Dear Diary: An Account Of The Things I wish I Knew Growing Up

Little miss thing and her dad, circa 1992

As long as you are on this earth, you never stop learning. I have heard that a lot. I have also heard times and times again that it is never too late to learn new things. But nobody ever talks about the time wasted doing the old and dysfunctional things, but more importantly no one talks about how in order to learn some new things sometimes, you have to unlearned things and behaviors that are at the core of who you are. It is a hard process, one that not only entails learning new things but also learning who you are as a [new] person, every step of the process as you unravel; as you fall apart to be reborn a new person who not only knows better but does better. Today I am reflecting on the things I wish someone taught me growing up, the things that could have potentially saved me from the heartaches and the heartbreaks. 

1- The importance of boundaries. 

I have always had a strong personally: always knew what I wanted, when I wanted it and who I wanted it from but one thing I didn’t have was strong boundaries. Or should I say I just did not have any boundaries period. I let people come in and take from my cup until it was empty. I let people get into the most sacred places of my life, a secret garden that I took time to curate and watched them defile them with horror and tears without being able to utter a word. Not because I didn’t want to but because I never knew how. For the sake of love. For the sake of friendship. For the sake of preserving bridges that should have been burnt a long time ago; bridges that cheated me from the one that should have rightfully be in my life. I became a accomplice of things that I managed to forgive others but still struggle to forgive myself. I learned a bit late that “boundaries are not walls you build to keep people out: they are a perimeter you establish to keep yourself [and your sanity] safe” 

2- The freedom of No’s 

“No.” is a sentence of its own. I had to learn to say no. It wasn’t always easy. It still isn’t. However, it is sometimes a necessary evil. I learned that for each time I was saying yes to something, I was saying no to something else. And sometimes those “things” I said no to were things that mattered to me. And yet times and times again, I kept on saying yes. I kept on giving even in times when I didn’t have much to give; hell, even in times when I had nothing to give, I kept giving making the people I was giving to thieves because I allowed them to take away from my cup the things that I needed to sustain my own self. I kept on giving not out of being a good person but more because of the fear of disappointing or because of that feeling of guilt within me: I had promised myself that I would always be what / who I never had growing up and so I did. At first it felt good. Then it didn’t: I felt trapped in a place where every yes felt like a burden. It took me a lot of years and a breakdown to learn how to exercise my no muscle and stand my ground, but it came with a price. A few lost friendships, a whole lot of bad rep, being called out of my name but I have learned it is a small price to pay for the freedom to do the things that matter. 

3- The power of a “yes” 

When I started saying no and establishing boundaries, it was out of self-preservation but quickly it turned into fear. Suddenly, everything was too big and too scary; a bit too much to handle for my comfortable self. I wanted to touch the sky from within myself: I wanted the beauty of living life without the risks and the hurt that might possibly come from it. No matter how comfortable my shell was, I had to follow India Arie's advice and break it to experience the world. I didn’t want to go through life feeling the rain which simply means getting by with life: I wanted to really be out there and have the whole experience of life. It is safe to say no but without new experiences, we cannot grow. I have learned to be courageous enough to say yes and to look for the lessons in everything especially in the “Ls”. And although it isn’t really something that can be taught, I wish someone had told me about it. 

4- Being comfortable with who you are 

“what is wrong with you?” I grew up hearing that a lot. So much so that I started to believe that there was something wrong with me and started to try to figure out what it was. It took me a while to realize that I was just different in my very own ways. I wasn't the typical kid, nor the typical teenager and I sure enough grew up to be a very atypical woman. It took me a solid 26 years to find out who I was and come to peace with it. I had to learn to be more compassionate with myself and to stop judging myself using a barometer that made me feel like an outcast, like a failure because it did not include the things that made me who I was. “If you judge a fish on its ability to climb on a tree of course, it is going to fail”. It was a pretty accurate description of what I was doing to myself: judging who I was based on criteria that were not applicable to myself. “Being” is not universal: it is an experience that is unique to each and every single one of us. Some things about myself still irk me, but I am learning to honor the process and by the same token honor myself through it. But, most importantly, I am learning to love myself and stand for myself in a world that more often than not, tears apart what is different because it doesn’t understand it. 

5- Taking the “Ls” as a champ and maneuvering life’s setbacks. 

Nobody likes losing. I hate it more than anything. But as a youngest of the family I have been sheltered until later in life from some things that I had to navigate my way through. The real world is hard, it can be merciless and cold at time. As someone who at some point in time had someone to help me along the way, there were some things that I had to learn on my own. Life sucker punched me and in the times I experienced setbacks, in the time I fell and was unable to get back on my feet, I was harsh with myself. I felt like a failure and I wanted to give up because I wasn’t ready. I learned in those moments on the hard, cold floor of life, that we can’t always win. That sometimes, what matters is not winning but rather showing up and doing your best, even if at the end you fail. That there will be times where you will have to fail a thousand ways before you finally make it but each and every time, you have to look at the setbacks as an opportunity to refine your strategy and improve your game plan. I learned that strong and successful people aren’t those who never fail or fall, but rather, those who fail and try again, those who fall and rise again. It is tough: Some days there is more resistance than other days and sometimes I really feel like throwing in the towel but instead I wipe my tears and my sweat, trusting that my growing pains will be my growing gains. 

I hope one day if I ever change my mind about having kids, I look back at this and teach them the things I wish I had known growing up. I know they won’t really be ready to face the world, but I will have peace knowing that I haven’t sent them out empty handed and that they have some kind of foundation they can stand on when everything else is falling apart.

When God is Silent

It is a brand new year and some people are already on their "new year, new me" pow wow. For some of us however, it is a more quiet thing happening as we are still unraveling and trying to navigate the questions that we have and perhaps the feelings of not being where we thought we would be as the year ended and a new one is unfolding. I had something totally different planned for my very first article of the year. Something more upbeat and more in the "let's go get it" spirit but I felt in my heart to be real and open about my own struggles so that other hearts can also be encouraged. So instead of sharing the article that I tried to write more than three times and finally gave up on out of sheer frustration and the inability to accurately capture what I wanted to say, I chose to speak on a very true and ever-present feeling which is feeling left behind. I know a thing or two (or perhaps more) about it as it is something that I am wrestling with every single day: from the moment I open my eyes to the time I close them; but as I dived into the Word of God, I realized that there is quite a handful of Biblical figure that also happened to know a thing or two (or maybe more) about the struggle around the feeling of being left behind. 

Ann sure did know a lot about it: being a wife to a wonderful husband was great but having to live with a co-spouse constantly taunting her about the thing she desired more than anything but couldn't have sure enough might have made her feel like she was forgotten by God, left behind. 

Elizabeth was also another figure that knew something about feeling left behind when for years she prayed to be a mother and only to be disappointed year after year. 

The woman at the well... She could have been the one with a PhD in knowing a thing or two about feeling left behind: four husbands, couldn't manage to keep one of them alive and now she was about to draft a fifth one while perhaps all of her friends and women her age were probably happily married and raising their children. 

Joseph knew something too (at the risk of sounding like I am only rooting for women and being labelled as sexist, let's invite the men into the conversation too). Waiting for years into a prison for a breakthrough to come while one of the people you help in that same prison (and who was supposed to return the favor) is out living the best life while you are barely getting through life. 

Those people knew a lot about feeling left behind and even though I probably don't know as much as they do, it is a feeling that I am familiar with. Last year ended on a good note for a lot of people around me and this year started with some pow wows that left me in awe of the things God can do. But if I want to be honest, the ever so real feeling of being left behind competed neck to neck with my praise and my joy of seeing God move around me. There was genuine joy but there was also the genuine and never ending question on my mental reel : "God what about me?"

As real and taunting as this feeling and this question are to me, as real as the stuck in the mud moments are for me, the Bible reminds that there is more to the story than where we are at, at any given moment. 

As I read about the characters I mentioned and turned pages after pages, I was reminded that for every single one of them, the story didn't stop at that "feeling left behind/ feeling stuck" chapter.  There was more ahead regardless of whether they couldn't see it, feel it or even at times believe it. Not much was said about the emotional state of these people as they went through that phase -except for Ann- but if I had to guess, I would say they were probably frustrated, angry to some extent, resigned and perhaps coming to terms with lowering their expectations of God. And if we have to be honest, even for a split second, as the new year rolled around and is unfolding, some of us still in the waiting season are just in that same emotional state: tired, angry, resigned, hopeless; and like the woman at the well who had a man who wasn't really her man , we are at a point where we are ready to do our thing and make it work our way instead of God's way. I don't know about you but I know I am. 

But as I kept praying and seeking God and as I kept pouring my heart and feelings before God, just like Mary the sister of Lazarus, God kept on nudging me to keep the Faith. He kept on nudging me and encouraging me to believe again, to hope again, to trust more as He is in the work doing a new thing (Isaiah 43:19). In all of those stories, the silence of God on their matters, on the things they were praying and petitioning God for was deafening. It lasted a long, long time but when the answer to their prayers (not necessarily what they asked for) showed up, it was life changing. Sometimes the magnitude and length of God's silence only equals how big the blessing to unfold is. The waiting season sometimes looks and feels like a winter : everything is frozen. It is a season where God makes us slowdown, strips us from all the unnecessary things and brings us back to the essential: Him and a closer relationship with Him. It is a time where He shuts down all the extra external stuff so that we focus on the internal and eternal things. It is a season of prioritizing what is important. Everything seems dead and dormant but there is still growth happening, there is still work being done we just cannot see it. Just because there is silence doesn't mean God is not there. He is there and still working but again , in the words of Hannah Brencher, He has removed al the advertisement because it is not time yet for people to know. I remember a few years ago when Adele went silent for five years and all of the sudden popped back up with her new album 25. Nobody really knew what she was up to but in that time a lot happened obviously because she came back with something new. We did not hear her or see her but unbeknown of us she was working, she was producing something right under our noses  but didn't blow a horn. She worked in silence and  when the time was right, dropped it into our lap. God does the same with us sometimes too.  He does the internal work as we lean in, carving, shaping, purifying and setting up the right props so that by the time the promise is fulfilled and the blessing is released, it is a solide thing, a done deal but most importantly, He is the only one taking credit for it. 

It is a new year and I don't know how it already looks for you friend but if you are still in your winter, if you are wrestling and struggling like I am, my prayer for you is to draw near to God and lean in a little bit more than last year. My prayer for you is to believe, hope against all hope and remain suspicious that God is up to something in the midst of that silence; to trust that even when you can't see it or feel it, God is at work and it is only a matter of time until His work is being revealed for all to see. 

Beloved, as this year is unfolding and we are moving through it, let's believe and trust that God will show up for us this year in a major way.

Take heart, help is on the way!

Until next time, 

Let God Have It

This is it: the last day of the year 2019 and of the decade. What a year/ decade it has been. As this year and decade are coming to a close, I thought about the kind of content I could bring to you in the last article of the year. And I fell strongly to share one of my last meditations that correlate with one of the most important lessons I learned this year. My meditation is found in Psalm 46: 10 which says :

"Be still and know that I am God".

I have lately gotten into the habit of looking up particular verses or stories in different Bible versions. This time, instead of going to my usual ones, I went to the Complete Jewish Bible and interestingly enough Psalm 46:10 in that version read :

"Desist and learn that I am God"

I went ahead and looked up synonyms of desist and the one synonym that caught my attention was relinquish which means to give up, let go. So a good/close enough paraphrase to that verse would be "let go and learn that I am God". This year and this whole decade I have wrestled with my need to control everything as God brought me into places that challenged me to let go. And in these times and through this verse, I have understood (quite painfully) that as long as we desire to control and manipulate things we cannot know truly who God is and what He is capable of as every situation we go through reveals a different attribute of God.

I want to believe that this ability to know God under a new light each and every time we walk through different situations and seasons in life is the reason why God did not add anything else after saying "I am Who I am" (Exo 3:14). To add an adjective or a noun after this statement would be to put God in a box and limit Him when according to Paul we know that He is the one "who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all we can ask or think, according to the power that works in us" (Eph 3:20-21). In order for God to be God, He has to be released from our need to be in control of everything and that need to be in control includes our predictability/ expectation for Him to move a certain way. God asks us to relinquish control so we can learn through our walk with Him and the things we go through who He is to us.

 I also want to believe that it is for that same purpose -- for us to know Him for who He is to us -- that in Matthew 16:13, Jesus asks the disciples: "What are people saying about who the son of man is?" only to ask a little further "But you, who do you say that I am ?"

It was important at this point because at this point Jesus had already put his disciples in situations where they had no other choice but to relinquish control to God (Jesus). Letting go and acknowledging they were at their wits end was an invitation for God to step in and be just that: God. It was an opportunity for them to know the I am Who I am under different nuances. One minute He stepped in as a provider by feeding five thousand people with five loaves of bread and two fishes; the next minute He is commanding wind and storm to quiet down affirming his authority as the creator of all things. In between those two, He reveals himself as the one who can bring dead situations and people back to life and a healer that came thru for a woman who had an issue of blood for twelve years.

In my valley season, I have learned to shift my perspective slowly from "why me?" to asking myself "what is the attribute of God or the lesson I am supposed to see here?" This is important because having this posture is when and where you learn about yourself but also about God day after day, every step of the way.  To relinquish for me this year / decade looked a lot like leaning more on God and less on myself to make things happen; it looked like "learning God" for myself, being on my own journey, rather than through the lenses of my disappointments, church hurt and let downs. And what I discovered is that God is faithful, loving, caring, reliable and forgiving rather than being God who will beat me around with a stick if I mess up or fall short of His expectations of me.

Beloved, walking in the valley is hard but there is something about God that you need to learn and it might require for your to relinquish control to Him. And it might go a little further than that: perhaps it might be letting go of the hurt you went through or the grudge you are holding onto so fiercely and tightly; or perhaps it is letting go of that "thing" that God has been tugging at your heart for a while now to let go of. To relinquish is to give God clearance to be who and what we need Him to be at the moment He meets you in our story.

Friend, as you let go and allow God to be who and what you need Him to be in this new year and decade, I pray that He rushes into the space you have made for Him with goodness, love, healing, deliverance, peace and comfort. I pray you see Him, find out and learn with an open heart who He is to you and for you.

As I write those last words and last article of 2019, allow me to formulate my wishes for you under the form of this passage from Numbers 6:24

"[May] The Lord bless you and keep you

Make His face shine on you and be gracious to you

[May] The Lord turn His face towards you and give you peace"

And to add to that in my very own words:

 May the Lord give you peace, love, comfort, faith

May He grant you the confidence and strength to be who He has called you to be and carry your mission with grace and poise.

May you be a light and may you shine bright

And as you shine, may the people around you see in you the God who has called you to do all those things

May you be bold in the pursuit of the things that set your soul on fire and may the anointing on your life changes circumstances around you and break off generational curses.

May you wear your crown with holy confidence and pride.

May you always remember who you are and whose you are.

May you remember that nothing is too big or impossible for your God.

May you remember that you "can do anything through God who strengthens you"

And in the days where you will feel like its too hard, in the days where you will feel like giving up, may you remember that you were made for such a time as this, for the times you are walking through in life.

You got this, and God got you friend.

Happy New Year and until next time,

Surviving The Holiday Season

I don't hate the holidays but I don't particularly care for them either. It can come off a little bit Grinch-y but it is the sad and cold truth. It hasn't always been like that though. There was a point in time where I used to love the holiday season but life threw a few major curve balls my way that knocked me off balance from there on. Then I moved to the U.S and things were never quite the same. As I write these words and share my feelings about Christmas season, I remember that Friday morning not too long ago where me and other members from my church were having a conversation about how what is supposed to be the most hope-filled season of the year is actually the quite the opposite and for many different seasons.

I remember sharing my story and my testimony of how it is only this year that God started that healing some things that had been weighting on me for years and preventing me from being able to relate to the joy, excitement and anticipation surrounding the holidays. For some people the holidays are filled with joy, hope, parties, love and it truly is the most wonderful time of the years. But for some others, like it is the case for me, it just turns out that it isn't: it is a season where some of  us are rigged with anxiety, sadness and/or paralyzed by depression for endless reasons. If you are there too, let me tell you this friend: you are not alone. And I wish I had a remedy or a panache that would magically lift off the weight on your chest, or dissipate those clouds and make the sun shine again. But I don't: I, myself, am still wrestling with those very feelings. And although I don't have a cure that would magically make the dis-ease caused by this season of the year go away, I do however have five tips that I hope you can hold on to during this time like you would to a life jacket until it's all over. 

1- Be gentle with yourself

I came to realize that around the holidays is the time where I am most vulnerable and my mental/emotional health is the most delicate. I have also found that it is the time where I need to treat myself with the uttermost care. Be kind to yourself. Be gentle. Give yourself permission to feel what you are feeling without any judgment. Sleep. Make some tea. Pamper yourself. Do the things that make you feel good but most importantly take it one day at the time. 

2- Surround yourself with good energy.

As an empath, I am naturally very vulnerable to people's energy and twice as much when I am in a low period. Whether you are anything like me and easily pick up people's energy like a sponge or not, it is a fact that energy is contagious: people that complain all the time will wear you out just like people that are happy and upbeat will lift you up. This season, make sure you surround yourself with good energy. And I know the last thing you want to do is to be around people but go against that feeling once in a blue moon this holiday season and surround yourself with people whose energy is worth catching. Give them as well as yourself permission to uplift you and uplevel your energetic vibrations. 

3- Practice daily gratitude

Although it can be hard, especially in times when we're brooding, practicing daily gratitude helps put things in perspective. I personally started practicing daily gratitude after seeing a post one day that said :" If all you had today was what you were grateful for yesterday , how much would you have?" Being grateful shifts the perspective and allows to find little rays of sun in the cloudy days. "A grateful heart is a magnet for for miracles": gratitude won't make your problems go away but it will help you realize [hopefully] that things are not as bad as they seem to be.

4- Do something that matters

Volunteer to serve meals to homeless people or to cheer up people in the hospital or something else but make sure you do something. Not only will it get you out of your head but it will boost your self confidence. Find a cause you are passionate about and throw yourself in it. Not all at once of  course because it can be overwhelming but rather, bit by bit until instead of being consumed by depression you are consumed by the joy of being of assistance and able to put a little sunshine in someone else life. You are giving back to your community and reaching out to other but indirectly, you are also saving yourself so I don't know about you but I think it is worth trying.

5- Know that you are loved and you are not alone.

Depression during the holiday season nine times out of ten is exacerbated by the feelings of loneliness and rejection. You may feel like you are alone but friend you are not. There is a faithful friend who is with you and will always be until the end of times (Matt 28:20). You may feel worthless, rejected and unloved but John 3:16 is the proof of God's love that stands the test of time forever: a life that was laid for you friend so that you could be here. God thought you were so worth being loved that He gave His only son so that by his sacrifice your life could be secured. Depression, anxiety, sadness and hopelessness are real but so is the everlasting and unfailing love of God (Jere 31:3). You are loved, you are seen ad you are worth all the amazing things God has in store for you.

Friend wherever you are as you read those words, I hope they find you well and if you are wrestling with all the not so good feelings that at times are tied to this holiday season, I pray they give you hope and a renewed strength to get through this time and more. I pray you know and remember that you are not alone: We are all in this together. 

Sending you love and good thoughts and wishing you the merriest Christmas you've ever had, praying that you feel more alive than you've ever been.

Until next time,

Managing Expectations or How To Weather Disappointment

I have very high expectations. I could either blame it on being an INFP or I could blame it on growing up in a household where nothing but excellence in everything was expected and demanded from all of us without exception. So of course, I grew up having high expectations of myself and at times of people. Needless to say that living from this place in life did not turn out well for me. The depth of my disappointment's pit had only match the high expectations I carried around and demanded from the world. Times and times I have heard people say that the best way to avoid being disappointed is to have no expectations, but can you really walk this earth without having any kind of expectations whatsoever? No expectations to be loved?  To be respected? To be acknowledged and appreciated? Even when you mess up, hurt someone or act like a twinkly little prick, you expect some kind of reaction to some extend so allow me to ask again: can you really live life and walk this earth without any kind of expectation hoping that it will save you from the heartache of disappointment?

See, I do believe that disappointment is an inescapable part of live and by the same token, I do believe that  expectations and disappointment are different sides of a same coin. Just as disappointments are part of life, so are having expectations: they are both part of the human experience and are to the Avengers what Thanos was: inevitable. Unless you are dead inside and genuinely don't care. In that case, cheers to you mate. For the rest of us, very much alive and vulnerable to the messiness of life, the key to weathering to some extend the disappointment tied to our expectations is to manage the latter when it comes to our experience of people and the world we live in. So here are five things that can be helpful in managing our expectations in order to avoid unnecessary disappointments.

1- Don’t expect yourself from others

I have heard it before from my mother and other people around me. There was a time where I seriously believed that the things I expected from people were a no brainer. But then little by little, I had to come to terms with the fact and reality that not everybody was raised the way I was. Not everybody came from the background I came from so of course some expectations did not make sense to them. Some of the things I upheld did not have the same weight to other people. Not expecting myself from people, not expecting they would display the same capacities and abilities that I displayed significantly softened the blows from disappointment. 

2- Be realistic

I sometimes check-in with friends and family to assess on a scale from zero to extra how realistic some of my expectations are. I do that because it is so easy for me to revert to my default mode and to get stuck and insist on some very unrealistic expectations to be met. These check-in allow me to be leveled and sometimes to scale down my expectations. Just because I can personally meet them doesn't mean someone else can. Just because I can handle a full plate doesn't mean someone else can do the same. We all have our limits and thresholds and I had to realize that some of my expectations from people although realistic for me were absolutely not for them. 

3- Know your audience

Even when your expectations are at a healthy level, you have to know who to place expectations on. Sometimes the problem is not our expectations but rather, who we place our expectations on. You cannot expect a man who is inconsistent to somewhat become consistent overnight nor can you be disappointed by a lack thereof, at least not after he has showed you consistently how inconsistent he is. In the same fashion, you cannot be upset at or disappointed in a friend for not being there when you need them when they have a history of being unreliable. Maya Angelou once said : "when people show you who they are, believe them" and I believe it is more than relevant when it comes to our expectations of people and circumstances. See them for who/what they are: don't extrapolate them but don't discount them either. Instead use what you see and experience as a barometer to adjust your expectations and be wise about where and who to invest them into.

4- Don’t assume: Ask

Assumptions make an A-hole out of you and me. In all the years that I ever lived from a place of assumptions, it never turned out well for me. You've got to ask what is expected from you and you have to say what you expect. 

5- Communicate

A continuation of point 4: communicate at all time. People change and with them, expectations. Adjusting expectations is hard if there is no line of communication. And sometimes, communicating expectations comes with some hard conversations but we have to excavate the things that are left unsaid. We have to run towards the hard conversations instead of running away from them no matter how afraid we are to break a heart, to lose a friendship, a relationship or an opportunity. It is better to say "I can't" or "I can't anymore" than to build someone's hope up and let them down by acting in a way that is anything less than the expectations you agreed to meet. 

Disappointment is an integral part of the human experience and so is having expectations. Those intricately and intimately linked experiences constitute an obligated passage of life. However bad and heartbreaking disappointments are, they do not have to be as long as we learn to manage our expectations of people and self.

Until next time,