perception

Slay Say

Good morning SLAYER! Your body hears what your mind says.

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

state-of-slay Problem

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

Slay Say

Good morning SLAYER! A miracle can be the shift in perception of fear into love, dark into light.

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

State Of Slay Miracle 2 (1)

Rocking Resiliency

How many times have we heard the quote “It’s not whether you get knocked down, it’s how you get up” by Vince Lombardi? I got knocked down a lot, and I got up a lot, and then I stopped. I just stopped getting up. I let every knock knock me to the ground and I just stayed there. I believed I belonged there, I didn’t want to be there, it didn’t feel good there, but my head told me I was exactly where I was supposed to be. So I stayed. Alone. In the darkness. It wasn’t until my life was literally on the line that that little tiny spec of light and fight in me reached out for help, and that was enough to pull myself up off the floor. It sometimes takes all of our strength to get up, but we do have the power to not give up and continue to go after our dreams and overcome our challenges. And the beauty is, we don’t have to do it alone, I didn’t, I had a lot of hands help me along the way, and still do, and in many ways you all lend me yours every day, even if you don’t realize it, to give me that extra strength when I need it, because sometimes I do need it. Resiliency is the ability to get back up even when things did not go as planned, it’s not dwelling on our perceived failures, it’s about acknowledging our situation, learning from it, and moving on. So, how do we do this?

1) Perspective – resilient people look at obstacles in their way as challenges, they don’t take them personally or let them stop them from moving forward and continuing to work toward their goal. They look at the obstacles as lessons and an opportunity to grow or look at a situation in a new way, or different angle. When we think of our obstacles in these terms it allows us to navigate around, or use this new information to build on what we already know to get the result we’re looking for. Turn these seemingly negative things into something that will make us better, brighter, and faster.

2) Promise – resilient people make a promise to themselves and commit themselves to their goals and to the betterment of their overall being. This pledge gives them a reason to get out of bed every day, to continue to push forward, to grow, to learn, and to live as their true selves. It extends to every area of their life, from work, to friends, to relationships, to their community, they are committed to engaging in these areas and contributing in ways that show their commitment and love for themselves and those around them.

3) Personal Direction – resilient people focus their energy on what is in their control, not wasting their energy on uncontrollable events, which leads to feelings of loss, hopelessness, and powerlessness. They stay on track by sending their energy towards those things they can change, improve on, or learn from in their own lives, and within their community, not getting lost in the chatter of outside things that can take them off course. They stay committed to their own path, and keeping their goals in mind.

These three areas keep things pretty simple. And, life can be simple if we choose to it be, focusing on the things that matter to us and not getting sucked into the vortex of other people’s issues and problems that we have no business getting involved with. It is always nice to lend a hand, or some advice, when asked, or if you think we can be of service, but not so much that it takes us off track and keeps us from living our life and moving us forward. If we are questioning our own resiliency, and perhaps our reasons for it, it is best to stay focused on our own personal direction before jumping into someone else’s.

Resiliency also goes back to self-care, something I’ve talked about quite a bit. But it’s one of those blocks of our foundation that is necessary to be resilient. Are we eating enough, or the right foods, are we getting enough sleep, are we exercising, are we doing things to give back to ourselves, things we love, things that add light to our lives, are we finding time to reflect and listen to ourselves? All of these things contribute to our resiliency. Without self care our resiliency tank will be running on empty. We have the power to come back from insurmountable places, if we can find the fire within to give us the energy to move on, the fire burns in each and everyone one of us, can you find yours? If not, how can you fan the flames so you can burn bright?

SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you consider yourself resilient? If not why? If so why? List some examples. What can you do to make sure you have what you need to be more resilient? How has your self-care been? Where can you do better? Where have you done better? What stops you from trying new things, or from moving forward? How can you overcome this? We are capable of anything, it’s all in how we choose to see it, make sure we’re setting ourselves up to rock our resiliency and give ourselves the tools we need to pick ourselves up and get what we want from life. SLAY on.

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

Slay Say

Good morning SLAYER! We see life through our own perspective, and sometimes the delusional goggles we have on can cause more harm than good.  Challenge yourself to see the truth in your life, only then can you work towards having the life you dream of.

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

State Of Slay Delusion

Perception: We All Have One

Before stepping on this path it never occurred to me that what I was seeing and hearing was being filtered through my own perception, I just took it all as fact, and reacted to it. What I didn’t realize is because I was living in a negative space, and quite often as a victim of the world and all of you, what I was seeing and hearing was skewed to fit the narrative I wanted to keep justifying. Often what was really going on was far from the way I had seen or heard it, making my reactions to it off and sometimes downright aggressive to the unsuspecting people I would encounter every day.

Perception is a tricky thing, even now sometimes I have to keep myself in check and ask myself if what I’m reacting to is really going on, or, is it just what I’m choosing to see and hear. Each of us has our own perception of the same things, and much of that perception is based on our past experiences, opinions, or whatever head space we may be in that day, and sometimes, it is whatever we’re wanting it to be based on expectations we had going in. Something to remember when we encounter people in our day to day life who may have a totally different perception than we do of that exact same event, and, just like with ourselves, we need to take into consideration that everyone else is fighting their own battles that we know nothing about, everyone, and in fighting those battles, is seeing things through their own filter, with their own perception. So, who’s right and who’s wrong? Well, it depends. It depends on who is taking in just the facts and who is lacing it with their own prejudices or preconceived notions of what was going to happen. It’s important to take stock of where we’re at and make sure we’re not bending the truth because of a bad mood, exhaustion, a case of being hangry, or maybe simply taking something out of context.

Misunderstanding someone’s meaning through email or text is really easy to do. It’s happened to me many times. We tend to read the words in whatever mood or head space we happen to be in, so a seemingly innocent message can come off angry if that’s the current mood we’re in, or if we’ve been harboring resentments against that person and haven’t worked on them and expressed how we feel. My recommendation always before immediately reacting is to pause, don’t do anything, maybe even go do something else for a while before getting back to it. Sometimes just taking a break does put things back in perspective and may help you read those same words differently. Something I also always do is ask myself if I can be misinterpreting the message, I question my perception because I know it can be off depending on what’s happening for me that day, sometimes just questioning myself can also put the words in perspective, as well as taking in the other person’s track record, do they typically talk to me like this, or does it seem out of character? Do some work before firing off a response and then hitting send. Trust me, you’ll make much less apologies when you practice this. Life is not a game show, we don’t get extra points for the fastest response, it never hurts to pause, and in some cases ask a friend for their opinion if you’re unsure yourself.

At the end of the day, we as individuals all see things differently, we all have our own opinions of the same events or information, we all bring our own history to every situation, the trick is to keep that into consideration before diving into an argument or engaging with someone you may have felt disrespected by, or offended by, ask yourself if that’s what’s really going on, and maybe ask someone else for their opinion. The idea is, we don’t just launch ourselves at someone without thinking it through, and reminding ourselves that someone else may be doing the same with us, so if you do feel attacked ask for clarification before lauding bombs back in their direction, communication is the key, and most of the time a simple clarification can fix things right up.

We are all human, we all make mistakes, remind yourself of that before becoming the judge and executioner in the course of a minute, what are the facts?

SLAY OF THE DAY: Are there times when you know your perception was off about a person or situation? Why do you think that was? What can you do in the future to keep your perception on track? Are you able to have compassion for others who’s perception may be off about you or a situation? If not why? Do you see how easy it is to be wrong about someone or something because of the where a place you may be in your life? How can you remedy that, or work on that for the future. SLAY on.

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