THE CURSE

“Wakey wakey”

I said as I strolled into our bedroom.

Giselle lay in bed, looking ever so beautiful even as she slept. Her beautiful tresses were spread across the pillow. She was such a beautiful view to wake up to every morning. Without make up, she looked gorgeous.

It was time to get dressed. We had a long day ahead of us. Our wedding was coming up in a few days. One hundred guests had seats at the beautiful wedding to celebrate our union.

The past few months were hectic. It was one drama or the other. It came from people who were close to us.

Jealousy

Anger

Resentment

Giselle finally found love, and all hell was let loose. She had a child with the man she found love with, and it became a problem. We had spent weeks praying together and going to therapy. The therapy sessions were brutal. We had to be vulnerable with our therapist, who did a great job stripping us off the walls we had built around ourselves.

At a point, I felt she was going through postpartum depression. She had different moods every day. Some days she would not want to hold the beautiful child we made together, Henrietta.

She was the happiest six month old human I had ever met. She had her mom’s beautiful eyes and smile. How could she look at the beautiful baby and not want to hold her? After a while, she was convinced she was not a good mother, and maybe someone else deserved to be Henrietta’s mom. It broke me.

I, on the other hand, had my issues with Stephanie, who was Giselle’s cousin. We were engaged to be married, but we broke up. I met Giselle and things got heated up and then complicated. Stephanie told everyone that Giselle snatched me from her. She said all sorts of nonsense about me. I tried to talk to her, but she refused. Giselle didn’t care. It put me in an uncomfortable position. Giselle was ready to ride and die for me. Family gatherings became like funerals for me. I felt like a Judas who had put two cousins asunder. If Giselle wasn’t pregnant with my child, maybe Stephanie would not have been so angry. I got used to the mean mugging, the snide comments, and the cold treatment from some family members. Stephanie’s parents were indifferent.

I stared at her as she slept. I didn’t want us to be late for our appointment. We had an hour drive, and we had to be there by noon. We also had to meet with the marriage counselor at 3pm, and dinner with her parents by 5pm. The nanny was downstairs. She watched Henrietta everyday from 9am till 5pm. I asked her to stay while we went for dinner with Giselle’s parents, and promised her overtime money. She was more than happy to oblige.

“Giselle wake up.” I called out as I walked into the closet. We had a huge walk-in closet in our bedroom. Her clothes occupied more than half of the closet.

I picked out a white shirt, black slacks, and my favorite Ferragamo belt. My shoe rack was by the door. I would wear my favorite ones. I could not understand why Giselle was still asleep. She always took her time to do everything. She had her morning routine, and she had slept through her alarm. She didn’t wake up to read her Bible in the closet, she didn’t go running three miles. She was not listening to her podcast. She must have been exhausted from running around yesterday.

“Babe,” I called out as I walked towards the bed to wake her up. She was still.

I leaned in to kiss her forehead. Normally she would stir a bit, open her eyes and smile at me. It didn’t happen. She was not breathing.

“Giselle” I called out and shook her.

She didn’t move. I felt for a pulse. There was none.

Giselle was…… dead.

Almost doesn’t count

But everybody knows, almost doesn’t count. ~ Brandy 

Brandy was right a decade ago, and she is still right today.

If they have one leg in and one leg out, it means nothing.

If they haven’t made up their mind about you, it still means nothing.

If they were thinking about you and didn’t act on the thought, it means nothing.

From today and onward, no more “almost”. Almost there, almost happy, almost crying, almost doing, almost tripping, almost buying. 

 No more!

Being intentional about everything we do is important.

Being intentional in the lives of the people we love is priceless.

When we have an “almost” attitude to a person or to life itself, it holds no value. Imagine what buying a gift someone would do to a person, it would make them happy, what if you almost bought the gift. It means nothing. It doesn’t count.

I have heard people say “It’s the thought that counts”. Fair enough. It is the action that counts. Moving forward, no more potentials. No more , what could be?It is either ‘it is’ or ‘it isn’t”.It is great to know that you are worthy of all the love you choose to give a person or thing.  You are worthy of the respect you choose to give a person or a thing. You would not want to be half assed about how you show love and appreciation to another person or a thing. If you would not be half assed about how you treat people, then do not accept half assed love or respect. Almost doesn’t count. It either is or it isn’t. 

A person that values you will put effort  to make sure you feel valued, wanted and loved. It is very important to understand that as much as we want to feel loved and cherished, also make sure you are giving the same energy to the right person/people that we allow into our lives. Vet the people you let in, so you don’t get disappointed when they don’t turn out to to be how you envisioned them. No “almost ” energy.  

So in order to move forward and reset, take an inventory of what you don’t need, what is not provided and what won’t matter in the long run and get rid of them.

Is there someone in your life that you are giving the “almost” energy to and deserves to be treated better? You are in charge of your life, you can upgrade , downgrade and remove where you deem fit. It either is or it isn’t. 

Just know that no matter what

 Almost doesn’t count.

Unforgiveness- the only prison in which you have the key to set yourself free.

As the year comes to a close, it is a good thing to look back and reflect on how the year has gone.  

Forgiveness is one thing we need to reflect on.  There has been offense from friends or family members and you tell yourself you have forgiven them. 

Here are some scenarios 

1. When you think about what happened, you are still angry. I sometimes rehearse how I could have responded to a situation, because I am still dwelling on the issue in my head and heart. I know there and then that I have not truly forgiven. 

2. You find yourself discussing the incident of almost ten years ago as if it happened today. I have heard a lot of people talk and hold on to how their parents treated them as kids. Their parents have most likely forgotten or not even known they offended their child(ren). Instead, the child grows up harboring thoughts of resentment and unforgiveness.  

3. When you find yourself refusing to be friends with anyone who loves them, you have not truly forgiven. I call it witchcraft campaign. It is when you decide to create enmity because you and a certain person are not in good terms. Imagine going to an event and you decide to avoid certain people because you have a clash with someone they love dearly. You will be the uncomfortable one in the room.  

4. When the attempts to make things right is met with your rejection, you have not truly forgiven. It is because you have maybe justified anger, it may be pride or betrayal. Maybe you need more time to process the conflict. Any or more of these reasons means that you have not forgiven. 

Check your heart.  

Have you truly forgiven that person? 

Do you know what it means to forgive a person. 

If you can forgive, you are a powerful person.  

Revenge is for the weak-minded person. 

Forgiveness means you are willing to move forward. It unties the cords that tie you to the offense that was committed against you. It sets you free. Imagine being bound with huge ropes to a container. You can’t move and it is uncomfortable. It is what unforgiveness feels like. You are the one suffering. The person who tied you up is not suffering. Forgiveness is for you. It is not for the other person.  

To forgive is to set a prisoner free and discover that the prisoner was you. ~ Lewis B Smedes 

We always say other people are toxic, we may be the toxic one. When you hold on to unforgiveness, it’s like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die. Isn’t that toxic thinking? 

It is exhausting carrying baggage from your past into your future. Your journey does not need the baggage of unforgiveness to where you are going. Leave it at the bus stop of forgiveness. 

Forgiveness is a choice you make every day. It is not a onetime event. The reason why is that the offense will come back to your mind again, you have the choice to let go or hold on.  It is a commitment. People process forgiveness differently. For some it is sooner than for others.  

A good way to look at it is putting yourself as the offender asking for forgiveness. It hurts when you ask for forgiveness and it is met with rejection. There is so much beauty in life every day to look forward to. 

When you hold on to the pain from the past, you actually hinder yourself from seeing beauty in a new day and new situations. You hold yourself at ransom that only you can pay.  You can’t free yourself if you don’t pay the ransom. Forgiveness is the ransom. 

If you want to love. Forgiveness will always be a constant. If you can’t forgive, you can’t love. While forgiving other people, also know that you have to forgive yourself too. 

Forgive yourself for mistakes you made out of ignorance. 

Forgive yourself for hurting other people. 

Forgive yourself for holding onto weights and things you should have released a long time ago. 

In this might, you need to learn to forgive, not because the other person deserves happiness, but because you deserve peace. 

He says he is not ready to be in a relationship (1)

There are many men, and they come along like the next bus or train every four minutes. You just need to be at the bus stop on time and get on the right bus.

He said he was not ready to be in a relationship.

After going on so many dates.

After investing physically and emotionally.

What happened?

The keyword is access. Who do you give access to?

As a child, my mother was very wary of the people I allowed into my life as friends. I was not allowed to make friends of my own unless they were my classmates. The reason being I always looked for the best in people and took them at face value until I got hurt or taken advantage of.

I took this mindset into relationships. Making myself open prey until I heard words that broke my heart and made me cry for days on end. Words such as,

“I am not ready to be in a relationship.

“It’s not you, it’s me”

Are there any warning signs that come before getting disappointed?

Most likely there would have been but we females, we tend to overlook them. When a woman is in love, even the ambulance wailings won’t wake her up from la-la land until is too late.

If a man has to take advantage of you, you have to give him access. Females are visually stimulated just like men are and also stimulated by the things we hear.

“I love you”

“You are the best thing that ever happened to me”

Do those words sound familiar?

These things happen because some women are easy to fall prey. Some men tell us what we want to hear because they have spent time enough with us to figure out what would work and what wouldn’t. Some of us are predictable, we try to play hard to get, but once they crack the code, they are in.

All those walls you worked hard to build will come crashing down like a pack of cards.

A simple analogy is giving a spare key. Once you give someone you may not have fully trusted a spare key, they have a copy and can get access into your house and worse still they can make a duplicate.

The stage of going from friendship to becoming exclusive is in the power of what transcends during the process. It first starts with telling.

Not showing.

Telling.

He tells you great stories, about himself, the things he does, the past relationships. The things that he feels look good on his dating resume. It is your job to investigate and make sure that what he is telling is truly who he is.

This takes time.

Character does not hide for too long.

So, I am sure you are asking, what is your role here?

Your role here is being the upper hand. You are the flower being sought, the one who has the access code. Hold on to it tight. Take your time to give access. To your heart, to go on a date, to have sex, to become exclusive.

There are many men, and they come along like the next bus or train, if you miss one, you can always catch another. Do not allow fear to pressure you into giving in. If he decides not to find you attractive because you are playing your cards right, let him move along to the next available chic. You are saving yourself from a lot of potential…..bullshit.

Apart from being in charge of the access code to your heart and body. You should also ask yourself if he is worthy of you. It is not about you being the perfect one for the man. Is he worthy of you? Your time? Your potential and who you truly are? Your future. It really counts for everything.

Most importantly go on dates to learn. Learn about the person. When you have a list of what you can take and what you won’t take, you will be able to filter out the garbage before it becomes garbage. Do not rush into anything because you won’t find anything out there anymore. You are not going on a date so he can like you, even though it is important to make a great first impression by putting your best foot forward. You also have to determine if he is worth your time.

If he is not worth your time, move to the next in line.

HEAUX TENDENCIES

In life, there are certain people you need to say hello to and walk past, nothing else.

I grew up in the projects. My brothers and I shared one room in or tiny apartment. It was what my parents could afford. They worked hard to make sure we had food on the table. All my siblings and I had to do were go to school and do homework. I was the middle child and the only girl. My older brother Joe was a year older than me. My younger brother Michael was two years younger than I was. We were very close because we were all we had. Mom never let us go outside to play with the other kids. There were a lot of kids our age we could pay with and attended the same school as us. The rule in the house was firm. We could not go out to play with those kids.

Part of the reason why mom never let us go out to play was that she was a stripper at a club downtown. She was ashamed of what she did. She was raped at sixteen years old and got pregnant. She lost the baby at four months and was never the same again. The grief haunted her for a long time. She barely graduated high school, but she decided to fund the easier way out. She was very attractive, she was five feet and six inches tall. She had a pretty face, full breasts, a small waist, and nice legs. I was the spitting image of my mom, so I knew I would look exactly like her when I got older.

Dad worked for a man who owned a mechanic shop called Alfred. Dad was four years older than mom, they met after high school and started dating. He worked at a fast-food restaurant while mom braided hair all day and followed men at night. They broke up a few times because mom would not stop sleeping with different men. Dad didn’t want to lose mom, at twenty-three years old. He had nothing more than eight hundred dollars to his name, a jalopy that could take him to work and back, and a one-bedroom apartment. He bought a ring and proposed to my mom. She agreed to marry him, and they started their life together.

Mom had a best friend whom she worked with.

Tatanisha.

They were thick as thieves, always together. They talked about buying new clothes and make-up. They talked about small shows. They also talked about Larry, their boss, a short Italian man who owned the club. I had seen him once when he came to the house to check on why mom had not come to work in a week. He reeked of alcohol and had a Cuban cigar in his mouth. Mom had a high fever and could not work for a few days. Tatanisha updated mom on what went on at work. She was unmarried and had no kids. It was the life she chose for herself She came from a broken home and ended up in the adoption system. Her parents didn’t want her, the system didn’t want her. It was the men who wanted her, that was what she lived for. The only day she didn’t have the same work shift as mom was on Monday. She always came in the evening to check on us and make sure we were tucked in bed after dinner. She would hang out with dad in the living room watching television. She was always gone in the morning.

One night, she came over to the house like she usually did. She always showed up at six-thirty and made sure we had dinner. She checked our homework and had a glass of beer with dad. Dad sent us to bed at eight-thirty instead of nine. Reluctantly we went to our beds. I don’t know how long I had been asleep, I woke up to yelling and noise coming from my parent’s room.

My brothers were fast asleep. I got out from the bed I shared with my brothers and walked towards the door. I wanted to hear what was going on clearly. I heard mom’s voice. Mom was home? She was meant to be at work. Monday was crucial for her, her best clients showed up on Monday. What could have happened?

ON THE RUN (1) a novella

For my dear life, I had to run.

The ray of sunshine filtered into the room through the blinds. I looked at the clock which was across the wall from me. It was a few minutes past 7 am. My partner was not laying next to me. He had not done so in almost two years. I never imagined waking up alone every single day. Some nights he would creep into the bed and put a pillow between us. Other nights he would have me drunk with wine and then have sex with me with the lights off. I could see his eyes in the dark and the contortion of his face when he was about to cum. It was a routine I had gotten used to. He didn’t care if I was on my period or not sometimes. It felt like rape.

Yes, I said “sex”. I could not remember the last time we made love. He kept himself buried with work on his computer or found every excuse in the book to keep away. Our lovemaking ended when our daughter turned two. I craved to have my husband to myself some nights. He rejected me every time I tried touching him. He came up with the idea of having a pillow between us. I pulled the covers over my head. Why did I wake up to this day?

It was May the 28th, my 31st birthday. A year ago, it was my 30th birthday, all I did was plan a small girls’ trip with my friends. I left my little one with my aunt, who was more than delighted to have her for the weekend.

I looked forward to this day as a child. At age thirty-one, I hoped to have a husband and a child or rather children. I hoped to have gone to college and graduated to become an engineer. All though I had accomplished everything on my list, I was in an unhappy marriage.

I never imagined I would ever be in an unhappy marriage. My parents had a happy marriage until my mom passed away. I was eighteen years when she passed away. My dad was distraught for a few years. It was hard to watch him slip into depression.

I don’t even know how my husband and I got here. I am sure you are wondering. Is there another woman involved?

Yes, there is another woman involved. She hates me so much that she is bent on watching my marriage get destroyed. I became a stranger in my own home, the one that I had built with him. We were broke grad school students at the time we bought the house. We wanted to get our Master’s and move on with life. When we got approved for the loan to buy the house, we spent to search for the perfect home in a nice neighborhood. We finally found a three-bedroom, two-and-a-half bath in the suburbs. Those were happy days for us until the other woman who was lurking in the shadows made her appearance.

LAW OF POWER 2: NEVER PUT TOO MUCH TRUST IN FRIENDS,LEARN HOW TO USE ENEMIES

I found this fascinating Law of Power from the book written by Robert Green. It has so much wisdom to it.

Here is the judgment

Be wary of friends, they will betray you more quickly for they are easily aroused to envy. They also become spoiled and tyrannical. But hire a former enemy and he will be more loyal than a friend because he has more to prove.

Infact you have more to fear from friends than enemy. If you have no enemies, find ways to make them.

Lord protect me from my friends, I can take care of my enemies

~ Voltaire 1694-1778

Pick up a bee from kindness and learn the limitations of kindness

~Sufi Proverb

As humans we all have needs and this fuels the purpose of having relationships and building excellent friendships until we realize to some extent that maybe we are a little too trusting.

The problem is that we think we really know our friends. A year ago I was in the position of trusting people too quickly and taking them at face value until I was left for dead and made a public enemy. This opened my eyes to see that most people are not who they really seem to be.

We have friends who you will never have a disagreement with, such people are the ones to be wary of, because they will always agree with you so as not to offend you but the reality of the issue is not so. I have had a lot of disagreements with some of my friends because I am pretty vocal and a good trash talker. Most times it comes from a good place and when it doesn’t I am straight up making fun of you. I do not have a problem with offending a person if I have to. I am basically checking you so you don’t cross your boundaries. Lately I have been doing it more often and people who don’t have respect for boundaries would eliminate themselves on their own by deciding not to “like me”

At work, If you come up to me with you bullshit, I will smile at you dead in the face with a one way ticket to hell. I am not kidding.!!! #ifyouknowyouknow.

Do not be scared to speak in your own voice. Build your own authenticity. Everyone does not have to like you. Find yourself and fall in love with you. It seems like a hard thing to do, it really is but as time goes on, things that really matter will stay and things that don’t are basically gone.

Some people feign being diplomatic so that they would show a high level of character and meanwhile they are the fakest and sneakiest people of all time. They do this to obtain a certain level of respect which they do not have for the other person.

Honesty rarely strengthens a friendship so sometimes you do not know how your friend actually feels. They may not want to tell you that you lack talent, or that you are fat and ugly, or you are not as smart as you sound,or that they don’t like your significant other. That aspect of people is lacking these days and it hurts when you hear how your friends really feel about you from other people.

Some friends just envy everything about you basically and even if you are doing great, they will never tell you, its also part of not being honest.

When you decide to use your friend for whatever you need, you get to really know what they can offer and before you know they feel you owe them something and oppression starts, it begins with resentment and then full blown envy, then the death of the friendship starts.

Do not do business or work with friends, be friends with friends and work with those who have the skills and requirements to do work. Familiarity breeds contempt.

When you have no enemies, you become lazy and complacent, view your enemies as your competition, you want to outwit and outdo them, its not really about them, its about you because this process would make you more focused.

Knowing all of this be very careful… the best of friends have become the worst of enemies by not following this law of power correctly.

THE INFERIORITY OF YOUR FRIENDS

Most people enjoy the inferiority of their friends, real friends don’t notice~ Norman Douglas.

As humans, basic relationships with other people is fundamental. Family, friends, co workers etc are basic essential relationships that we can foster.

Everyone is different, no one has the same traits except they have shared values. Diversity allows for us to learn from other people and grow.

When i was a child, my mom made me foster friendships with only friends children, they were older than I was at the time usually more than three years. The only children who were my age that i made friends with were the kids in my class.

As an adult, I realized that I made a lot of mistakes with my friends over the years. I accept people at face value not realizing their risks or the trash that they come with until it is too late. I have trusted the wrong people with sensitive information, I have hung out with people who I had long outgrown but i stayed for no justifiable reason.

Looking back I have made the decision not to hang out where i don’t want to be. I want to hang out with people I can learn from who also have a similar vibe or better than mine. My ex boyfriend used to tell me that in the midst of some of my friends i was usually the most intelligent and that meant i needed new friends. I just thought he was fussing until the tower of those friendships crashed like a pack of cards.

One of my biggest realizations too was that most people enjoy the inferiority of their friends, the ones who weren’t rich enough, the ones who were not up to standard. I have observed certain types of friendships where one friend has outgrown the other and living in the shadow of a friendship is obvious. Instead of taking a break from the friendship, remaining in the friendship just feeds the inferiority.

As an adult, You are responsible for your life and your relationships, choose what is desirable.

WHY DO YOU KEEP MEETING TRASHY PEOPLE?

Sometimes, one needs to reflect back on their life to see why they keep meeting trashy people,i would always say making “rubbish friends“. These are the type of people that don’t bring “peace of mind.” Apart from that you become those people.

You realize you are such a great person but you keep feeling remorseful over the type of friends you have been making and probably keeping. Certain types of drama keeps recurring.

Why?

Let’s figure out what is going on.

Trashy people have a tendency to be toxic and such people love being friends with people who cannot say “no” to other people, they always feel the need to please people. The need to be relevant among their friends and family members would always keep you running into trashy people. The idea of being relevant is more detrimental to you rather than the trash that you attract.

For instance, you have to be at work by 6 am on Saturday morning, you know for a fact that at midnight, you need to be in bed but you decide to kick it with your “cool” friends so as not to offend them and you end up getting home at 3 am and sleeping with one eye open, waking up at 5am and chugging a cup of Starbucks to work at 6 am and being partially productive for the eight hour shift. This means you have no boundaries.

If you always have a boundary problem, you will keep attracting toxic people. Once you are able to tell your friend no, or refuse to oblige, then you fall out of favor with the person, it’s a good thing, they need to go but most importantly you need to draw up boundaries. Self discipline is priceless.

Learn to say “No”. You wont die.

Seriously.

You would lose people who are truly not meant to be in your life.

Loyalty is also a major factor. It is very important to figure out who you want to be loyal to.

Does your loyalty come with a price?

Would your loyalty be reciprocated?

Can you call on such a person when you need them?

If you answer “no” to more than one of these questions, then you need to check what and who you are loyal to and why you are loyal to them?

Guilt trips are also used by trashy people to make you feel bad so that they can get you to do what you want.

Sometimes you cannot make an event they invite you to or cannot help them babysit their child or borrow them the money they need because it will also inconvenience you, they put you on a guilt trip and then you instantly feel bad and then ultimately change your mind so as not to offend them.

I am telling you now please “OFFEND THEM” if it will cost you, your peace of mind and comfort, do it.

Trashy people also love insecure people, people who don’t know their worth, they could be beautiful, gifted, talented and still feel worthless, a trashy person will out of jealousy want to stay close to the person in order to control them and ultimately destroy them.

Do you see yourself as any of the above mentioned people?

Then it means you have tendencies of attracting trash. You need to re evaluate yourself.`

FATHER’S DAY

I looked forward to today like any other Father’s Day this year.

But this year, its a little different.

My dad is in the hospital.

He has never spent a Father’s Day anywhere else but with family.

This year, we would be going to spend time with him at the speicalty hospital.

He won’t be able to have fancy dinner with us. He would be eating from his feeding tube,

He won’t be able to try on the new stuff we got for him because he would be confined to the bed with different tubes plugged to his body.

That is why this Father’s day is so difficult.

It’s hard to fathom the man who would take me to school everyday, who would attend all the PTA meetings, the one who would take me to do my hair, the one who would take me to country club and allow me to climb all the trees and pick apples, the one who would take me to the office and allow me to play with the electronic calculator and write on all the notepads till I got bored. The list is endless mehnnnnnn.

It’s hard to fathom that he would be laying helpless in a hospital bed.

This is hard.

But regardless of how hard it is, I am hopeful that he is still alive. He may not be able to speak, but he would grimace and nod in response to our suggested speech.

I love him.

I wish him and all other father’s out there a Happy Father’s Day!!!!