not to cry every day, since I was gonna be here for a while.
I told a good friend of mine that I was going to do a self-experiment with becoming un-depressed, and he suggested that I write about it while I’m going through it, noting that most people forget what it was like over here when they get to the other side of happy. Sounded good to me, so for a while I did that. I wrote my friend a journal-esque entry every day about my adventures in not crying. That worked out at first, but then it didn’t. So I stopped. In the meantime I learned some things…
We write in our journals and hide them in the deepest, darkest places, closets, drawers, even under our beds, pretending all the while that we don’t want anyone to read them, when truly it is the only thing we really want. For someone to care. For someone to clean out the drawers and find out who we really are…
Why This Comes
My hope for this blog is that it will help. Both you and I. I think the world will be a better place when people can be honest about who they are and get over this notion that we have to be ashamed of the struggles we have been through. We’ve all had issues and oftentimes, our struggles are the greatest catalysts for our forward transformations.
It makes me happy to share my life with others and feel connected to people, and, since I mostly eat dinner by myself these days, I hope that I can come home and tell you how I’m doing. Your interest helps me to be accountable for continuing on an authentic path of integrity …
Structure
This blog started out with two categories, but has since evolved to many sections. It starts with “How Not to Cry Every Day Then”, which are the original writings I sent to my friend when I embarked on this adventure in January 2011, and “How Not to Cry Every Day and then Some”, which are written in real-time. It then continues on to “How to Live With Integrity” “How to Blossom” and on. The topics change as major shifts are made in my life and the current topic is “The Initiation”.
It is organized by days. Although the most current blog is on the top of the page, the story begins with Day 1, and I invite you to read whatever interests you. I started off writing an entry every day, but I have stopped crying every day a while ago, so now I just write when I am inspired, but they are still numbered by days. Every blog heading is titled with something I learned on that particular day, and they are in order from Day 1 until Day…
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There is a place in the in between. The space between a thought and an action. The space where you know that the thought you just thought will come to pass. Insha’ Allah this is going to be good…
They have a new thing going on with WordPress. Had to switch back to the classic editor cus I ain’t ready for all that.
I just wanted to touch bases with the world. This is my healing. My balancing. My centering. My dance. My gratitude. The roller coaster ride of my life is becoming a river, an easy stream. I am learning to relax into it instead of flailing around with fear. I am learning to surrender and be with ease.
I ate dinner with a friend last night. My People. A giant of a man. A kind, brilliant soul. He is my friend. He has never hurt me and serves as a reference point on how things can be with people. Easy. There can be trust. There can be a deep understanding of mutual goodwill and harmlessness.
I brought him some food. We prayed together and he spoke about the harvest and the harvest moon. Then we went outside in his backyard – there is a lemon tree there – and sat under the moon. We talked about life, just chatted it up. I was myself and safe and so easy. I was having such a good time with him. He hugged me. His hug is electric. Can’t hug too long or it will turn to sex and we have only ever been platonic friends. He is a magician of the best kind, transmuting through Love.
And this morning I am thinking about ease. I am thinking about being easy and loving and forgiving, as a way of life. I am thinking of joy as a way of life. I am grateful that I made it to this day, a day in my life where I can believe that it is possible for joy and Love and Ease to be foundations of my very being. I am grateful that fear is easing its grasp on me and I am becoming better. More kind. Some people can’t tell, but I know. I have a million gifts to give the world. I want to write poems. I want to hug someone and Love someone. I want to help people get out of these deep, deep, ugly feelings that usurp our lives and have us living like zombies for so long. Mostly, I want to laugh again and live with ease.
I’m excited. I have shirked my own power and responsibility for my life for so long. I’ve had my reasons… but I think you need to take all of you on these journeys, even the best of you. We are always focused on loving the worst of us and coddling our pains. But the best of us is important, too. The good things. My friend judges me all the time. Not the one I just wrote about. My Earth Guardian friend. He reads my blogs so he can judge me and call me self righteous. So I’m a bit self-conscious as I’m writing, so as not to sound self-righteous.
Life, thank you for this day. Thank you for this moment of interest in ease, joy, and good will. Oh, and especially Love and forgiveness. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Ameen.
Day 542
Ease
You are hurt. Feeling rejected. Back to eleven again. Everything happened at eleven. I have been reliving eleven over and over and over. And now here I sit, crouched in a corner, rejected again. Mad at my grown up self. Why didn’t I make life better for me? Eleven year-old me thought I would get her out of this. All this hurt and rejection over and over and over. All this not having what I really want over and over and over.
Lucy passed on the script. Said she only works on things that she “absolutely loves”. And I understand. And she gave me a gift in her words. I didn’t absolutely love my script before I sent it out. I kind of liked it. It was good enough. Now I will work on it till I absolutely love.
My Eleven, I’m sorry. All these years, I didn’t know I had grown up. I didn’t know I had the power to take you out of this curled up ball, always rejected, always hurt. I’m sorry I didn’t make life for you any better than then. Please forgive me. I have tried. I have really tried. I have been going in circles and bigger circles and bigger circles and most of us do. Most of us don’t break out of our traumas in one go round. I need to forgive me, please. I’m sorry I didn’t take such good care of you. I’m sorry I didn’t heal your wounds. I’m sorry I didn’t find you places and spaces where you could play and be safe and thrive and I set you up over and over again to just barely be good enough.
I’m sorry I didn’t work on that script till I absolutely Loved it… Grown ups don’t always know that we have grown up. I didn’t see how hurt you were. I was busy running for so long. I was trying to survive. I was just doing things to do them. My baby, I was not that smart like they thought I was. I was stupid. I hate to use that word, but I was. Yes, grown-ups can be stupid. Most of us are. But we are smart, too, sometimes. We keep you alive as long as we can. Forgive us. Please forgive me. Please forgive me for taking so long to see so much.
How can I ease this pain of rejection for us? How can I heal all of these wounds poking the same spots over and over? How can I make it up to you? How can I restore all these years that the locusts have eaten? There are stories in holy books of redemption. Is my time too late?
You rail and say NO! Can I tell you something about adults? There are those of us who don’t grow up. There are those of us who don’t even know we have wounds, much less knowing how to heal them. We try to build mountains on piles of maggots, so far detached from the deepest hurts that we don’t see why we can’t thrive. I know it is nothing to look forward to, but I want to tell you something. Today I learned something. We need your help. I need your help.
You know. You, my resilient young eleven, know how to love. I know you know. I have forgotten. I need you to remind me, please. I know you think you are too little and you can’t do anything, but, oh, your smile! It brings life. I will keep it safe. I will keep your innocence safe this time. Please forgive me. This rejection hit a wound. But it hit a wound because a wound was there with you, my eleven, crouched up in a ball always feeling rejected.
We can work together now at last. I will bring you band-aids and medicine and sing to you. I don’t care if the whole world talks about you and calls you names and only sees the curled up ball you have become. I will look for your smile and when you show it to me, I will keep it safe at last. I know how. I will find safe spaces and places for you, even if folks call me crazy. And if meanies come around, I will scare them off for you. And I will use my grown-up powers to tap into more than me to keep us both safe, so I don’t have to spend so much time fighting and running and we can play at last.
I will start to do things in ways that I absolutely Love. It might make me different or weird. I’ve always been afraid of being different or weird. I know, it’s not a grown-up way to be. That’s what eleven-year-olds do. But I’ve been afraid all these years and have kept you in spaces and places where we fit in with whatever we started with in this life. But my baby, I want to tell you something that might be scary. We were not born to fit in with this. No. We were born to be heroes. Did you know that? I’ve been keeping it a secret, even from myself, but it’s been hurting us so bad, trying to be things we aren’t, and trying to live in a way we’re not supposed to.
I know, you never thought you were a hero, but somewhere deep deep deep deep deep deep down, you knew… To Be Special, Different, Lucky, any of that was a bad thing and so we tried so hard to push away anything that would make us be that. But still people hated us. For being that. For not being that. So it didn’t work, you see?
What am I saying? I’m saying that I’m going to be a grown-up now. Yep. You stay around with your smile and your love and your innocence. Oh, and your friskiness. I Love your friskiness so much! I now know that I’m eleven, but no longer eleven, and I can get out into the world and find us medicine. I can nurture us and nourish us. I can create things and do things in a way that we absolutely Love! I can turn in projects that we absolutely Love! I can make them that good to a point that I absolutely Love them!
I can absolutely Love you and me, even now. Even as we’re feeling rejected and even though we didn’t do so many things and be so many things that we wanted to do and be by now. I hear you cheering for me and saying I can still do it. I hear you pushing me and smiling at me and saying that I have done so much, that I am worth something, even right now. I hear you thanking me for looking at you finally. You forgive me already? You believe in me. You are celebrating me… I am celebrating you. And do you know what I will do for you? I will be a grown-up. I will get up. I will use all my grown-up tools that I’ve learned all this time – I’m not perfect, but I have learned some things about healing and cooking and I know places we can go to play and, I’ve never done it before, but I have an idea of a house we could live in that smells good, and even if I don’t feel like cleaning, I know how to make money so that we can find someone to clean for us and pay them.
I’m not gonna be perfect, OK? People might still reject us. But I know how to make my writing better, and it’s actually fun to work on things and practice until you get them to a place where you absolutely love them. You know what I mean? And I guess as I’m thinking about a man and friends and work and even as I’m thinking about how to fix some of these old relationships I’ve been in with family and old friends and old Loves – I know that scares you and has you going back into a ball. “Do we have to fix those?” you ask me. Only the ones you want to fix. Only the people you miss, OK? I haven’t figured out what to do about those yet, but we’ll put our heads together, and call on our super powers, and get a big ol’ light bubble, – I can get that for us so we can be inside it and no one can hurt us – and we can tap into the biggest Light of the World to help us figure out what to do about all this ruin.
Are you with me? Cry about this rejection if you feel it. Feel it. I’ll be here with you as you feel it as long as you need to, giving you medicine, keeping you safe, singing to you, making a life for us as last. Responsible. Me and you together, Eleven.
Ameen.
Day 541
Dear Eleven (Absolutely Love) (Grown-up Stuff)
I kind of want to talk, like, use my voice. Today is a big day for me. A huge day. I made a decision. To take ownership of my life. A thought just occurred. I have a friend that has been a phone friend for a very long time. He’s a guy. Only ever been a platonic friend, although when I met him over fifteen years ago, he was trying to hit on me. I called him and told him I didn’t want to date him, and we’ve been friends ever since.
He gives me a lot of insight into the thinking of men…
But I don’t want to talk about him. I can’t write long. My life changed all of a sudden. For the better. I want to go hug a friend today and then I have an awesome meeting coming up. I’m vibrating at a speed that I’m not used to, and from what I know, when my energy is like this, miracles happen.
So, I’m expecting that when I walk out of this door, the highest possible outcome for my life will be forthcoming. I am looking for the choices that I can make 100 percent. So I have to get off this internet now, because the choice I can make 100% for now is to go see my friend immediately and hug him.
God Bless you. Bless you. Unconditionally. Bless you Unconditional.
Ameen.
Day 538
Unconditional
Here we go. So much pain and unprocessed/ unintegrated emotions still… Thinkin of my sister. Can I just write it out? This might be a bit incoherent. She hates my guts. I wish she didn’t. A few of them hate my guts. Why? They wanted me to be there for them in ways I was not. Am not. I guess I did try to punch one of them in the face. She kept coming for me. That’s what it felt like. It felt like she was just coming for me, trying to pull me in directions I didn’t want to go. Not respecting what I was telling her. Not giving me space when I asked for it. Messing up the good situation I was in by having conflict with my caregiver, which in turn distracted him from his caregiving and even made him feel like he was giving too much to me; when he was giving exactly what I needed for the first time in my adult life. It was the first time in my adult life where someone was actually respecting me, interested in what I needed, and offering care to me in safe ways. I was in Heaven. And then she came around just messing everything up, talking about I don’t need what I need. Not even knowing to this day what was wrong with me or what my diagnosis was. Her actions felt slightly malicious. They didn’t feel all the way accidental.
My other sib is mad at me because she’s going through a major life transition. I stayed with her for three months to help her through, and then left to come back to LA. She wanted me to stay longer, even though she was sitting over there talking about my help is just the same as anyone else’s and she don’t need me and I don’t love her. It’s hard to get anything done for myself when I’m with her. It feels like she wants me to pour all of my time and energy into her all the time, and she resents when I have “Me” time, or if I move forward and she’s not. But then she gets angry if I try and encourage her to do stuff to move herself forward, and accuses me of trying to control her, etc, etc. So I came back to LA. Because I need to move forward with my life. And everyone resents me for wanting to move forward.
It’s like the people in my world feel like I’m obliged to give my all to lifting them up. The give what they can when they feel like it. Sometimes when they don’t feel like it. But they’re not about to move out of their home or quit their job and delay their plans to meet me wherever I am and support me in whatever. They’re definitely not about to do that if they see I’m farting around. But they expect me to do that for them…
That’s not what I meant to write about today, but I’ve been cussing people out in my head. Cussing people out in my dreams. Having all these conversations in my mind with others. Trying hard not to say mean stuff to people, but I got so much mean stuff to say. They’re assholes. Can I say it here? Somehow I feel like it needs to be said. Somehow I feel like they don’t get it. That’s why their lives are all effed up. I wish someone would tell me the stuff that I don’t know. The mean stuff that they gossip about, but never say to my face. I would like to know.
My mean ass brother loves to tell me about myself, but he’s so daggone mean. And he usually has no clue about what’s really going on with a person. He did say something to me, though, as I was crying and tell him I feel like a wounded baby. He said I’m not a baby and I need to get my ass up and take responsibility for my life. I mean thing to say to a person in pain, as usual, but it resonated.
My nerves are tingling. I feel anxious about writing more on this blog. Feel like pushing delete, but I’m gonna finish it out. Closing my eyes… Self responsibility. I am going to have to choose, with every ounce of me, 100% to grow. Something deep in me knows I can. The question is, do I want to quit? Do I want to settle for a life that’s not what I dreamed of? The answer is no. I don’t. I want to live my dream. I know I’m getting old, but nothing else will do. But I don’t know how to live my dream, you see. I’ve never seen it done by someone like me who comes from where I come from.
People have tried. People are trying. They are doing their best. But their is no role model. Perhaps I am to become the model. Yes, that is the truth. That is why so many are upset with me. They expected me to be the role model and show them the way. I didn’t know the way, but they thought I did.
Integrate, process, own, live… It’s time. It’s time to stand up tall in myself. It’s time to get over feeling sorry for myself. I can have compassion and kindness, but it’s time to get up now and fight for my own happiness. It’s time to fight for my own redemption. Make an intention for myself. Make an intention for the world. I’m going to go ahead and finally do it.
I commit. I intend. I’m going for the gold. Yep. Even now. I’m going for the gold. Even when I’m over here all emotionally unbalanced. I’m going for it. I’m going for the gold. I’m gonna face them. I’m going to face my fears and have all of these conversations that have been pent up. Or write letters. Or something. I’m going to process and integrate stuff and I’m going to grow and do my very darned best to make this life something I like being a part of. I commit. I intend. I choose. I’m gonna fight for myself, and I know that when I fight for myself, I’m fighting for everyone else who my life touches.
So here we go. I’m getting offline now. Gonna take a shower and finish two things on my list today. Three things, actually. Finish reading a book. Maybe one thing. Maybe the book might take a while. We’ll see. We’ll plan to finish the book. And hug someone. I need to touch and be touched. Thanks for reading. Have a Blessed day.
Day 537
Integrate, Process, Choose
Hi
I’m at my alma mater. Sitting in my car with the heat on. Don’t judge me. It’s 10:24 at night. I needed to get out of the house… I haven’t seen anyone all day. Spent most of my day lying on my deflated sleeping bag on the floor in my room, trying to avoid the world.
The world didn’t disappear. I closed my eyes, hoping to wake up to a different feeling, a different anything, but I didn’t. What got me off of the ground was a phone call from My People, the most awesome man I’ve ever met, who refuses to marry me. He says he won’t marry anyone. He’s old. A priest of sorts as well as consultant to kings, queens, presidents and so many elite people. I’m not even exaggerating. He’s that cool. And he calls my phone sometimes. I should blessed that I can connect with him from time to time… I always know that whenever he calls, I’m at a real critical place.
He gave me advice. I was thinking about doing a ceremony, and asked his advice. He gave me advice. Validated what I’d already known. Told me what to do. The thing that I had been avoiding… Write. He told me to write. He said I’m a writer. And he told me to use my words to set an intention and get my ass to a life I like to look at…
I had been getting this message for a while during prayer, but avoiding it. Lying on the ground instead. I’m supposed to write people letters. Write poems. Forgive people and stuff. Tell them how I feel. Tell them how I want to feel. Make decisions. Make intentions. Make commitments. Aaaaaaagh! Painful stuff all the way around. I have felt so mad and so offended by so many people. I don’t know how to let it go. Honestly, I haven’t wanted to let it go.
Because what will I have after that? Can I just be honest here? I know it sounds silly, but I don’t know a life where I’m all right. Since I was a kid, eleven to be exact, I don’t remember if there was ever a time that I felt ok in myself. Do you know what I mean? Happy all the way. With no burdens. No offenses. No broken relationships… A moth just flew into my car. Moths have been all up in my apartment since I got back to LA.
The police murdered a black man on camera. Again. A pandemic came through and shifted everyone’s lives… I was already in the middle of a restructuring of my world when this all hit. Y’all, there’s so much I need to write.
“Start with your feelings”, my Spirit says. I feel hurt. Confused. Desperate. Sad. Lonely. So alone. Unforgivable. Misunderstood. Lost… I’m not quite sure what I’m doing here on this planet. Some say it’s a mirage. A matrix of sorts, our lives. And here we are, caught in the midst of mirages. And if the real thing is only the centered place, then what’s the point of it all?
My mind goes deep. The hurt goes deep, but under the hurt is sadness. The sadness is so deep. Do you know what I feel like? Like no one knows me. Like no one gets me. Like there is no one to hold and be held by. To smile at. Just smile at without no other strings attached. Like everyone who actually does see me and like me wants something from me that I don’t want to give. Or wants me to give what I’m giving in a different way or be what I’m being in a different way. I feel alone. And I don’t care. I don’t care about the things I’m supposed to care about. I feel like I don’t have a religion… I don’t have a place where I belong. I am fighting a battle on my own, but I can’t win it on my own.
A part of my brain says that this is just a story, and I am so powerful that I can change it just like that. In an instant. Everyone can’t do it. But I can. I know how to dematerialize and manifest in an instant. Change the story. I hesitate to think that I can do this. It feels bad and blasphemous to assume that I have any kind of power. To think that me and God are one. I’m laughing because one of the names of God, actually, two of the names of God in the religion of my youth, translate to the “One”. The all in one, and the one in all… A part of my brain does not want to be special. They will not like me. I want to write poems and tell people off, but they won’t like that either. I want people to be ok with me not being happy all the time, but they won’t. I am the motivator.
And no one is coming to save me. I’m here in my car in the middle of the night without a soul to hold. Without a soul to talk to who can give me comfort. And my mind says, “Well, who are you giving comfort to?” and I want to say, can I just be an ass for a minute? Can I just receive for a minute? Please? Is there some list somewhere of my giving? Haven’t I given enough to enough people where I can take a break? Just for a minute? Can I just not think about giving for a minute and get?
The programs in my brain are fried. They are not making sense anymore. I feel sorry for myself. I remember the days I basically lived in this car. Basically got a blanket and slept here because I didn’t want to go home to whoever was there. The question deep is am I going to fight for my life? Am I going to use my power? Am I going to be sovereign and blasphemous? Who am I without the guidance and overbearing programming of my mother? My siblings? Without the voice of my used to be best friend telling me what to do? Who am I without the book of God that I’m supposed to go to, telling me what life is about?
You say I have to make a choice. Tonight. Put a stake in the ground. I am dying from indecision. Halfway, half-hearted moves will not suffice at last… To be or not to be… the question makes sense for the first time… To be or not to be.
What does it mean? I look for guidance outside of me. Any book. Any body. Any anything except accepting my own authority… My People says I am a writer. He says that what I say with words can be a reality. He says that I can catch a vision for my overseas heal the world mission, and speak it, and plant seeds for a new kind of world. He says that I can use my free will for my own life. Decide. Decide the life I want and have it. Create. Accept it. Allow. Just decide that this is the way it is to be. And be… And I am so afraid of this. I am so afraid of this. I feel so afraid of this.
But still I must decide. Can I? Can I decide not to be this anymore? The only thing and the only way I’ve known for so long? Can I decide to take ownership of my life? I feel like throwing up as I write this. I want to write poems, but I think maybe because the world is talking about race and diseases and my poems are talking about sad stuff that maybe my poems won’t be received right now? I don’t know. But I know I have to do it.
I have to do this. I have to decide. Now. I have to make a full 100 percent decision. This won’t work anymore. I’m dying of depression. I’m dying from heartache. I’m dying from not expressing myself. I’m dying from living out of alignment with who I am and where I belong. And even if I don’t know… even if I don’t know the truth of it all. Even if I don’t know the whole of it all. I know I don’t belong here anymore.
I know that much. I know that this is enough. A lifetime, probably lifetimes of being stuck inside myself… a lifetime of having so many beautiful thoughts die… a lifetime of painful relations… My head hurts, but I’m going to do this, Insha Allah.
I am going to, for the first time in my life, on purpose, carefully, use my words. All the way. Yes, I am going to be like one of those Maya Angelou people. Yes, I am special like that. Not because I want to be better than anyone. I have such a resistance to doing anything more than anyone or people thinking that I’m trying to be better than them…. I am going to lay everything down. Every single thing, God. Everything.
I don’t know what religion to choose. I don’t know about if it’s a mirage or if anything here is real. I haven’t found the meat that fills me up, but I’m going to look for it. There. There you have it. I commit. In this moment, in my lucky car that I won on a game show in 30 minutes… This car that I’ve taken out loans out against and paid my rent with and paid other people’s rent with… this car that I went to an audition for. The lady at the audition asked me why I want to be on the show, and I said because my car broke and I need a new car. And I went on the show. And I won a new car in 30 minutes. And it’s in my name. And it’s the only thing that I own as far as property in this world… In this lucky car, God, that reminds me that there is more to life than meets the eye, I am going to stand my ground. I am choosing to take ownership of my life fully. Now. I own two things, now.
I choose. You say that that is our gift. To choose. Our will. I reclaim my will. Now. Back from everyone. Back from the will of my ancestors. Back from the will of my mom. Back from the will of my friends. And my siblings. And my lovers. And my race. And my gender. Back from my agreements known and unknown, ever. Chords, spells, binds, blocks, implants, illusions have no power over me any more. Today, in this moment, June 13, 2020 12:38am, I call back my power… and I choose to accept it. I accept it. Now. ALL OF IT.
I don’t want to paint the picture too deep yet, God, because I want you to paint it with me. Hand in hand. I don’t want to do this on my own. I can’t, in fact. I choose you, Good forces known and unknown, I accept you to be here with me. I am willing to be a grown up now. I am willing to be responsible for my own life now. My gift. I will face the void and choose to see it for what it is. I accept. I accept. I accept. I accept. I accept happyness and fulfillment as my life. I commit to it. I’m going home now. And so it is.
Ameen
Day 536
Untitled Stake In The Ground Choosing To Be
We were taught aloneness. Independence. Some of us. Something to be proud of. We did it all by ourselves. And no one but you can get you into Heaven. Is it blasphemy, then, to say that I don’t want aloneness? I don’t believe.
I don’t believe it’s possible anymore, alone. I don’t see the purpose of alone. It feels like the biggest lie. And even together, we are alone. I heard a talk today from My People. My People is a genius. He is a world changer. I didn’t even realize how phenomenal he is and I pinch myself every time I become aware that this guy is my friend. He talks to me and gives me water and he gave me money to buy ice cream once. I Love him. I wish he’d marry me and be my baby daddy to be honest, but he doesn’t want to.
So I am content with receiving what he is willing to give and navigating our relationship in the places where we agree. He’s an international speaker, and I looked him up online today. He had done a talk in the past few weeks, and I took this from it. “I am with you in the reality that allows you to know that you’re not alone… Let me come to where your suffering is, and let’s get out of it together…”
This was it. These were the words. This was the safety I had been wanting all these years. I’m not supposed to say it. I’m supposed to say other things like I can do it all by myself and I don’t need anyone and no one owes me anything and I better figure it out because nobody is coming. I know. I know. How dare I feel entitled to that level of Love and how dare I think that I can’t do anything without it?
I know. I’m not supposed to want those things. I’m supposed to figure out how to get along without those things and don’t even focus my life on trying to give those things – It’s called codependency in many cultures… But those words? Those are the words I’ve been wanting all my life.
My brother gave it to me recently when I was sick down South. He was with me. He was with me, where my suffering was, and he helped me get out of it. To come to the place of another’s suffering and help them get out of it; to be with them in the reality that allows them to know that they are not alone… What a gift.
Many people, some of my mentors, say don’t worry about being alone. Get over this fear of being alone. I see both sides… That is where my mind was when I started this blog today. Aloneness and togetherness. But we will go down that thought path on another day, maybe.
Right now, I’m thinking about this time in my life. The next phase. A new moon. An empty apartment. An older lady. A womb with eggs that have expiration dates. A phone that doesn’t ring that often. Phone numbers that I mostly don’t feel like calling. A realization of so many mistakes. An awareness of my situation like never before. A sadness. A deep, deep sadness. Knowing what to do next, but feeling real resistance to actually taking action.
I had a lot of boyfriends this past week, and dumped them just as fast. Didn’t do anything with anyone. Mostly talked to people on the phone and texted. An old acquaintance who had been trying to get it for some time came by. We didn’t do anything but talk. A young guy looking for a hero. An older guy who is very accomplished and ambitious and lonely. A friend from overseas. I told him that I was just about ready to get married and he confessed his secret undying love for me. Another friend, who has constantly been trying to court me, tried every way to come visit when he heard I’m back in town. I didn’t see him. A birthday of a guy I dated. He was trying to find a way for me to help him with stuff and I said I’d help. He was hurt when I asked him to video stream stuff. Another good friend from overseas messaged to confess that he’s trying to get boo’d up. And finally, the guy whom I went on my first date in life with, a super cutie and respectable guy, reached out… I should be flattered. I used to be flattered. It used to be fun having all these guys around who liked me. Maybe because I grew up as an ugly girl, it made me feel valuable to have guys like me. Or maybe it’s because they were generally my only friends. The people I was doing life with. And so I just ignored that they actually liked me, because I wanted them to be my friends.
It’s not fun anymore, though. Because it hurts people. All those guys are probably nuts anyway, but I’m not helping them by holding their feelings hostage here. And I’m not helping me, either. I’m holding my own self hostage.
So I awake on this auspicious Saturday morning realizing that I’ve wasted a lot of time. Metaphysical people don’t like when you use the word wasted, but ghetto people do. I’m ghetto and meta, so I’ll say wasted. I feel like I’ve wasted a lot of time, and I feel sad about it. And I’m afraid of everything. Not knowing how to start over. Can I just tell the truth? Can I just be honest about what I think and feel? It’s not pretty. I feel like I’ve been in some kind of darkness for so long. And I’ve wasted a lot of time doing the same old things and not even recognizing how deeply they were impacting my life in a negative way.
And now that I see the light, I’m asking myself, how could I have been that way? How could I have done those things or not done those things or thought those things or let people do those things to me? How is it that I’m living a life with no love? No real love. So many of us are so unhappy… How did I get here? Why did it take me so long to even fathom… I can’t even get the words out. I feel ashamed of myself. I really feel ashamed of myself for so many reasons. I feel embarrassed. And my relationships that have fallen apart? I can’t say that I really want them back. In fact, I can say that I don’t want them back in the ways that they were. But how to change them? How to change me? Where do I start? Is there time? Will I have kids before I get too old? Will I ever fall in love and have a healthy relationship with someone who loves me, too? Will things ever be good – for real good – between my family and I and so many others? Will I ever get to experience that real flow? The flow of authentic goodwill – no jealousy. No anger. No bitterness. No resentment. No control. No judging. Just Love and acceptance. Will that ever happen between me and family? Or me and my friends? Or me and anyone except the people who really aren’t trying to be a part of my life like that?
Where do I start? My brother says I should be focused on trying to get to Heaven and taking responsibility for my life. The kid in me wants to say, “You’re wrong! I’ll show you!” But the grown up in me doesn’t want to fight anymore… I don’t want to fight anymore. I just don’t. My other mind says, maybe if I just did what everybody wanted me to, and just said sorry about everything and I said I was all the bad things they think I am and wrong and tried their ways of life, maybe they’d like me then… But I don’t believe it. I don’t really believe I was all the bad things they said I was… I just don’t… These thoughts really wreak havoc on me, though, and have me knocked out on the bed for days. The thought of my brother and mom and family members thinking I’m a bad person really gets me. It gets me really down and has… I got distracted.
Someone, a business acquaintance, sent me an email asking if he could support me in any way and also reminding me that I’m powerful… Well, the good news is that since the start of this blog till the end, I feel a lot more empowered. My Best Friend would be really proud of me. He used to say, “turn it around”. Like, whatever deep hole you were going down, turn it around. I miss him still, but don’t feel strong enough to engage with him. He doesn’t know how to Love and not hurt or use people. We all have our flaws…
I’m debating about deleting this entry and starting a new one… So many freaking thoughts pass through in such a short amount of time. Just now, for some reason, I ended up reading emails from someone who said I was unstable… Oh! I know what I was thinking. I was thinking about how, when you see people in those AA meetings, they always say, “My name is such and such and I’m an alcoholic.” I was wondering what I had to confess to, and then I thought, “I’m emotionally unstable.” Then I went and looked for an email from some guy who had called me such, but I couldn’t find it. I’m a shirker? I’m trying to find the main thing that needs to be repaired. The fulcrum.
The fulcrum is that I don’t accept my power and I don’t want responsibility for leading the direction of my life. That is the point upon which all other disasters have rested… Can we change it? It’s weird, because I feel like I can, but I am so afraid of doing it and admitting it. I feel my heart racing in my throat and belly. It is now or never, really. We can keep on like this forever. Many do. No judgement on them. This is just not the lifetime for them to breakthrough…
But we can keep on like this forever. Or we can not. It was seven years ago that that guy called me emotionally unstable. And six years ago that I got sick and was diagnosed emotionally and physically unstable. And more than ten years ago that I met He Who Came Before and became so unmoored and psychically unstable…
And now, from the outside looking in, I see myself, with these old lady pajamas on and sunglasses and looking so pathetic, and there’s no brother or mother to reach out to. No book that can tell me about myself better than I. There is no sister who’s judgments can reach places that don’t exist in me. Am I willing to know what to do and do it?
Am I willing to jump out of this sad, sad, identity… my back hurts as I write this. My heart rate speeds up. I’m gonna do it. Yep. I’m gonna do it, God willing. I close my eyes. Am I willing to accept my won power? Finally? Am I willing to accept my own power? For real. Even if means not being liked. Oh, my God. Even if it means being liked? Am I willing to accept my own Grace and take ownership of this life at last? Am I willing to own my life at last? Am I willing to own my body at last? Am I willing to own my power at last? To Love myself at last… My body belongs to me. My body belongs to me… My body belongs to me… My life belongs to me. My energy belongs to me… Dream Lover tricked me. He was married all along. I’m sorry, Laydie. Benjamin hurt me. He betrayed me, God. I’m sorry, Laydie. And they don’t really Love me… They don’t Love me, Allah… I’m sorry, Laydie… Would you be willing to forgive?
From the outside looking in, would you be willing to turn your own power towards yourself for the sake of your happiness? Would you be ok with this? Your own happiness? Would you be ok with this? Your own happiness? If no one else made it out, would you be ok with this? Your own freedom? You’re a good person. You’re a good person. From the outside looking in, you’re a great person. A sweet person. A humble person. From the outside looking in, you’re a kind person. And you’re so gifted and… I had to stop again.
Y’all. Do you know the hardest thing? To accept. After you have been through so much shit and you are used to living a certain way… I’m used to being an almost. Not a done. And this shift is huge. And I know that if I open up to my power and use it towards myself and accept the Grace of God, then it’s possible. But I am afraid of possible. It hurts my throat and makes my shoulders tense. But I know it is the only way. But I am even afraid to tell you that I’m going to make it. Like I don’t think you’ll like me if you think I’m going to make it. Like this was the agreement. How not to cry every day was the agreement. The other side of happy – the happy side of happy was no where in the picture.
So, this is a big one. Maybe the biggest one. Maybe the biggest day of my life. If I could get on the outside looking in and tell me what to do… And do it. And if I could accept my power, I could do it. If I could do it, then my life would change. Like, for real. Not a temporary change. Not a part-time change. The nerves in my body are acting a fool right now. My throat hurts. I am tempted to stop writing and go look at my celebrity crush’s Instagram page. But I’m going to power through, God willing.
My name is Laydie Byrd and I am powerful. I accept being powerful. I accept being powerful. I accept being powerful. I am Loving and Loved. I accept being Loving and Loved. I accept being Loving and Loved. I accept being Loving and Loved. My life is a good life. I accept my life being a good life. I accept my life being a good life. I accept my life being a good life. I accept my life being a good life. Whoa. I accept my life being a good life. I accept my life being a good life. I accept my life being a good life. I accept a good life. I accept a good life. I accept a good life. I am willing to have a good life. I accept a good life. I am willing to be a good life. I am willing to be a good life. I am a good life. I am a good life. I am a good life. I am a good life. I am a good life. I am willing to have a good life. I am a good life.
I turn my gaze towards myself. I am willing to listen to the wisdom of my own being. I choose to listen finally. I choose to accept a good life forever more. Forever more. Forever more. Forever more.
Who am I being today? How am I being today? Today I am being full of Grace. I just accept it. Today I am relaxing into my own power. I relax even though it hurts… I just accept it. From the outside looking in, I want you to know that you can do this, Laydie. You can do this. You are ready to do this. You are not on your own with this. Don’t tell them what you’re about to do. Everybody don’t like you. But tell yourself. Tell yourself. Write it down. Write it down now. Today. Make that commitment to yourself. Commitment. Today. Write it down. You know what to do. I will tell you. You know where to get help. I will help you. Please accept my help. The world is counting on you. This is not a fairy tell. The world is counting on you. This is how the world wakes up. One by one by one by one by one. And some person that thinks they’re better than you sees you break free and they say, “If she can do it, I can do it”, and they break free.
And that is your gift. You are your best gift to yourself and everyone else. You understand? From the outside looking in, I am putting my arms around you. I am giving you the compassion that you’ve so craved. I am putting my arms around you. I am loving you… Feel it. Look towards me, now. Feel it. Your life is not the same now. Feel it. I am Loving you. Feel it. Let me Love you. Feel it. Feel what it is to have your shoulders touched with Love, no debt accrued… I see you. I see your pains. I see your suffering. I am so sorry. I know you have been hurting for a such a long time. I know your posture has changed and your skin has changed and your eyes are not as white. I want you to know, though, that I Love you still. And I love you even at your best. Love is not just for the broken hearted. Nor is it only for the ones who got it right. The sun shines on everyone – on anyone who is willing to go out and receive it.
So forgive yourself, my baby. And accept my Grace even if you can’t forgive yourself right now. OK? Even if you only do one thing today. Even if you do no things, but I know you will do many things… But no matter what happens or doesn’t happen, know that I am here with you. Loving you, appreciating you, helping you. I am here helping you. I am here helping you. I am here thinking highly of you. Yes, even now. Look towards me now. Join hands with me now. When you are weak, I am even here lifting you, carrying you, bringing help to you. And I am clapping for you. You can be strong, too. You can be a giver, too. You can be a helper, too. Don’t focus on that, though. Don’t worry about it. They will call you selfish. I am here protecting you from the pain of their words. Let me help you. I will teach you about your own goodness so much so that no lie calling you out of your name will ever land again. And you will be good. You are good. You are good. You are good. Open up your arms. Hold me now… I’m holding you.
Have faith. Go to the place where you know what you know. Know it now. Know it now. Know it now. We are changing lives. We are moving upwards and onwards at last. You were born for this… I was born for this… I was born for this…
Ameen
Day 535
From The Outside Looking In
Where to start? I’ve been avoiding writing because I’ve been afraid to deal with all these heavy feelings. Thinking they might come rushing in and take me over…
Don’t really want to be paralyzed with overwhelm… Writing this blog is like the thing that makes me face myself. I ask God to be with me. Let me know that He is with me, so I can face my shadows.
I feel like a fool writing this. Don’t think I’ll write in code today. My siblings. My family. A lot of them don’t like me. Or at least it feels that way. For different reasons. Mostly, they think I’m bad. It sounds so small when I write it, but it is so huge. Or they think I’m good. Or they are disappointed in me because they wanted me to be a way – a hero of sorts, and I didn’t save them.
Or they think I’m manipulative. Or just looking for pity. Or a bully. Or mean. Or cold… The wires in my head are crossed. Resistance to feeling all this stuff. I’ll push through, God willing, and get it out. Another sibling says I’m abusive and always trying to cut people with my words and not help them. One says I went off on her, when I swear I only said one sentence. “I don’t like telling you my problems because you never sympathize with me.” Another sibling made up a whole saga about me. Said I told the family all kinds of lies about her and I was the reason why she separated from the family. I never did it. In fact, I had gone to visit her to try and show her that I cared about her and never said anything but good things about her to the family until she disappeared based upon what she thought I had done.
A trouble maker that brings mischief everywhere, they called me. And yet they seek me out first for help with just about everything. They ask my advice and come to me for comfort. They want my approval.
Something is very wrong here. I’m sure there is some kind of psychological condition that I’m not seeing.
The other day, I was hurting. I can’t even tell you the deeper reasons why I was hurting so bad, but I was hurting so bad emotionally. I had come back to town and stayed with my brother for a couple of days. My brother has a new fancy place and invited me to stay with him. Nothing really happened. A small thing happened. He was just nit picky about cleaning up and anxious… I had cooked spaghetti one night and the water spilled over on the stove. Neither of us had cleaned it up. The next morning, he was in the kitchen and I heard him saying, “Uh uh”… He called my name. For whatever reason, that triggered something deep in me.
I became eleven years old again. Missed the bus for school and ended up staying home with the 20 year old not cousin who lived with us. I was an ugly duckling and no boys ever liked me and I didn’t have very many friends. The twenty year old used to call me pretty, though. He used to pump on his bike and buy me candies and joke and talk with me. And when we were home alone that day, I asked him if he’d ever kissed a girl. He had. He asked me if I’d ever kissed a boy. I hadn’t. He was my first kiss. Lionel Richie’s song “You Are” played in the background. I just found it online and tried to listen to it, but felt like vomiting, so turned it off… After we kissed, I got up abruptly. Didn’t say anything. Went to another room. I felt excited, but I felt bad, too. I had done something bad. But I had also had my first kiss. I went to the bathroom to wash my mouth and avoided my first kisser all day.
When my brother, my best friend at the time, came home, I rushed to tell him! I had kissed my first kiss! Guess who? My brother was not as excited as me. He was enraged. “You have to tell mom,” he said. “What?” I thought. I couldn’t tell mom! My brother said that if I didn’t tell her, he would. He did. That night, my mom confronted my kisser when he got off work. I was with her. I still remember being downstairs in the airport tunnel where we came to pick him up. He had worked at the airport. He was walking towards us with his bike. My mom confronted him and started slapping him. She kicked him out. Gave him a short amount of time to leave our house and said that he and I were not to be in the same room ever again while he was at the house…
I abided to the decree. Shortly after the incident, I noticed that my brother, my best friend, wasn’t talking to me. He would just walk by me and I would speak to him, but he would just brush me off and not say anything to me. He didn’t invite me to play or do stuff anymore. One of my girl cousins, who lived with us, asked what was going on, but I didn’t know. Finally, my mom got wind of the situation. She called us for a meeting. Asked my bro why he wasn’t talking to me. He said because I was bad and I liked boys… and that was how I lost my best friend.
Within a week or so, my kisser and I bumped into each other alone in the upstairs game room of the house. He said he wanted to tell me something. He said that he didn’t kiss me because he liked me. He said he actually liked someone else – my mom. Yep, he said it. Said he kissed me because I reminded him of my mom… I don’t remember what I said. I don’t think I said anything. Somehow, though, I made it downstairs to the bathroom. I got in the tub, ran a bath, and cried and cried for hours until I felt nothing…
I didn’t know it at the time, but I had left my body. And over the years, I would perfect the art of leaving my body whenever something painful tried to hit me. People would think I’m strong, but I didn’t really care about being strong. I actually resented the idea, because to me, it wasn’t a good thing. It meant you had to go through hard shit on your own. But I wasn’t strong. I just wasn’t there…
This writing is painful… I had to stop writing because my Essence was tryna rise up and just get up out of my body and I breathed so that I could be present through this… I’m going to finish it out. My brother and I fought over this core issue over the years. About me being bad because I like boys. We actually fought about me not practicing the religion that we grew up in. According to him, it was the only way to salvation and peace. And if I didn’t practice it, I was doomed. I interpreted this belief as me being bad if I didn’t practice it.
My mom reinforced this belief. I mean, it’s essentially written into many religions. Religious people will say it’s not, but it is. If you don’t believe this path and follow this path, you are not chosen or saved or going to Heaven. Ergo, you are unchosen, cursed, not saved, going to hell. Bad in so many words. In my estimation, this kind of thinking allows to kill each other in the blink of an eye. “If you don’t believe what I believe, then you are wrong. You are destined to the worst place you can imagine. A hell of hells. I am not to associate with you.” It’s hard to have compassion with one another with this kind of programming.
Over the years, I would fight my brother and my mom about whether this was true. We would try and find the worst things about each others’ lives in order to prove that our beliefs were correct and that’s why the person with the correct beliefs had a better life than the person with the incorrect beliefs. We hurt each other much…
So, the other day, when my brother said, “uh uh” and called my name after seeing spilled water in his brand new apartment that he wants to keep clean, it didn’t feel like someone just being protective of their stuff like they should be. It felt like I was being called bad, abandoned, not wanted, a burden, and never quite good enough no matter how hard I tried.
I cried and cried and eventually I left my brother’s place and came back to mine. My mom called, meddling, until I told her what was wrong. She essentially told me how my brother loved me and then advised me that I’m difficult to live with and went on to recount how I had bullied her into accepting one of my friends during our recent time living together, and how, although I used to be lively and vibrant, I was mean and cold now. And she advised that I stay from my friends. There was no “friend” in particular that she could name, but just advised that most of my friends were deadbeats and I should stay away from them in general. She said I had hurt her deeply by being mean to her during our last time living together. Said I should try being the religion I grew up in and my life would be better.
Yesterday my brother called to see what was going on with me. I think he genuinely wanted to help. I told him I felt lost and confused about my next steps in life, and I told him that what I wanted most in life was good relationships. He asked if I wanted his advice and I said yes. He advised that I should set goals, make a plan, and that the most important thing to me shouldn’t be good relationships. The most important thing should be my religion and trying to do what’s right by it. I rebutted against his usage of the word “should”. He said I said I wanted his advice and should was what he advised. He told me eff my feelings. Don’t worry about what others think of me and don’t worry about relationships. Eff my daggone feelings up. Make up my mind that I’m not gonna cry and get to work with whatever I need to work on. His tone felt angry to me, but somewhere in his intention there was some love. I could feel it. The interaction did not feel good, though. My tone was defeated.
Defeated…
I wonder if I am this person. This mischief maker. This bully. This bad person who won’t submit to Guidance. This abuser who tries to cut people and put them down. This hellbound heathen. I wonder if any goth people have made a song called Hell Bound yet… But I digress. What if I was all of this? What would I do then? Change? For who?
My brain swirls. There is nothing to hold on to. One of my new friends, whom I met at my spiritual center the other day, told me that I’m an awesome sister. A gem. I don’t know if I am who some of my family members think I am or who my friends think I am or who I think I am. I don’t even know who I think I am… Maybe it’s official. I’m coockoo at last… What to do?
After writing all this, I’m not feeling as emotional as I was feeling when I started. I think what I’ll do is I’ll just make my own opinion of myself. Take an honest inventory. It’s time. Maybe I won’t focus so much on changing as I will on accepting and forgiving. And I’ll do the same for others.
I’m tired of this game of bad and good. Fed up, actually. I’m tired of being seen as anything but a Blessed gem. I know I ain’t perfect and I can say some cutting words. I’ll accept that. Usually, though, it’s in defense when someone has deliberately crossed over some boundaries that I explicitly asked them not to cross or tried to bully me or hurt me. My cutting words is all I got to keep me safe.
I’m afraid that if I tell my family sorry for stuff, then they’ll think they’re right for all their abusive, manipulative, insensitive, codependent, disrespectful, judgmental, not trying to understanding nobody’s point of view, condemning everyone including themselves, expecting someone to give them what they’re not willing or able to give nobody bullshit that they expect from me.
Something about all of it doesn’t feel right. Like, it doesn’t come from Love. I don’t know how to explain it, but most of all of what happened has nothing to do with Love. It’s about ego and identity and self worth and unmet needs, but it’s not about Love.
How do I process this? How do I process me?
-Pick it up and put it down. Walk. Through. This. Darkness. And. Know. The. Truth. About. Yourself. How do you know the Truth? Just ask to know the Truth. How do you know what to do next? Just ask to know what to do next. Give them all their opinions back. Just give it back to them. They are theirs. In fact, lay even your own opinions down. This is grown folks work. In everything, slithers of Love exist. Pick. Those. Up… Give. Those. Out. This in an intentional practice. You have been instructed. Now proceed…
And so it is.
Day 534
About Love (Again)
