“Until you let go of all the toxic people in your life, you will never be able to grow into your fullest potential. Let them go so you can grow.”
DLQ
Ending any kind of relationship is hard.
Whether it be a relationship with a partner, or with a friend.
It’s all painful, heartbreaking, and frustrating all in the same token.
So what happens when the individuals involved in this relationship grow in separate directions and one of you refuse to accept who they are now?
In my experience, the arguments began. The resentment for one not taking the time to get to know who you are now, and for refusing to accept who you’ve become or why.
I was left feeling as if I was this terrible human being because I did not fit into their world any longer. Because they could not agree with the fact that I would not conform to be who they expected me to be.
There was one thing I was not going to do though… change who I was becoming, or the path that I was on. I was beginning to FINALLY like myself. I was starting to look forward to my future. I was not allowing others to dictate my happiness and who I was.
That’s when I realized what was really happening.
All of my life I had forced myself to conform to others. I always put their happiness above my own. And when I finally started putting myself first, they couldn’t handle it.
So I challenge you, with the new year approaching, to set a New Years Resolution that has nothing to do with physical health. Work towards your mentalhealth. I can promise everything will fall into place, while the toxic things (or people) will fall out.
“It’s up to you today to start making healthy choices. Not choices that are just healthy for your body, but healthy for your mind.”
Steve Maraboli
Until next time my friends, continue to stand strong like the wildflowers that you are.
What if I said there is no normal? That normal is based off of current societal standards and acceptable behavior to our peers.
It sounds so constricting right? But yet that is what is expected of us by our peers. To be their idea of “normal”….
And if you don’t conform to their idea and definition of normalcy where does that leave you?
Up a creek without a paddle
This leaves you isolated and branded. Every single being on this planet has their own opinion of what normalcy is. As unique as all of our personalities are, is how unique our idea of normal is.
So why force others to conform to essentially change their personalities to match ours? That wipes out who we are as individuals and we lose our self identity.
Can you remember who you were before the world told you who you should be?
Charles Bukowski
Really can you remember? I couldn’t, then I found myself seeking nature and the sanctity of it. The more I found myself in the woods, the more of myself I found out there.
By feeding my soul, I found my own idea of normalcy and chose more and more to be accepting of others’ personalities. Even when we have different values and opinions, it’s still so important to me to accept them as they are.
But I also found the strength to be MY normal despite it going against everyone else’s false sense of normalcy.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m still a law-abiding citizen. I’m still focused on my mental health as well as being kind to others. But I am truly finding myself and who I am without others, as well as society telling me who I’m supposed to be.
If we had all conformed to society’s definition of normalcy from the beginning we wouldn’t have some of the strongest movements in the world today.
From the #metoo movement, to the LGBTQ community’s strides that they have made, to the Civil War. We will always have the chances and the need to grow and adapt as a society. But one thing that all of these monumental movements have in common is that these were people who refused to let society and their peers define who they were.
The chose to break free from the normalcy despite the costs.
I challenge you to find a quality about yourself (let’s face it we all have at least one) that doesn’t conform to your society’s normalcy and choose today to be YOU. Set your own standards of who you want to be. It’s always scary to dig deep within yourself and put yourself out there. But you will NEVER be disappointed in yourself for being your very own, unique self.
As always my friends. Continue standing strong through the storms like the wildflower you are.
The struggle you’re in today is developing the strength you need for tomorrow. Don’t give up.
Robert Tew
When things are going good, it’s so easy not to think of the negatives. So why is it so hard for us when things are going badly, to think of the positives?
These past few weeks have been a bit of a struggle for a lot of people in my life. It’s hard to see our loved ones go through things that you have no control over, with no idea how to help. For me, it’s physically painful to see my loved ones in pain. How do we deal with this? How do we go about helping not only our loved ones, but ourselves see the positives?
This, in an essence goes back to my Fake It ‘Till Ya Make It blog. But it also goes deep into the entire meaning of my blog. Feeding your soul.
When you start discovering what truly feeds your soul, you’re able to start putting things into positive perspectives. There are times where I need isolation, meditation, yoga. There are times when I need to be surrounded by my best friends, or family. And then there’s the times when I need to pour myself into music.
Music has always fed my soul. Every aspect of it. It doesn’t matter the genre, what matters to me is the connection I get with a song. If the lyrics speak to me, my soul is being fed. This week has been the week that I’ve needed music to feed my soul.
With all of that being said, I’ve had a lot of discussions with my husband this past week about feeling like I’m consistently used by people for selfish reasons. I’ve always been the type of person who is happy help an individual in every way possible no matter the repercussions to my soul. I’ll deal with myself later. This year I’ve learned hard lessons. I’ve lost people who I’ve given everything to. My heart has been broken. Losing friendships can sometimes be worse than losing a romantic relationship. But something that I learned through this time was that I’ve literally given parts of my soul to people who never had any intentions on helping me when the time would eventually arise. I was surrounded by people who used me to make themselves feel good, to be selfish with me, and never in a good way.
They threw me away like trash, and carried on when they didn’t realize that when they threw “me” away, they threw away pieces of my soul with it. I was angry, resentful and heartbroken.
Then it hit me. If they were truly the people I had thought they were and who they portrayed themselves to be, I wouldn’t be in this position. I took complete responsibility for my heartbreak, because I trusted pieces of my soul with people who didn’t want them in the first place.
I’ve learned to keep that closer to me, the more I have learned to feed my soul, the more full I feel. And I refuse to entrust it with anyone who doesn’t deserve it ever again. Because the most positive thing in life is to be your own savior first. The narcissists will show their teeth when you start doing this. But remember to be true to yourself first, love yourself first, protect yourself first. The rest will come.
Luke Combs newest album What You See is What You Get just dropped on Friday through Spotify and I’ve not been able to stop streaming it. I’ve always respected Luke as an artist for many reasons. But one of my favorite things about him is how raw he gets. And no matter how deep a song can get, he finds a way to make it positive. I encourage you to lend an ear to this new album, you will not be disappointed.
When I was reflecting on all of this with my husband is when I encountered Luke Combs new album, and a song stuck out to me. Dear Today has done more for me this week than anything else. There is a lyric in this song that stopped me dead in my tracks..
Stop takin’ me for granted like I’ll always be around
Cause even as you read this boy that clock is tickin’ down
And remember every second I got’s borrowed. So I hope you think of me today,
sincerely tomorrow.
Luke Combs-Dear Today
He’s so right. Every second is borrowed, so reach out to who you care about. Quit wasting time and start living your life like you there isn’t a tomorrow. Treat every second as it’s your last. Because if there were no tomorrow, I hope your soul is full and you were as positive as you could be.
I challenge you to try to find a song today that feeds your soul. Listen to it as many times as you desire, reflect on it. At the end of the day, see how your soul felt. I challenge you to reflect on the people in your life. Are they soul feeders or soul suckers? What can YOU do to lead a more positive mindset with a full soul?
Until next time my friends. Continue to stand strong through the storms like the wildflower that you are.
Changing your thought process is no easy task. As a matter of fact, my best advice when it comes to this process is faking it until you make it.
You see, my perception of this concept is far different than most people I’m surrounded with view it as. Most people view this concept as faking a positive outcome, until the outcome is truly what you wanted in the first place. But it goes so much deeper than this.
Having a positive outlook in life is something most of us strive for. But how do we get there? When I realized that I was quite frankly exhausted of being negative all of the time because it was absolutely redundant. So how did I start the process of not just thinking but LIVING positively?
I started by going into the deepest, darkest parts of my soul. My biggest fear has always been to be left alone with my own thoughts. They were scary, mean and just plain hateful. When those nasty, self-loathing, negative thoughts would enter my head, I made a conscious effort to reverse those thoughts. I would essentially “fake” how I was thinking. Eventually, one day I realized I hadn’t done it in a while and realized I MADE IT! It wasn’t something that happened overnight. It has taken me the better part of a year, and something that you have to be honest with yourself is that you will NEVER stop working on yourself.
We are constantly evolving as human beings. So why would we put our thought process in a stalemate just because we are comfortable. Change is something that is uncomfortable and scary for a lot of people. However, the longer and harder we fight it the further it pushes us back from being the best versions of ourselves.
So I challenge you to try reversing your negative thoughts each day to positive ones. After each day, take a mental note of how that affected the rest of your day as well as your attitude. Review it after a month and I guarantee that you will see change!
Until next time my friends. Continue standing strong like a wildflower in a storm!
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Feeding My Soul One Day At A Time 