hope

Your Life Doesn’t Get Any Better By Chance, It Gets Better By Change

What’s the definition of insanity? Doing the same thing and expecting different results? That was me, for most of my life. I wasn’t happy with the results I was getting but I didn’t do anything differently to change them. I certainly hoped they would changed, and wished for them to change, but without taking different action there was really no hope at all that they would. The only way change happens is if we take action and make changes.

Change takes work. It takes risks. It takes us getting out of our comfort zones and doing something we’re not used to doing, maybe something we may not believe we can. But we can. We just have to do it. Those voices we hear may tell us we can’t, but we can. For me I had to hit a pretty hard bottom before I made the changes I needed to make. I was one stubborn gal and even though I didn’t like where I was and how I was living my life, I thought I could just wish it away, and not only did it not go away, it got worse. So for me, it took my life being in jeopardy to finally make some changes. You don’t need to wait quite that long, in fact, you can start right now!

It can be scary to start something new, or try a new way of life, but it’s typically just scary at the beginning, those first few steps, and once you’ve taken them you feel it’s right and taking the next few steps becomes less scary because you’ve already taken some, and it’s already feeling good. For me, I made sure to surround myself with others doing the same, and those people already in my life who supported me and cheered me on, it helped to have a cheering section and a group of people doing it with me, so even when things may not have gone as planned, there were always people there to encourage to keep trying, and that’s the key, just keep trying, each step isn’t always going to go the way you would have liked, and it’s those steps that we typically learn the most, they may sting in the moment, but that sting will help us grow, and, hopefully ignite the fire in us to try again.

Nothing changes if nothing changes. It’s that simple. In fact, in my case, and in others as well I’ve spoken to, when nothing changes, a lot of times, things actually get worse. The universe has a way to pushing us in the right direction, and if we’re not taking the hint, those nudges can sometimes feel more like a push, there’s a reason for that, we’re not supposed to be where we are. Take those cues, those hints, and look at your life and what you may not be changing, or taking action on, look at what may not serve you, and maybe never did, but you convinced yourself it did. Be honest with yourself SLAYER, and truly look for those areas that need change, that you can take action on and take it. Don’t even think about it, just take it, trust that you’re being directed where you should be and take the leap, we’re all here to catch you if you stumble.

Wishing for the life we want without doing the work doesn’t work. We have to roll up our sleeves and get to work, once we do we see that things start to fall into place, there may be a few bumps in the road, but those bumps don’t come close to the despair of staying somewhere we shouldn’t be. Trust that you have what it takes to get what you want, what you’ve imagined for yourself, go take it, and you may just find that you’ve made your own chances and a life that you once only dreamed of.

SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you take action when things don’t feel right, or hope they just get better on their own? What in your life could you take action on but haven’t? Why haven’t you? How long have you lived in this place and not take action? How does that feel? What can you do, SLAYER, to take action in that area of your life? Are you afraid? What are you frightened of? Does not taking action and staying stuck where you are bring you even more fear? It should. We are not meant to stay in one place, we are meant to learn, grow, explore, and challenge ourselves, get out there and go after what we want, make the changes we need to have the life we want, the life, up until now, we’ve only dreamed of. Make those dreams a reality, one change at a time.

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

There Is Beauty In Everything

I never used to think that. I thought there was only in beauty if I got what I wanted. Or if someone else got what was coming to them…from my point of view anyway. In fact I was conditioned to think that life was not beautiful, that it was dark, unforgiving, unpredictable, cruel, harsh. I could only see what I wanted to see, and what I wanted to see was what a victim I was, coupled with believing I only deserved bad things. My life was dark, vengeful, angry, full of fear, but I was my own jailer, I held the key to letting myself out of the prison I had locked myself into.

When we’re looking for the negative, the negative will present itself. Like attracts like. The energy we put out comes back to us. I never believed I held that much power. I just thought life was something that was happening to me. Funny enough, it was the act of surrendering, of asking for help, that gave me that power. It took a while for me to learn how to use it, but even the act of saying that I needed help, started the process.

As I started getting better, I started to strip away the darkness, the hurt, the hate, the pain. My days got brighter and I started looking for the light, the goodness in my life. It became easier to see the beauty in my life, the world around me, and the more I looked for it the more I found it. But it was also just as important to find the beauty in the days I had left behind. Not romanticize it, or downplay how bad it had been, but to realize that there was beauty in the breakdown, because without it, I wouldn’t have never gotten to where I am today.

For me it took a lot for me to get help. There was no other way. I wasn’t going to go into this journey willingly if I could still tolerate or justify the way I had been living my life, and, I could tolerate a lot. So it took, almost loosing everything, for me to finally fall to my knees and say I need help, I surrender. Which, is one of the most beautiful moments of my life. That is the moment I actually began my life. It’s that date I consider my birth day. And what’s more beautiful than that? I look for the beauty in everything, and everyone. It is there, most times, if you look. Even in tragedy there are always incredible acts of beauty that happen, people, places and things, that rise out of the ashes and bring beauty even in the most darkest of days. It’s those instances that we continue to have hope. And to me, hope is the most beautiful thing there is. Hope saved my life, it was a gift that was handed to me from someone else who had found it, and that is why it’s important to me to share it and give it away, as it was given to me.

Beauty doesn’t always appear to us as beautiful things. It can come from the ugliest of circumstances, which is why we should never give up, because something beautiful may just be around the corner…or maybe is always here, maybe, you’re just not seeing it yet. SLAY on!

SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you have trouble seeing the beauty in life? In other people? In yourself? When was the last time you recognized something beautiful? What if you sat for a moment SLAYER, and thought about the beautiful things in your life? Write them down. Then write down 5 beautiful things about yourself. Ask a friend, family member, or co-worker to write down 5 beautiful things about you and give it back to you. Do you see those things in yourself? If not, why not? How do you think others see them in you? Focus on seeing those things in you. Focus on the beauty in your life. Even if it’s small, it’s a start. It was only the size of a pin for me at the beginning, and now, I see it all around me. I see it in you. Now it’s your turn to see.

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

Inactivity: The Fear Of Failure

There are a few reasons why we don’t take action, but many of them are rooted in the fear of failure. We assume we’ll fail so we don’t start. We delay. We make excuses why it won’t work, instead of just trying. As I’ve said before, sometimes the win is just in the trying itself. But we don’t even try, we get stuck where we are, even when we’re not happy there. What happened to us? When did we let fear win? As children we are fearless, most of us, we climb, we jump, we try new things, with new people, and then something happens, and we let fear take over.

For me it was outside voices telling me I was different, not normal, that I couldn’t do something, coupled with my inner-voice echoing the same, that inner-voice got so loud it was the only voice I could hear. And many times I stood paralyzed by fear. There are moments when I burst through, got out of my comfort zone, let the light in me shine, but for the most part I dulled that shine and stayed hidden in plain sight.

When we don’t start something, we can’t finish, and it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy that we’re not good enough to have what we want, but we haven’t worked for it. We always seem to leave that part out, and solely focus on the not getting what we want part. And the more we don’t take the responsibility for not taking action the more we fall down the rabbit hole of believing we’re not good enough to get it. There are those of us too, who just fling ourselves into things without doing the footwork or looking into it first, we’re just flying by the seat of our pants hoping that it’ll all work out, instead of arming ourselves with the work and research needed to fully tackle something head-on, giving us the best chance at a positive result. When we fall, we again tell ourselves that we aren’t worthy of it, but we didn’t set ourselves up to necessarily succeed. It’s another way, a sneakier way, of self-sabotage, because we can say we tried, but we didn’t do all the work leading up to it.

So, why is failure so bad? It’s not really. Failure, like I’ve said before, is just information. And, if you’re like me, you learn the most from failure, especially when it stings, I do my best learning from that place because I don’t want to feel that again, so I’m likely not going to try to do the same thing the same way again. At least not anymore. The old me would have, in fact did, expecting different results, when the only result was always me losing and telling myself I deserved it. But today, I learn from those failures, which if you think about it, don’t really make them failures if you take away some valuable information away from it. As I said, failure is really just information. The start of a blueprint of how to do it different next time. And that’s also the key. To keep trying. Try to do it a different way, a new way, a way you haven’t tried before. And don’t be afraid to fail. Everyone has failed, everyone. It doesn’t mark you as a bad person. In fact it’s within those failures that we often connect with other people, who have also failed, and we learn that we are not alone, but we don’t get that lesson if we don’t start in the first place.

Take away the power fear has in your life that you might fail. The only thing failure does is show is that the way we tried isn’t the right way, so, go look for the right way, or the right path, or the place that you are meant to be. Sometimes the failure to get what we want is actually saving us from it, because it’s not what’s best for us, or where we’re meant to be. Trust those signs.

Follow your heart, go after what moves you, excites you, inspires you, and if you fail, remind yourself that it’s just information, look to see if there is something you missed, something you could have done differently, if not, maybe that failure is pointing you in a new or different direction, something you hadn’t even thought of. But most importantly, you have to start in the first place. Always take action when and where you can, when you take action you begin to defeat fear, or even, walk over it as you sprint to the finish line. SLAY on!

SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you let fear stop you from trying new things? What are you afraid of? Are these fears real in your present life, or stories from your past? Name 3 times you let fear stop you from going after something, or doing something you love. Name 3 times you walked through your fear. Beside each example, write how you felt. Now, wouldn’t you rather feel like you did when you walked through your fear? Remember those feelings next time fear pops up and tries to stop you from doing something new, or going after what you want, think of those feelings and let them quash your fear as you sail ahead to your goal.

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

Don’t Stop Before The Miracle Happens

I was speaking last night at a rehab center in LA. I enjoy speaking to people who are at a crossroads in their life, it’s something I relate to very much, as I have had many, but one in particular where I chose to step into the light instead of slip into the darkness. We do always have a choice. I never plan what I’m going to say when I go to speak, I trust that the words will come out of my mouth that are meant to and that my story or message will land where it’s supposed to land. I was reminded last night of a miracle I experiences early on in my journey, a milestone that I had placed importance on, and that if I didn’t feel better by that milestone I would set out on my original plan to take my own life. I made a promise to myself three months earlier, that I would work to live in the light, that I would do what was suggested and dive into whatever work I needed to do to get better, and if I didn’t feel better at the end of that three months then I was free to let go. But something miraculous happened. When I hit that three month mark, having worked very hard to change the way I had been living and better myself, I no longer wanted to die. Now, I’m not saying it was all rainbows and unicorns from then on, it certainly was not, and I had a lot more work to do, but I wanted to stay and do it. By changing my actions, by doing what I could to take action in a positive way I had changed the trajectory of my life. It was, by all accounts, a miracle, as I had spent years prior wanting to die, and at that moment, on that milestone, I realized I didn’t. That was the first miracle I’ve received on this 12 year plus journey.

I’m grateful to always remember that. It reminds me that anything is possible. Change makes things possible, it’s not always easy, but when we stick to it, dedicate ourselves to it, miracles happen. They truly do. I am a living example of that, and each of us who has made it back from the depths of darkness and despair are as well.

A big part of that for me is sharing my story with others, because it not only may give someone else the hope they need to start their journey, or continue on their path, but it reminds me that miracles do happen and to keep going. That what I need to focus on is doing what’s best for me and my mental health, and when I do, and am able to be my best self, miraculous things happen. When we are at the depths of our depression, our despair, it doesn’t seem like anything will or can help, it seems hopeless, and it only is if we don’t take positive action to bring some light into our lives. And, believing we deserve to. As I’ve mentioned before, it starts with willingness, if we are willing things start to happen, it may be slow at first, but willingness opens the door, even if just a crack, and the more we take action to live in the light, the more that door opens and the more light comes in. That all may seem really daunting at first, or from where you’re sitting right now, but, you only have to do the next right thing, that’s it, just one thing, and that one thing will lead you to the next, which will lead you to the next and so on. But it starts with one thing. You don’t have to worry where all those things will lead you, just keep doing them and you will be amazed because before you know things will change, shift, get better, just by doing those small things each day. I started over 12 years ago and still do them each day, and each day I am amazed at the beauty that my life has and the many miracles that have happened along the way, but the most important miracle of all is that I am here, and that today I want to spread and share my light with others, rather than die in the dark.

Go find your miracle, stay on the path of light, and watch your life change. SLAY on!

SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you want things to be better for yourself? What gets in the way? What can you do today to step into the light, to take action and get yourself on a better path? What has stopped you in the past? Is this something real or what you tell yourself to keep yourself in the dark? Is it something someone else tells you? Why do you think they’re telling you that? No one has the right to tell you who you are and what you deserve, only you can do that. So stand up SLAYER, dust yourself off and change your path, step into the light and start the story of the rest of your life.

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

Slay Say

Good morning SLAYER! Do the work. Be the prize.

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

State Of Slay Happy Ending

Slay Say

Good morning SLAYER!  Trust that things will happen when they are meant to, sometimes not getting what we want when we want it might be a blessing. Do the footwork, keep an open mind and heart, and let go of the rest.

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

State Of Slay Happen

Slay Say

Good morning SLAYER!  Sometimes the smallest step in the right direction ends up being the biggest step of your life.

SLAY on!

State Of Slay Everything

When We Share Our Stories, We Spread Hope

For those of you who join me for the SLAY TALK LIVE livestream each month, you’ve heard me talk about giving back, of spreading a positive message to those who need it, and of my commitment to spread a message of hope. Last night I spoke at a mental hospital here in Los Angeles. A place that is not a part of my story before stepping on this path, but probably should have been, heck, there are probably times even on this path I may have qualified for the psych ward, but it was a place I wanted to speak because of my own struggles with mental health issues, I wanted to bring some light to the patients there because, for many, is not the brightest time in their life.

We all have the ability to share who we are and where we’ve come from with others, I’ve talked about the power of that many times, and in my last blog, and how someone’s story saved my life, so it’s important for me to share mine with others. I’m a firm believer in we have to give away what we’ve learned to keep it. If we just keep it to ourselves we can lose it, we can forget where we came from, where we fought our way back from, who we used to be, it’s the act of giving it away and sharing it with others that reminds us of those things, keeps us humble, and keeps us on the right path. Tonight it reminded me of likely where I would end up, if I was lucky and didn’t harm myself, if I were to stop doing what I do each day to stay in the light. The privilege I enjoyed today of walking in for one hour and then walking out could easily be taken away if I let myself slide back into the dark hole that I once resided. The weight of that was not lost on me as I sat there and listened to the patients share their struggles and I watched as they found a little bit of hope in what we were saying. That could easily be me. In fact, when I first stepped out on this journey, that was me, I was just not institutionalized, but the fear, the desperation to find answers, solutions, was all the same, I identified myself with them, and hopefully they identified themselves in me and were able to see that there is hope, that if they are willing to do the work, to do what may not be comfortable, to do whatever it takes to get better, they can. We all can. I did.

Each one of our stories is valid. Each story has value. Each of us has something to share that can help another individual, or many, we all walk this path with many at our side, who are all doing the best they can, and together we can all help each other. We can offer someone hope. With hope in our hearts we can accomplish so much, it’s hope that opens the door to willingness, and willingness to taking action, and even the tiniest bit of it can save a life, can light a path, can be a beacon to bring someone home. It is the most beautiful gift we can give, and it’s a gift that gives back to us in return. For those of us that have come out the other side of our personal struggle, for those who have found a better way of life, solutions to those problems that used to plague us, hold us back, bring us down, we have a lot to share, even when we are still trying, working, to get out, or to a place we want to get to, our journeys so far can help someone who is just starting theirs, and may be just what they need to hear to find the courage to begin. Even on a bad day, a day when you think you have nothing to offer, you do, by being honest about your struggle you may help someone with theirs, and, you may just find a solution by talking it out. We are all here for reason, we are all here to learn, to grow, share what you have found so far. SLAY on.

SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you see that your story or journey so far may be the light that someone else might need? Do you see the value in your story? If not, why? Has someone else’s story inspired you or helped you on your path? If so, how? How can you SLAYER give back and share your story with others? How can you be of service to those out there who can be helped from your journey so far? We all have a gift to give, one of honesty and truth, no matter how we may feel on any given day, our story matters, and it may just be what someone else needs to hear.

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

Slay Say

Good morning SLAYER! When old patterns are broken, new solutions can be found.

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

State Of Slay Dysfunction

Living With Unsolved Problems

We all have them—those lingering problems we just can’t figure out. Maybe it’s a situation where someone won’t discuss or engage with us to find a solution. Maybe it’s something completely out of our control. Whatever it is, these unresolved issues can eat away at us.

For years, I let those problems take control of me. I thought I had to solve everything, to my own satisfaction. I couldn’t let things go. It literally drove me crazy, trying to force solutions where sometimes, there weren’t any. I didn’t know how to accept what was or give myself permission to move on. Back then, moving on and acceptance were not even part of my vocabulary.

But I’ve learned something.

Acceptance Is the Key

Acceptance truly is the key to so many of our problems. Things often don’t look or feel the way we think they should—or the way we want them to—and sometimes, there’s just no way to change that.

For those of you who just recoiled at that idea, this blog is especially for you.

Nothing—absolutely nothing—is worth surrendering your peace of mind for, especially if it’s just to prove a point or make sure you’re right. That imaginary scorecard we sometimes carry around? It’s a heavy burden that robs us of our serenity.

For me, it became a matter of life and death. The things I fought so hard to control couldn’t be solved by me alone. When I finally let go and accepted that, my world expanded. I was able to look outside myself for new possibilities—and I found them.

Some Problems Just Can’t Be Solved—At Least Not Now

Sometimes, there’s no solution to be found. Maybe the situation has reached a standstill, or someone has passed, or circumstances just don’t allow for resolution in this moment.

But here’s the thing: letting something go now doesn’t mean a solution won’t present itself later.

I always say, “Never say never.” I’ve seen miracles in my own life where solutions appeared to problems I thought were impossible to solve.

Find peace with what you can’t solve today. Stay open to the possibility of resolution down the road—but don’t wait for it. Trust that if a solution is meant to appear, it will, when the time is right. Time has its own schedule, and we can’t rush it. Let it do its thing while you continue to live yours.

Protect Your Peace

There will always be things in life we can’t control or solve. If we want to live a happy life, it’s up to us to find peace and acceptance around those things. Do what you can to figure things out—but know when to walk away. Your peace of mind is worth far more than a forced solution.

Sometimes, no solution is the solution. At least for now.

SLAY on.

SLAY OF THE DAY: Reflect & Rise

Do you have a hard time letting things go?
Do you feel like you need to solve everything?
How do those unsolved problems affect your peace of mind?
What would happen if you accepted that some things can’t be solved—right now?
How could that acceptance set you free?

Call to Action: Join the Conversation

I’d love to hear from you.
What’s one problem you’re ready to stop forcing—and let time or acceptance handle?
Share your story in the comments. Let’s cheer each other on.

And if you know someone struggling with unresolved problems, send this to them.
Sometimes, just hearing “It’s okay to let go” makes all the difference.