Author: Carrie Genzel

Hold On For The Good

Today is the 9 year anniversary of the night I should have died. I’ve written about that night in a blog entitled “A Power Greater Than Myself,” it was a night I should not have survived, and a night, back then, where a part of me wished I hadn’t. I had struggled with depression for most of my life, and that coupled with mental illness, there were many nights, years even, where I could only see the darkness in my life and didn’t actually believe there was good waiting for me, and if by some miracle something good did come, I believed it would be taken away. I’ve spent many years working on my own self-love, working on acceptance and working to live my life in the light, I no longer wish to die, and today, 9 years removed from that very dark and scary night, I am living the happiest days of my life.

When I sat on that beach that night, feeling alone and afraid, like death was closing in, I never could have imaged this place I am in right now. I was certain I was going to die on that beach, and my last memory of that night was me surrendering to the fact that I was not going to see another day. But the universe, God, whatever your belief or name you prefer, had other plans and knew where I was meant to be, one day, and so by some sort of miracle I was saved and survived insurmountable odds to find myself right here, right now.

The last seven days have been ones of great love, of a lot of laughter, of companionship, caring, and support. My life has changed tremendously, I became a Mommy to an adorable little pup, and became someone’s fiance, two things I would have missed out on if I had died today 9 years ago. Life has a plan for all of us, and even on those days that seem our darkest, or impossible to survive, if we let go, get out of our own way, and ask for guidance we can walk out of anything. I spent so many nights hoping I wouldn’t wake up in the morning, and thinking of that today it makes me sad, because today I look forward to start of each day, to walk this path with someone who loves me, who makes me laugh and brings so much light in my life. I am extremely grateful that I didn’t miss this time in my life, that something, or someone, knew better and kept me here when there were so many times I wanted to check out.

My point for sharing this today is to show my gratitude, but to also send out a beacon of hope to those who may be in the dark. There is a way out, and there may just be something really wonderful waiting for you that you can’t even imagine yet. Always keep fighting, even when things seem like they might not be worth fighting for, trust me, they are, and you’ll have no idea if you give up and stop fighting. When I was in my darkest days, I never could have imagined the life I have today, but there was a plan, and getting through those dark days inspired me to write this blog, and to give back in the many ways I am of service today, and coming to terms with the demons of my past has allowed me to find self-love and acceptance, and has allowed me to share my true self with someone I love, so even if things look to be at their darkest, hold on for the good, you have no idea what may be waiting for you. SLAY on!

SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you feel that there is good in your future? If not, why not? If you do, how do you know? What do you put your faith in? Have you overcome darkness to now see the light? What did you learn from that experience? Don’t let the darkness you may be living in tell you it will always be there, or that it is the only future for you, keep fighting because your brightest days just may be right around the corner.

S – self L – love A – appreciate Y – you

Slay Say

Good morning SLAYER! Fear can be a healthy motivator is we choose it to be.

SLAY on!

state-of-slay healthy fear

Slay Talk Live Video

Hello SLAYER! For those of you that couldn’t join us tonight, here’s what you missed…Daphne is exhausted from her first livestream. SLAY on!

Healthy Fear

Until stepping onto this path my life was ruled by fear. Fear ran my life and was the basis of all my decisions. I would never have admitted that, or even identified it as such, but that was the truth. I was in fear of missing out, I was in fear of not getting what I wanted, I was in fear of loosing what I had, I was in fear of not being good enough, I was just in a constant state of fear. In my journey of recovery I’ve managed to lose most of my fear. That has come with living my life in a rigorously honest way and having found my way to self-love love and acceptance. When I’m living in that place, and connecting to a power greater than myself, I am very rarely in fear, but, some types of fear can be healthy.

Healthy fear motivates us, it stops us from procrastinating, or may shorten the length of time we procrastinate, it can help us take the right action, even if there is an easier one that may not be right, it can help us in many ways to do what we need to do when we need to do it. We can use healthy fear to our advantage if it gets us to where we need to be and where we should be.

For me, I have a fear of not being prepared. So I can use my healthy fear around that to make sure I’ve done my homework. Whether that’s in my career or a meeting with the bank or a lawyer, my healthy fear causes me to research, to ask the questions I need to ask, and get the information I need to to feel safe and educated in that area. I have also turned a great fear, a fear that kept me distant from people, or isolated, and turn that into healthy fear by asking the right questions when I meet someone new, whether in business or personally, because I have issues with trust, I know I need to take the initiative to find out about that person or people and once I feel like I know the kind of person or people they are, and what they’re intentions are, I have used my fear in a healthy way, and, once I know the facts, I am safe. Fear for me has always been around feeling safe, so I use my healthy fear today to find that safety, as best I can, in asking questions and doing my homework. And that goes for anything in my life, if I have a fear of something I can choose to turn that fear into healthy fear by taking some action around it and not let paralyze me, or keep me away from people. I have the ability to make change happen and stamp out that fear, or reduce it greatly. I am no long manipulated by it, I address it, tackle it head on and use it to my advantage. Now, that’s not to say sometimes my old foe, fear, doesn’t pop up and stop me in my tracks, it does, but I now can work through that fear, get to the source or root of that fear and begin to work through it, many times that fear is from my past, and not actually a threat in my present life, so it’s recognizing that and getting to work on letting it go.

Fear will always try to keep us in it’s grips, but we have the power to turn our fears around and have it work for us to achieve the goals we want to achieve or to live the life we have imagined for ourselves. It’s all there for the taking, if we choose to take it, and make our fear work for us, letting go of what doesn’t. I recently made the choice to walk through some major fear in my life that was tied to my past, but affecting my life today and my future, and because I set out to let that fear go, because it was no longer valid, something really wonderful is happening in my life because I was able to leave that fear in the past. It’s up to you SLAYER, do you want to be a prisoner to your fear, or leave it behind and go after your dreams? SLAY on!

SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you let fear take over when making decisions or taking action? Does fear stop you from taking action? What has fear gotten in the way of in your past? Do you regret that? What can you do today to let go of that fear? How can you change that fear into healthy fear? What other healthy fears do you have in your life? What can you change into healthy fear? Fear can only rule our lives if we let it, it is up to us to live in our truth, to let go of the past, to investigate and find out the answers we need in order to move on and leave fear behind. You can do it SLAYER, I know you can.

S – self L – love A – appreciate Y – you

Slay Say

Good morning SLAYERS! Within difficulty lies opportunity.

New blog goes up Tuesday, until then…SLAY on!

State Of Slay Two Things

Growing Through Something Difficult

I’m all about changing the language I use every day to reflect a positive life and positive communication with myself. For most of my life, my default place was a negative space, I would tell people I was cursed and that’s why things were always going wrong in my life, or things were so dark. The truth is, it was the result of the choices I was making and how I was living my life. It took me hitting a really hard bottom and some serious work after to realize that. But I’ve walked this path of self-love and positivity for many years, and my life today is far beyond what I could have imagined, or even hoped for back in those dark years, and I make a conscious effort to speak in a way that is healing and nurturing to my journey.

I heard someone this week say she was “growing” through a difficult time, instead of saying “going” through a difficult time, something I’ve said many times in my life when I may be walking through a patch that is more challenging, and I’ve always grown through those times, in fact, that’s when I grow the most, but it never occurred to me to change that one word in that statement to reflect what is really going on, and, changing a negative into something positive.

No matter what we are going through, we are meant to go through it, and there’s always a reason for it, typically it’s growth. Those things that come along and challenge us prepare us for what’s coming next, or, may be showing us where in the wrong place and prompting us to make change, but there is growth in that. When we work to change our perspective to see those challenging times as an opportunity to grow we start to look for the growth in what we’re going through, not look at it as something bad that is happening to us we’re just trying to get through. If we are always just trying to “get through” it, we’re not taking away the growth or lesson in it, and, that situation will keep happening until we get it, so, why not “get it” the first time and move on? We can’t control what life is going to throw at us, but we can control how we deal with it and react to it, and by just changing that, and looking for the positive in those situations, we are able to take some control in how things will go from there because if you’re able to get out the situation what you need to that situation will not come back around again, or at least, happen less, because sometimes the universe likes to see if we really did learn what we should have and it throws us a situation similar, or the same, just to check, and if we did grow and learn so that next time should be easier because you are now making better choices.

Changing our language, what we say, and how we speak to ourselves, is the difference of working through something you label as negative, or an opportunity to grow, and wouldn’t we rather have an opportunity over a negative experience? We have the power to change a negative to an opportunity, and that in itself is already a positive. Look for the opportunities in your life to grow rather than just trying to get through a difficult time and see the difference that makes as you “grow” through your next difficult time. SLAY on!

SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you tend to focus on the negative? When something is happening that you’ve labeled negative, do you let it get you down or begrudgingly go through it? If you do look at those experiences as difficult, how do you think they might change if you changed your outlook into one of growth, rather than punishment? Thinking back to your last challenging time, what growth do you think came out of it? And, how do you think you’ve used what you learned after coming through that? How do you think you’ll use it in the future? If that same, or similar, experience were to come again, how could you use what you learned to handle it differently? Life is a journey of learning and growth, it can be an adventure if we choose to look at it that way, and when we do, no matter what comes our way, we can look at it as just another opportunity to grow.

S – self L – love A – appreciate Y – you

Slay Say

Good morning SLAYER! Every time you judge someone you reveal a part of yourself that needs healing.

New blog goes up Sunday, until then…SLAY on!

State Of Slay Judge Others

Blame-Saying Is Game-Playing

Before walking this path I spent a lot of my time pointing out the faults of others. I figured I knew how to fix everyone else’s lives, even though mine was falling a part, and like a runaway train heading toward a tunnel of death. But to talk to me, I know better. You were all doing it wrong, or could do it better, and if you’d just listen to me, you’d straighten things out. It’s funny to me, looking back, because I’m sure many people in my life were thinking the same about my life, and they probably had some sound advice, but I would never listen to it, because it was all of you who had the problem, not me. What I didn’t realize at the time is that I was doing that to take the heat off myself. I spent so much time pointing out the faults of others, I didn’t have time to look at my own, and even if I did have time, it was much easier to point out yours than actually look at the issues that were making me, and keeping me, sick. It’s easy to get caught looking at the faults of others, it can start so subtly and can easily turn perverse as we give ourselves self-granted permission to remain comfortably unaware of our own defects.

For me, the sicker I got the more I focused on those around me to find relief my the inner struggle, but the more I focused you, the more my disease grew because my attention was elsewhere, it was a smokescreen that allowed me to get sicker, and the sicker I got, the more focused I became on fixing everyone else.

Today, I know that I need to keep the spotlight on myself, and if my mind wanders and starts to look at the fault of others, I know I need to turn that focus back on myself because there is something I’m avoiding or trying to dodge. When we don’t want to deal with something, or are trying to avoid a feeling, we often will look out to outside things to distract us, or hope it passes, but what we should be doing is facing it head on, looking into why we’re trying to avoid it, and what the root of it is. It goes back to self-respect, honoring who we are and what we need, taking the time to get to know who we really are, it’s only then that we can figure out why we do the things we do and why we may be avoiding certain feelings or emotions. We are on a life long journey with ourselves, it’s up to us to explore, love and learn who we are, and to celebrate ourselves in a healthy and positive way. Playing games with ourselves keeps us stuck, keeps us sick, and can make us sicker if we continue to look around everywhere but inside ourselves. Stop passing blame onto others, judging those around you and avoiding the true issue. What is causing you to avoid who you really are? SLAY on!

SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you focus on others when you don’t want to deal with your own issues or feelings? How do you do that? Why do you do that? Write an example of when you’ve done that. What was the result? Have people told you to mind your own business? Should you have? Did you after you were told to? Or do you persist and keep meddling in their lives? How do you feel when someone gives you unwanted advice about your life? Do you appreciate it? Or get angry or annoyed? We have no right to judge others, our lives, each of us, is what we’re responsible for, as is everyone else. The more we take that focus off of us and direct that at others, the more we’re in danger of letting our disease, or the darkness, take over while we’re distracted and looking somewhere else, which is exactly what it wants. Once it convinces us to look outside of ourselves it can do what it wants, and if we’re so focused on everyone else, we’re in danger of loosing ourselves. No matter how difficult something may be to face, it doesn’t compare to the pain that is building within ourselves as we try to ignore it and distract ourselves from the real issue at hand, we are giving that pain permission to grow and slowly take over. It’s time to take that permission back, and get in touch with our true selves.

S – self L – love A – appreciate Y – you

Slay Say

Good morning  SLAYER! To deny the truth doesn’t change the fact.

New blog goes up Friday, until then…SLAY on!

State Of Slay Denial Worst Lie

Deny Denial

When I was living in my disease I was totally in denial about how sick I was. I would tell myself stories about how it was everyone else’s fault or that things weren’t really that bad, they were. No matter what happened, or how bad things got, I never admitted the truth to myself until I couldn’t deny it anymore because I couldn’t ignore the place I found myself. I was emotionally and spiritually bankrupt, and in grave danger of taking my own life. I think for me, because of my stubbornness and cunning ability to deny my truth, it took me falling down that low for me to finally see the problem, and to be willing to do something about it. I don’t suggest waiting that long, because things very easily could have gone a different way during that time, a more permanent way, one where I no longer had the choice to get well, but I was granted some grace, and a tiny bit of hope, to reach out my hand and finally admit the truth. And, even now, over 13 years later, my mental illness will tell me I don’t have it, that I’m OK, it still actively wants me to fall back into denial.

I wrote recently about being rigorously honest, it’s imperative for me that I live in that place, because if I start to bend the truth, or leave things out of my story, I start to deny what is really going on, of who I am today, and where I came from, and once I start doing that my disease sits up and takes notice. It waits for me to get a little lazy, or back off on my recovery and when and if I do, it peppers denial into my thoughts without me even noticing it and then starts to open the door wider to more and bigger denial, if I allow that to happen, I am in danger of falling back to where I was, or worse.

Life can be painful. There are things that can be hard to face, or admit, but if we don’t live in our truth, admit our faults, and make amends or apologize for what we’ve done denial takes over and tells us all kinds of lies that keep us sick, or isolated, or in our own heads. The truth keeps us well, healthy, and in the light, there is no place for denial in truth. Denial may feel like the safer place, especially if it’s a place we’ve lived in for a while, but it’s deceptive, denial does not keep us safe, it leaves us exposed and in harm’s way, we are only safe when we know and live in the truth.

But first we need to have the willingness to live in our truth, and to see things as they really are, not as we’d like them to be, or prefer them to be, or the story we’d rather tell. Perhaps our story is that we’re not like everyone else, even though we would prefer to be, and so it may be about finding acceptance in ourselves and who we are, and, for some of us, that we do live with some kind of mental illness, or some other health issue that may cause us shame, or difficulty, or may separate us from those around us, if we let it. We may have gotten so good rationalizing our denial, or coming up with alibis for our behavior that living in our truth may seem like a tall order, but it can be done, and needs to be done if we are to live in any kind of healthy loving way. And that brings us back to self-love. When we learn to love ourselves we learn to accept all of who we are, even those parts we used to deny, and when we are able to shine love in those places we used to hide we can truly live in the light and become our true selves.

Denial only leads to more denial, more lies, stories, and untruths. We as SLAYERS live in the light, our truth, we deny denial, we take responsibility for our actions, and we own who we are and what we do. Denial only brings us more pain, and possibly leads us down an even darker path than the one we already find ourselves on. Let go of the fear you may hold of telling your truth, and find the freedom in accepting the truth, and sharing that truth with those in your life. SLAY on!

SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you live in denial? What specifically do you refuse to accept? Why do you think you refuse to accept it? What’s stopping you? What are you afraid of? Do you see how living in denial is keeping you sick, or making you sicker? What evidence is there of this in your life? What can you do to get more honest? Write down 5 things. Find acceptance for who you are and what you may struggle with, it’s only then that we begin to step out of the shadows and start living the life that we are meant to, and are capable of having.

S – self L – love A – appreciate Y – you