Trust Your Dopeness

The essential thing I have learned in my life is when a person is insecure, they will use words of discouragement to tear down your confidence. When I wasn’t aware of my dopeness, I would minimize my greatness to make others feel more important, but deep inside, I was suffering. My suffering led to people-pleasing, self-sabotage, and not feeling worthy or enough.

When I began to cultivate self-worth, let go of self-sabotaging behaviors and flow into a self-confident version of myself, others became threatened. I was no longer dimming my light for them to feel better about themselves. I decided to love myself, face my inner issues and let go of my insecurities.  

However, I believe we all have to face the ugly mask of insecurity in our lives, but when these inner issues are unchecked, it creates self-misery. I have learned over the last year that insecure women are fixated on being accepted and validated by others. Their greatest fear is not being liked, so they migrate to the people-pleasing lane, and when another woman radiates confidence, she will spew words of hate to disempower another woman.

Although friendships have withered away, I understand that losing myself is no longer an option. Trusting your dopeness means walking in your confidence and being unapologetic about who you are.

Here are a couple ways you can embrace being “that girl” and exercise your dopeness.

1. Be Authentic: Know who you are, walk in your power and maximize your voice.
2. Be Unapologetic: God created you to be the best verison of yourself even when others don’t embrace you.
3.  Be Around People Who Want To See You Win: When you are around people who want to see you win then, the conversations are different. Make sure you let go of toxic connections in your life (heal from toxicity).

Become the Picasso of Your Life

In 2019, I realized to have a different year I needed to become the painter in my own life. So often I have allowed other people to paint their ideas, opinions, and theology for my life which resulted in forgery. Allowing others to paint on the canvas of your life causes fraudulent creations because you are letting them put their vision into action. It is essential to create a vision for your life and be the creator of it. When you put other people into the driver seat of your life it causes chaos. I am learning that when I have a vision, I can’t expect people to understand it or co-sign on it.

A vision is something that gives you clarity about the goals you want to accomplish. When you are not clear about the idea for your life society will cloud your judgment with their perspective. In 2019, it is time for you to take back the paintbrush and begin generating your life masterpiece.

Below I have three specific ways you can become the Picasso of your own life!

1.Create The Vision: Whether it is a vision board, vision journal or collage take the time to define your vision, this will help you see your goals clearly. Then you will be able to create action steps to accomplish them.

2.Stop Explaining Yourself: I have learned the hard way that sometimes it is better to keep your mouth shut. When you prematurely share your dreams, aspirations or goals with others sometimes it can discourage you if their input is not what you wanted to hear. True, we want everyone to be excited about our goals, our life and dreams but understand everyone will not understand the blueprint of your life. God individually designed your life to fit you and others validation is never needed.

3.Creativity is Messy: Understand that the road of life is not a straight line but filled with dead ends, detours and u-turns. When you are handed a blank canvas to create the vision for your dream life know that being flexible is essential. Many artist create beautiful masterpieces by understanding the first stages are messy.

 

How do you plan to become the Picasso of your life in 2019? (Leave your comment below…)

Be Raw, Be Flawed, Be You!

When you look at a rock you see nothing exciting or beautiful about its features. A rock has no human form, people would consider it to be cold and aloof.  Yet a rock is apart of God’s creation just like a flower. However, we may say that a flower is more beautiful than a rock because of the outside features.

Nonetheless, just like a rock some people are hard on the outside yet beauty lies within. You never know what transpired in their life to make them bitter. Their bitterness is an accessory expressing their hurt.

I remember a period in my life where I accessorize bitterness. My heart was harden by traumatic experiences that happened. I was tired of life disappointing me over and over again. So, I created walls around my heart. I thought if I became emotionally unavailable then I would not get hurt. My elusive behavior kept me from love & fully living.

As I look back on my life I realize I was who I needed to be at that time. I understand that regretting who I was in the past does not serve me. I was raw, flawed and me. Those who saw me as a mess didn’t understand I was a rough draft. My blueprint of greatness was still pending.

Many times we judge ourselves for the raw version of who we are instead of being gentle with ourselves. When you are raw it forces you to be real; unrefined and unpolished. For instance, when a new singer produce their first album it is appealing because their vocals are unfiltered. Once they become commercialized they lose their authenticity; the record label want them to go with an image or sound that sells records versus talent. Growth is a beautiful thing but I never want to lose the thing that makes me relatable.

So, I urge you to be raw, be flawed & be you even if it is ugly right now. Don’t regret the rough draft you are at this moment. As you pursue a better version of yourself you will begin to peel back the blueprint so people can see you….the masterpiece!

A Seat At The Table…

In a world full of people pleasers it is refreshing to be yourself. When you choose to be yourself magic happens in your life. You no longer settle for mediocrity but you embrace the extraordinary. It will ignite a spark in you to do life in a different way.

Fireworks are created when you no longer follow the crowd but decide to become the life of your own party. When you choose to walk in your power everyone will not accept you. However, learning to be you bravely takes courage.

In this journey you will understand that everyone will not get an invitation to the party of your life. The people you use to entertain will no longer get a seat to the table. You will  gravitate towards people who empower, inspire and encourage you. They will be the ones who become your tribe because you deserve a life filled with those celebrating your existence.

So, today I encourage you to reevaluate the people you have seating at the table of your life. Ask yourself this, “Is this person celebrating me or tolerating me?” You deserve the support, love and joy you give freely to everyone else.

 

Would love to hear your thoughts so chime in below!

 

Be Uncommon

When you find out who you are you stop running. All the illusions you once believed about yourself begin to fade away. You realize chasing others for external validation was never needed because you found out the truth. The truth was that you were always amazing.

When you are introduced to the real you then your life will change. How do I know?Well, it took me 37 years to find the real me beyond the layers of inadequacy. I spent seven years going through my “authentic journey”. To be honest, the journey has just begun. 

All those years in my life where I felt inadequate and wanted to fit in, I never realized it was never meant for me to fit in. Freedom came when I let go of the stigma of pleasing others & embraced loving myself. I believe when people truly start being themselves then we would have a world full of originals  instead of copycats.

So, today I challenge you to embrace the passionate, weird, quirky and funloving you. Because you my friend need to be the original AMAZING masterpiece you were created to be!