Good morning SLAYER! You have the power to make your dreams come true, take action, run into the tornado, and get what you want! You deserve it. You can do it. You can make it happen.
New blog goes up Sunday, until then…SLAY on!
slayer
Run Into The Tornado
We all have moments when we can either run and hide, or, run into the tornado. When we get an opportunity to go after something we want, or create the opportunity to reach a goal or achievement, we can let fear take over and hide, or just run full steam ahead and take it. Before walking this path I often let my fear of the unknown, fear of what you might think of me and my goals, and fear of not getting what I wanted stop me, stop me from trying new things, stop me period. As a result I would get angry, angry that others ran and got the things I wanted for myself, angry that I didn’t try, or angry that my life “was so difficult” that I couldn’t run and get what I wanted. But I could have, I stopped myself, I let fear win, and when I stopped doing that and started to run anyway, even full of fear, even if I didn’t get what I wanted I still won because sometimes the winning is just in the journey itself and not in the result, so run straight in, don’t look back and go get what’s yours, no matter what that is.
I like the visual of a tornado because that what it seems like many times. You’re running towards this whirling, grey, unstable beast the size of a gas station and you don’t know what’s going to happen, but just do it. Fear of the unknown stops us from doing so many things. When we set out to try something new, or go after what we want, we don’t know the outcome, we know what we want the outcome to be, but we never know exactly what’s going to happen, or if it’s going to happen just the way we envisioned it, in fact, it probably won’t. So knowing that, we use that an excuse not to chase after those things, but we should. We should always run after the things that inspire us, challenge us, excite us, nourish us, support us, and just make us feel good, go after all of those things, and by go I mean run, go get them, grab them, work for them, and never make excuses for them. When you get a no, still go, when you trip and fall, keep going, when you think you can’t go anymore, keep going, I didn’t say running into the tornado was going to be easy, that you wouldn’t get knocked down, but when you get there, in the eye of the storm and everything is moving around you, and you are just still, in the place that makes you happy, or having reached the goal you wanted, that you worked for, all of it, everything will seem so small. We build up the excuses, the reason not to in our heads, we stop ourselves from reaching our potential before we even start, so don’t give yourself the chance to, just run, run with purpose, run with passion, run with the intention to win!
Now running with total wild abandon will sometimes get us what we want, sometimes it’s just the act of running at all that is the victory, but typically there’s some footwork that needs to happen before we strap on those sneakers and get ready to bolt. It’s about setting up your foundation to succeed, all of the things I’ve talked about in my previous blogs, loving yourself, knowing and believing you deserve good, surrounding yourself with good people who love and support you, making your intentions known, asking for what you want and then diving in and getting it! Go get what’s yours, and what you want, take it, not matter how stormy the journey is, if it’s what you want it’s work fighting for.
SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you go after what you want in life? What stops you? How can you stop that from stopping you? Is what stops you a real obstacle? Or are you creating one so you don’t have to try? Or so you fail? Do you set yourself up to fail so you can continue the narrative that you are a bad person, or don’t get to have good things in your life? If you do, only you have the power to stop that story, and you can stop it. Today, take control of your story and your life, run into the tornado and go after your hopes, dreams, goals, go get them, you deserve to have the things you have worked for and have had the courage to go after, go get them all, and know that in doing so you are giving yourself the gift of trying, of fighting for you, and of honoring yourself. SLAY on.
S – self L – love A – appreciate Y – you
Slay Say
Good morning SLAYER! Staying in love with our sadness holds us in the past, when we let go and learn to live in the light we begin to see the beauty there, and the potential of what lies ahead.
New blog goes up Tuesday, until then…SLAY on!
Are You In Love With Your Sadness?
I have to admit, I was. I had a total love affair with my sadness. I loved it. Sat in it. Relished it. It was my identity, the cloak I wore to protect myself from the outside world, a cloak that I thought kept me safe, but was slowly killing me, keeping me alone, and more and more disconnected from the world around me.
I used to wear my sadness like a badge of honor, I thought it made me a martyr, that I would get up and grace anyone in the day made me a hero, that I could overcome my sadness just long enough to participate in life made me a superhero I thought. But it was all self-indulgent bullshit. My sadness was within my control. My sadness was my choice. My sadness didn’t make me a martyr, it made me prisoner, but a prisoner of my own prison, that I had made. I would tell myself I was safe there, better off there, and deserved to be there, I thought it protected me from getting hurt, but it was holding me back from living life, from exploring new things, and from moving forward from the pain of my past. Looking back it was selfish, I cheated, not only myself, but everyone in my life from getting to know the real me, from me fully being engaged in my life and theirs, and from ever opening my heart.
When I look back at those years now I feel, well, sad. I feel sad for that girl who thought she didn’t deserve better. I feel sad that she wasted so many years hiding in the darkness when she could be been shining bright in the light. I feel like I never want to go back to being that sad girl and give up what I have now.
We get to choose, we get to say who we are, and how we’re going to live our lives, and today I choose happiness, gratitude, and light, to be brave and step out of the shadows, to connect with others like me, and to challenge myself to walk tall and be proud of who I am. Sometimes that sad girl creeps back, she finds me, and sometimes she’s hard to shake off, but I’m not her anymore, that dark cloak doesn’t feel good, it doesn’t feel safe anymore, it feels dangerous, and heavy, and suffocating. Thankfully that cloak doesn’t stay on too long today, my love affair with it has long past, even though the voices in my head will tell me that’s who I am, where I belong, I know different, I feel different, so I work to leave it behind. We have the power to leave it behind. We hold the key. And that key is light, a bright shiny light. When we let our light shine that dark cloak starts to disappear, the sadness starts to disappear, and we feel the warmth of our hearts, and who we are, who we are meant to be, anything else is a lie, a lie that we tell ourselves when we are afraid and we try to romanticize the darkness to make it OK to live there.
For me it took drastic changes to lose my love of my sadness, and it was hard to start, but just by doing loving things every day, for myself and others, the cloak of sadness slowly started to slip off, it slowly lost it’s place in my life, and it slowly went away.
It takes far more courage to live in the light than to bask in the darkness of our own sadness. We as SLAYERS don’t fear the light, we don’t back down from challenges and the work it might take to have a life that have dreamed of, a life full of goodness, love, and light. It’s there for us, if we choose to take it, and if we choose to shed our sadness for something brighter.
SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you have a love affair with the sadness in your life? Is your sadness a place that you feel safe? Do you let it define you? Do you see how it can be keeping you from connecting with people and living life? What’s stopping you from letting it go? Is it worth giving up living a happy and full life to continue loving your sadness? What do you think you would gain by letting it go? Is your sadness even valid, or is it events from your past? You have the choice SLAYER to linger in your sadness, or to let it go and live your life. It’s your choice. Stand in the light and let it go, the love you may feel for it doesn’t compare to the love that is waiting for you if you let it go. SLAY on.
S – self L – love A – appreciate Y – you
Slay Say
Good morning SLAYER! For many of us, just trying to do something we haven’t done before is the victory, and in trying we may receive the gift of belief. Belief in ourselves, and the belief that we can change and become the person we want to be. It all starts with the act of just doing it.
New blog goes up Sunday, until then…SLAY on!
In The Doing, Something Happens
We’ve all heard the saying, “fake it til you make it.” It’s something I have used in the past when I’m unsure about something but know I need to find a way to accept it, or a way to do it, but sometimes people have a problem with the word “fake,” and I understand that, we as SLAYERS are meant to live as our authentic selves, so how can we do that if we are faking something? Valid point. But instead of “faking” it, why not look at it as just doing it, just doing it even if you don’t believe it will help, just doing even if you don’t know if it will work, just, well, do it. Sometimes in the act of just doing it, something happens, an understanding, a revelation, and a belief that we can. In the doing, something happens.
When I first stepped on this path, a lot of things were suggested to me that didn’t sound like anything I wanted to do, or things that seemed like they wouldn’t help. I was told to do them anyway. To go through the motions and see how I felt. It felt fake to me. I thought, if I don’t believe, or want to do this, how will this help? But it did. The things that were suggested for me did help, they helped me to get out of my comfort zone and reach out, to share my truth, to connect with other people who were also on the same path, and to give back. Give back. At a time I thought I had nothing to offer, I did, and by just doing it I realized that no matter how low I may have felt, there was someone out there that may feel lower, and might look to me for inspiration, and in just doing, I not only helped someone else, but I helped myself, and I started to believe. In the act of just doing, taking the suggestions and just doing them, miracles happened. I started to feel better, I started to have self-esteem, I started to connect with people and didn’t feel so alone, I began to see some light in the darkness. In the doing, something happened.
It’s not a matter of believing to get started, it’s merely the act itself that can bring you to believe, and sometimes, that’s all we have. For me, my life depended on me just doing it, the voices in my head were still so loud, telling me it wouldn’t work, and I just yelled back louder, “I’m going to try!” Sometimes we’re so set in our old ways, or so afraid, or so determined to fail that we don’t believe things can get better, we shoot the suggestions down before we even start, but if we can get ourselves to just begin, to inch forward, to just do it, incredible things start to happen. And, although it may feel scary, or strange, or awkward, we’ve all felt those things before, and we’ve all survived them, so push through them and SLAY on, learn to find your comfortableness in the uncomfortableness, learn to find excitement there, learn to love that feeling of being unsure but trusting it’s right, learn to believe.
Every new chapter, every victory, every new life begins with taking action, there are always a million reasons to not do something, but there are a million and one to start, that one is you, and that is the most important one. You are worth it. You matter. You can and will make a difference. Just do it. You hold the key to your own freedom, but you have to turn the key in the lock you’ve created, turn it, walk through, and set yourself free.
You don’t have to have all the answers. You don’t have to have it all figured out. It’s about taking it one moment at a time, one step at a time, one action at a time, and as you do you’ll gain momentum, you’ll gain confidence, you’ll gain freedom. All you have to do, is do.
SLAY OF THE DAY: Are there things in your life you know are good for you, or better for you, that you just don’t start? Why? What’s stopping you? What if you chose one and just did it? Just started, even if you didn’t know what the result would be? What do you think could go wrong? What do you think could go right? Do it SLAYER! Even if things don’t go as you would like them to, you still learn, and maybe within that lesson is the solution you’re looking for. But, you’ll never know unless you start. Just do it and SLAY on!
S – self L – love A – appreciate Y – you
Slay Say
Good morning SLAYER! Stay focused on what’s important, not getting distracted by wants and other people’s opinions keeps us in a state of grace and on track to SLAYDOM!
New blog goes up Friday, until then…SLAY on!
Place Importance On Important Things
We see this all the time, people in dire need of something or someone, reaching out frantically, putting up emergency posts, IN ALL CAPS, with lots of punctuation, only to find that it’s just something they want, not a necessity. Or, they make a big deal out of something that really isn’t, causing themselves anxiety, heartache, and pain needlessly because it shouldn’t be given so much weight in the first place. Or maybe we are guilty of those things. Causing drama, panic among our friends, when it really isn’t necessary. I think we all can be from time to time. We get used to something being a certain way, or we convince ourselves that it has to be one way or everything is off, or will go wrong, or something catastrophic will happen, but will it? Or are these just things we put too much importance on in our lives?
What is important? Things we need to live, food, water, family, loved ones, a roof over our heads, safety, these are some of the things that are important. For many of us, it’s easy to lose sight of what is truly important, and what we deem as important because it’s the way we want it to be, or the way we’d like to be, or because everyone else seems to have it or is going where we want to go. But what is important is not loosing sight of what really is important.
The important things in life change for all of us, but there are four simple ones that apply to everyone, and when we focus on these things, the rest fall into perspective.
Your health. Not taking care of yourself and your health will not only limit the time you have to live your life but it will impact the quality of life you have, and your ability to enjoy it and those things you love. Ultimately, your heath, mental and otherwise, is most important thing in your life, and should be protected and nourished daily, making sure you are getting what you need to thrive, grow, and live the live you want to live. Make sure you are taking care of you, in every way that you need to to be your best, most effective, useful you.
Your self-love. Finding and owning your self and loving yourself is also one of the important things in life. Self love is a major part of our foundation as human beings. It grounds us. Gives us strength. Confidence. We make stronger, better choices, because we are doing what’s best of for us, not what’s expected, or what looks good from the outside, or what will impress others, we do what works for the lifestyle we want to live, and for the people we are and who we strive to be.
Your relationships. Life is about relationships, the connections and communication we have with others, whether it be friends, family, or co-workers, invest in the relationships in your life, or, find some worth investing in. Spending time with actual people, not the computer screen or phone, getting out and connecting, socializing, doing things that you love, sharing, is what makes our lives richer, and reminds us that we are not alone, it add to our foundation and fortifies us when life gets tough, relationships teach us who we are, who we want to be, and, take us to where we want to go. All important.
Living your purpose and dreams. When we’re taking care of our own needs, finding love in ourselves, and surrounding ourselves with supportive, like-minded people, we are on track to finding out who we are and what our purpose is in life. I know for myself, it was through my journey of self-love and healing that I became aware that my purpose was to be of service to others who may be struggling, I never would have figured that out had I not found my way through the first three things on this list. When we feel good, when we feel love, and when we give love, we become open to finding a meaning in who we are, in finding a purpose and how we can be most effective. We learn what values are most important to us and how we can apply those to our dreams, or find new ones. It’s important to dream, there is a reason we are drawn to certain people, places, and things, question that, pursue that, and use the knowledge you have gained about yourself and those around you to go after your dreams and make them a reality.
Having all of these in place, it’s time to take action, and to remember, what is really important in life, it’s not the stuff, it’s not the activities you feel you’re missing out on, it’s not something only having to be one specific way, it’s your health, self-love, relationships, and your purpose and dreams, everything else is gravy, so put the importance on life on the important things and with everything else, go with the flow and let things go, you’ll be happier when you do, and, you just might learn a thing or two about you.
SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you place importance on unimportant things? Do you think everything you want and need is important? Do you see that perhaps not everything on your list is important? List the important things on your list? List the things that may not be important but are nice to have or you like to have? Do you see the difference? It’s easy to get caught up in wanting and having things, but life is actually really simple SLAYER when you allow yourself to see it that way, and when you focus on the truly important things, you’ll probably find that many of those things you would like to have may just come your way as a result of you taking care of yourself and investing in your relationships and your hopes and dreams. SLAY on.
S – self L – love A – appreciate Y – you
Slay Say
Good morning SLAYER! When we act on self-righteous anger we are in danger of hurting ourselves, and those around us. You are in charge of how you react, and who you choose to engage with. Choose wisely.
New blog goes up Tuesday, until then…SLAY on!
Slay With Me In Person
Hey SLAYER! You can SLAY with me in person this month at Modesto’s Classic Comic Con in Modesto, California October 27-29th.
Get your tickets here: Comic Con Tickets
Photographer: Bianca Dorso
