#fdwrites

Invest; “Putting in the time, money, and energy into making your current and future life better ”

It is time for you to invest in yourself, not looking or trying to invest in someone else but only you. When you invest in yourself, your glow-up is real, taking the time to nurture, care and honor your well-being is love. Loving yourself is pouring into your cup and watching it overflow.

I can’t tell you how happy I am to see so many of my fellow Queens walking the talk, and learning to understand the assignment. Investing in yourself doesn’t make you selfish, narcissistic, or arrogant. It is energizing to your heart, mind, body, soul, and spirit. It brings true wholeness to you and how you choose to invest in yourself is your business (as my fellow Queen Tabitha Brown so eloquently states it). You can’t be a blessing to others if you are not a blessing to yourself, we need to become investors for ourselves. You deserve the trips, the careers, the home, the wealth, health, you deserve it all.

All of this sounds great, right? But unless we learn how to do it, then it will only be words that we read from posts on social media, in books, or listening to podcasts. We have to learn how to become practitioners of investing, meaning we have to start where we are currently. If we have to scour the internet in search of free resources (because only you know what is in your wallet), maybe join online or in-person groups in your area or outside of your area (depending on your geographical location) that are learning to invest in themselves. Community is so key because when you are feeling weak or down, or ready to give up, having your sisterhood come alongside you to lift your arms to help you stand up from your chair is a game changer. We need that, we need the fellowship and those cheering for our wins (no matter the size of them). Let me give you a word of caution because we all need it, don’t allow anyone to minimize or trivialize your growth. Dream killers exist because they were too afraid to go after their dreams and invest in themselves. Be mindful of who you share with as well because everyone is not rooting for you, Queen.

Investing in yourself is not a road to walk alone, pray for God to send Queens your way to help you. Investing in yourself is also not for the faint of heart because we have to unlearn a lot of unhealthy habits, toxic thoughts and become set free from trauma. These are the blind spots that we can’t see because we are too close up in the mirror, not realizing the accidents waiting to happen because we’ve made to believe that everyone else comes before us. So I will say this and then I’m done. If you don’t take anything else from this post, I need you to know that you got it in you and it may be buried deep down inside but it’s there, and it’s high time for you to unveil it.

 Well Until My Next…Invest in Yourself Because You Deserve It!

I’m Enough; “You Feel Confident in Yourself and Your Abilities.”

One thing I have found myself repeating a whole lot this year is, “I’m Enough.” When you are no longer looking for validation from others, you are no longer feeling the need for collaboration because you used to believe that you needed others to succeed or be taken seriously, you fear failure is inevitable because you have never seen the level of success that you dream of happen for your family or friends. But there is another side of the coin to this, and that is “You Are Enough” for whatever it is you want to do.

It took a long time for me to realize and to say, “I’m Enough.” As a Black woman oftentimes we either weren’t taught or were raised to not even say this because it was perceived as being arrogant, not humble. But as old thought processes and habits are shed, you begin to realize that being enough doesn’t mean anything negative it’s a positive because it quickly notes that you have exactly what it takes to succeed, that you know who you are, you are powerful, smart, beautiful, loving, kind, soulful, oh you get my drift, don’t you? Do you see where I am going with this, I hope you do because for so long our culture has taught women that we need others to be deemed successful but there are other cultures where this is not taught, it’s the opposite, they are taught about being enough from young. This is generationally passed down and we are in a position to break these curses, and shout “I’m Enough.” But don’t think it will not come with pushback from every hotep, misogynistic, and pick-me societal woman. Who would rather remain the same and shame women for no longer bowing down to this disgusting patriarchal society. We see our fellow Black Sisters have risen up and it is time to join the ranks.

If you are hiding in the shadows because you are believing the lie that you are not enough, I am here to tell you that you are more than enough. Come out from under the cover of darkness, out from oppression and depression because of the lie you believed. It is time to take your position. Write it on sticky notes and post them all over your home, journal You are enough hundreds of times until you believe it, perform mirror work by watching yourself say it, get some merch made with “I’m Enough” on it, do whatever you need to do until it sinks into your spirit and blooms out of you every day.

And when you finally believe that you are enough, pull your fellow sisters along with you, this is not a walk for you alone, no, it is for you to make sure everyone is empowered and we are all standing shoulder to shoulder together.

Until My Next Post…We Are Enough!

Curate means, “you organize and present it. Curate comes from the word cure, and a curate is supposed to cure that most important part of you - your soul. ”  Are you curating your own life? Or are you emulating another person’s life? Bringing “YOUR IDEAS” into existence will not allow you to copy what some else has because you have decided to open up your gifts to bring them to life. Your gifts and talents are to be expounded upon so you can be a blessing to others. Curating your own life doesn’t allow for you to copy another person, you will truly see that these are your unique blessings given just for you. But the problem we find ourselves in is trying to copy another person’s persona, the person you are trying to emulate has curated their own life which is designed just for them, not for you.

Then the question becomes, “Who Are You?” You need to know who you are to organize and present your life. When you stop trying to be like the people you see in the media, you will have a better handle and assessment on how you are to move with your life. Curating your life will have its ebbs and flows. I know that it’s easier said than done, especially with the way media advertising is all in your face, on your social media pages, even your emails but when you take your eyes off of the distractions, you will be able to oversee your life. Your curation is your evolution, you will not remain the same when understanding your purpose, your posture changes and so does your voice because you have decided to no longer look to your left or right trying to be like the people you see in the magazines, on the internet or videos (TikTok, IG Reels, FB, etc.,)

To curate, your life means, “Showing people who you are.”  It’s time for you to stop hiding and start shining. This is “Your Time” so let’s get to it.

Mental Health means, “a person’s condition with regard to their psychological and emotional well-being” Why in our communities (Black. Brown, and Indigenous) space is not held for us when it comes down to our mental health? Could it be because those spaces weren’t made for us while we were growing up and now, therefore, grapple with taking charge of it, meaning not allowing people to interrupt, disregard, disrespect, abuse, use and manipulate us? Why are we perpetrated to be strong and out of this world beings? This is coded language that we must recognize for what it is, this was said to our ancestors when they were enslaved, strong strapping animals (not even recognized as human beings) while white people were called fair, not meant for heavy labor, and must be protected at all times. This dangerous and demonic narrative is still glaringly alive today and it must be destroyed, torn down and burned, to never grow again.

We all witnessed how Tennis Sensation Naomi Osako withdrew from the French Open citing Mental Health reasons. Now if anyone has been paying attention to this young lady, you can tell that she struggles with these preposterous ineffective interviewing that they subject athletes to. In one interview that I saw, Naomi said, “I’m just really sad right now” it wasn’t because of the game, she was having a mental health crisis, and let me tell you I was so broken for her at that moment because it was so clear that they heard her but didn’t care. After all, in their demonic minds, they were saying, “What does she have to be sad about?” For many of us, these are the same questions posed by our family and friends. And here is the crux of the situation, most of us suffer from anxiety, depression, and mental illness, if you grew up in a religious family you were told to just pray it away. Don’t get me wrong prayer is phenomenal and it does work but God also prompts us to seek out therapists. Now He created them so why do we feel shame for even considering it and Lord knows the church makes it worse, (for many people the church is where their trauma stems from) but this is a topic for another day, coming real soon. So let me tell you why? It is because our families were never encouraged to do so for themselves, so how can they possibly encourage us to do it.

I have learned a lot of lessons during the pandemic and being in quarantine. One of my biggest lessons is taking care of my mental health at all costs and by any means necessary. I currently don’t have a therapist but I am looking for one because I am not ashamed to say I want one. When I look back on my adolescence, teen-aged years, and adulthood, I can see faces of people who I grew up with that I now recognize as battling with their mental health. Comments that the elders would make about people being disrespectful, hardheaded, they are going to die young, they are slow, and the remarks went on and on. I know these words were spoken because they heard the very same things when they were growing up, so it’s learned behavior, a vicious cycle, generational curses, and trauma. Healing wasn’t spoken to them, so how could they speak healing to us. So this is why each of us must get help, you can start here; https://therapyforblackgirls.com/ Do command the space for our peace of mind, protect our mental health, allow ourselves to heal, say no, show up as our authentic self, allow ourselves to be planted, pruned, watered, and bloom. Don’t do it for anybody else, “DO IT FOR YOURSELF” - BECAUSE FOR MANY OF US IT IS A MATTER OF LIFE AND DEATH.

Until My Next Post…We Are To Be Each Other’s Keeper!

Here Comes The Sun…Beloved, You are The Sun, please remember that. Too often we get caught up in what everyone else is doing and then look at our own lives, and say we aren’t doing anything. Now I am going to stop you right there, first cut the negative talks and name-calling that you are doing to yourself regularly. Two, each of our journies are very different, we may be in the same fields or have the same businesses but this is where the similarities end. Third, I know that this is easier said than done but for the next 30 days, start speaking positively into your life, even if the negative thoughts and emotions want to rear their ugly heads, speak over them, envision your positive radiance shining as bright as the sun. Even those whom we deem are so successful are plagued with negative thoughts and emotions but the difference is, they refuse to be defined by them, and no longer will we be defined.

Most of this destructive thinking and emotions stem from childhood, let’s be honest it all comes from there. The old children's rhyme we used to say, “Stick and Stones May Break My Bones But Words Will Never Harm Me” is a lie straight from the pit of hell, because words do harm us, they harm us in unspeakable ways that we could have never imagined. The healing journey that I have chosen to embark on, is a spiritual and working progress.  Changes come when you put in the grind on time, this means even when you don’t feel like it, even when it hurts, even when you feel like giving up, damn it continue to push through it until you get to the other side. Anything worth having, you have got to work and fight for it, you can not sit by idly and expect for your healing to just happen. The Sun rises because the Lord tells it to, the sun doesn’t rise on its own, there is a word spoken and the sun responds. This is how our healing works, there is a word spoken of no more, then the Lord tells us to get up, we respond and He does the surgery that will ultimately repair every one of us.

Just remember, as the Sun rises each day, no matter where you are living in the world, you too shall rise because “You Are The Sun.”

Well Until My Next Post…Here Comes The Sun!

Photo Credit:  Vonecia Carswell

Encourage means, “give support, confidence or hope to someone”…Truth means, “that which is true or in accordance with fact or reality”… This pandemic/quarantine has taught me many things, especially about myself, things I have forgotten about or didn’t even realize existed within me. I have always been an encourager of others but never to myself, and I always told the truth to others but never to myself. What a bitter pill that I had to swallow but then I remembered a time, I wasn’t always like that, I remember when I was free and flowing, with my arms in the air, a huge smile on my face, and the sun surrounding me like a halo. So during this time of lockdown, I have had to face some truths and try to figure out how did my life just go topsy turvy and I didn’t even realize it until this deadly disease that was sweeping across the world hit us all. And since I’ve been home I am facing the music about myself.

Being in quarantine has made me look at myself in the mirror, and not just passing it as I often did while rushing to get ready for work. This slow down caused me to look not only topically but inwardly, and I have to tell you I didn’t like what I was seeing. Where did my inward encourager go? Where was my inward truth at? And how did I morph into someone I didn’t even recognize anymore? It was like seeing me for the first time while reaching my hands up to touch my face. And I knew at that moment I could never return to what and who I was before the pandemic/quarantine. I knew that if I truly wanted a life that mattered to me and allowed me to become the person I always wanted to be, I could not return to my former life and that is my truth and I make sure that I encourage myself to move forward into the blessings that God has always had for me and to finally bring my gifts and talents to fruition.

I wonder if anyone else has had this epiphany? And what are you going to do about it? Will you shed the old and embrace the new or will you revert right back to who you were before the pandemic/quarantine. Now that places are starting to open back up (and please take precaution with this because people have already proven that they don’t care about their own lives and they damn sure will not care about yours because the coronavirus is still really out here in these streets). For me going back into an office is not an option, I will not get caught up in that rat race ever again. Now I have become strategic in my life, I am an encourager and a truth-teller for me. My possibilities are endless now, between being a content creator, designer, photographer, and soon to be an author (by another name). I am more ready than I have ever been and to make sure I don’t turn back, I have taken to deep prayer and meditation, journaling, manifesting, affirmations, and a whole lot of self-love. I am ready for my close-up now.

 Until My Next Post…Encourage Your Truth, Beloved!

Commitment means, “the act of binding yourself (intellectually or emotionally) to a course of action”…Consistency means, “ability to be asserted together without contradiction”… For whatever your reasoning these two words tend to allude many of us, we will start stronger than a rhino, charging into whatever we are going to do but then halfway through we lose steam, slow down, take a seat, and the rest, as they say, is history. Now, this isn’t to shame anybody because we all have experienced it, some have made their way past it and are now going strong, others it’s more like a start and stop, while others have mental blocks, or maybe some mental health issues. And if we are being honest with ourselves most of us get caught in the hamster wheel because we are too busy looking at what other people are doing and then get discouraged. After all, we are not where they are. Listen, each person’s journey is different, just as the arrival will be equally different. Some land quicker than others but that should not diminish whatever it is you are working and striving towards.

Social media for all of its good also has an incredibly dark side.  We love to see other peoples work, cheer them on and in the next breath will come down hard on ourselves, and say, “oh it’s because they have more time to do those things that’s why but I don’t have that much time, and it’s a struggle for me to do anything.” I can tell you one of the greatest challenges is time management, some of us have it down to a science while others are just all over the place, again this is not to put anyone down, I am just stating facts. I have to correct and refocus myself constantly because I sometimes tend to become unfocused, I will start off doing something and then become unglued, so I started to monitor myself, and when I begin to veer off, I can gently nudge myself back on course. Most of the time it works and then other times not so much.

Let’s talk about consistency, which is a harmony of conduct or practice (Merriam-Webster). Consistency takes practice and lots of it, it is not something you can do three times and then you yell out “Ah-Ha” no it doesn’t work that way. Consistency is working at something, not in big chunks but in small bite-sized pieces, when it’s smaller you won’t feel overwhelmed, it will be easier to chew and digest. And just because you start small doesn’t mean you are not making progress, on the contrary, you are moving in the right direction. Consistency should also be celebrated, you don’t need to wait until you do something major, small victories are key in keeping you going and also lifts your spirits. You also need to stop looking to your left and your right, and just look straight ahead because you are moving forward, becoming committed, and learning how to be more consistent. 

Until My Next Post…Commitment and Consistency look great on you!

I’ll Be Home For Christmas…9 Months, that’s how long we have been in Quarantine, well at least those of us who are taking this pandemic seriously plus all the while trying to survive it.  The unemployment rate is at an all-time high, discrimination is still in the forefront, the death toll has reached 300,000, food scarcity, rent, and mortgage payments unable to be met education disparity are clearer than ever and the list goes on and on.  And let’s not talk about the demonic idiots who are still refusing to wear masks, the cry of the November Presidential Election being stolen (rolls eyes) plus the fools still riding with this demon as if he and the ones who aided him haven’t brought this country to the brink of collapse.  

As I sit here writing this I shake my head in sadness, frustration, heartbreak, and heartache.  This year many of us believe that it was going to be our year for love, new job changes, traveling, creating our businesses, family, growth, and pivoting. I was so excited like many of you and just ready to take on the world. All of a sudden March 18th (for me) when everything changed, I felt like I step off the edge of the world and have been falling ever since, desperately grasping for something to hold on to and my hands not connecting to anything concrete to keep me from continuously falling. My full transparency I felt like this was the year that I would fall in love again, I was so ready, my heart was beating and getting primed to love again. Well, I didn’t and I am believing that I will in 2021, trusting and believing God that it will happen. Thus my title, I’ll be home for Christmas was supposed to be me and my lover together.

But we do have a New President-Elect and for the First Time a Madam Vice President-Elect. To tell you that I felt the atmosphere shift when it was announced after the ballots were finally counted (not including the other states who were struggling to get their final counts in), There was a celebration in the streets that I hadn’t seen in a very long time it seems because we have been protesting vehemently about the injustices done to black and brown people. We will see celebrations for the justices very soon for our black and brown brothers and sisters, mark my words.

Now that most of us will be home for Christmas I do pray that it will be filled with love, peace, and joy. I pray for jobs to open up for you, I pray for financial blessings of abundance, I pray for your health and healing, I pray that depressions are lifted, anxieties are removed, unbelief turns into belief, doubts are vanquished, and for true rest to come for each of you.

Well Until My Next Post…I’ll Be Home for Christmas.