Good morning SLAYER! You can close your eyes to things you don’t want to see, but you can’t close your heart to things you don’t want to feel.
New blog goes up Tuesday, until then…SLAY on!
State Of Slay
Feeling Your Feelings
Before stepping on this path I never wanted to feel. Good, bad, anything. It hurt too much to feel the bad, and I didn’t think I deserved the good. So I looked for ways to stuff down my feelings, to quiet them, or if I could, numb them all together. I lived like that for the first 35 years of my life. When I think about all the things I was supposed to be feeling in those 35 years it makes me sad, because for the most part, I didn’t allow myself to feel any of it. I also didn’t share those feelings with anyone, so they just got stuffed down, feelings on top of feelings in a big heap I tried to bury as deep as I could. If anyone asked me how I was, I would always respond with, I’m fine, I wasn’t, and even that lie generated feelings I had to stuff down. The more I did it, the easier it got, but it always weighed me down as I dragged those unfelt feelings around with me and tried to pretend like they weren’t there.
When I made a commitment to get better I was also making a commitment to feel. That was scary. I had spent my whole life running away from my feelings, and now, having taken away everything I used to use to cover up my feelings I felt like I was standing alone completely vulnerable to a lifetime of pain that was coming at me like a giant tsunami and I wasn’t prepared. But what that taught me was how to get prepared. Making sure I had as many life rafts as possible, so when that wave hit, I had places to go for safety. I found that in counseling, support groups, new friends who were walking the same path, and old friends who knew me and my history, and, I found a spirituality that worked for me, that I began to find comfort in, and eventually guidance. It was hard to feel, at first, and because I had stuffed down so much for so long, it all came at me at once. Loss, grief, betrayal, disappointment, hurt, shame, abandonment, truth. All of that and more came at me, so much so there were days I didn’t want to get out of bed, and held on to my mattress to make sure I wouldn’t get blown away by the force of those waves.
I made it through that storm. It took time. And sometimes I did get knocked down by the waves, but I learned to get back up. And each time I did I got stronger, and I was better able to work through my feelings. I used to have trouble feelings things in the moment , a dear of mine would often tell me I had emotional jet lag, I wouldn’t’ feel things as they were happening, from all the years of not letting myself feel, there was a delay, from the event or moment itself, to when I actually felt it. That delay has lessened a lot, and today I do feel things when they happen, most of the time, there are still times when I don’t, and now I just observe those times and look into why I may be trying to protect myself from my feelings, and why I’ve held my feelings back.
I am proud today that I feel things in the moment. And if that brings up emotion, even in public, that’s OK. I am allowed to have feelings, no matter what they are, and I honor myself, and who I am, when I do. It’s OK to have feelings. And it’s OK to share those feelings. Because when we do they connect us to other people who also feel, and may just be feeling what you’re feeling, and when that happens, there is no better feeling in the world. SLAY on!
SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you allow yourself to feel? In not, why not? What scares you about your feelings? Have you been told not to feel? Have you stuffed down your feelings so deep that you can’t access them anymore? Do you do things to keep them stuffed own? What do you do to not feel? What if you stopped doing those things that stop you from feeling? What do you think would happen? What if you let yourself feel SLAYER, what if you made sure it was safe, found the support and guidance you need, and let yourself feel. You deserve to let go of your past and feel true feelings, and let those feelings connect you to others who feel just like you, allowing you to not feel so alone and able to be your true self in any given moment. Feel it SLAYER, let yourself feel it.
S – self L – love A – appreciate Y – you
Slay Say
Good morning SLAYER! It’s not what happens to you that determines your future, it’s what you do about it.
New blog goes up on Sunday, until then…SLAY on!
This Isn’t Who I Am, But It’s Who I’ve Become In This Moment
I know this feeling all too well. I remember thinking this when things got really dark. When the self-hatred overtook the light that used to burn inside of me. I didn’t like who I was, I didn’t like to look at the person staring back at me in the mirror, and I knew that wasn’t me, but what I’d become. When you’re staring at yourself from that place, the journey back seems impossible, to far to travel, you don’t like where you are, but fear you’ve gone too far the other way to make it back, to return to the you you once where. Or maybe you never knew who you were, or never liked that person either. So the journey then is more about self-discovery, to places you’ve never been, and that alone may paralyze you and keep you right where you are.
But going back to knowing this isn’t who you are. How did you get here? What lead you to this place? And why isn’t this place you? These are questions we need to answer. It’s easy, sometimes, when we make small concessions each day, to slowly lose ourselves, let ourselves slip away to something that may seem easier, or look better, or may be the promise of something new. But when we let who we are slip away, slowly and slowly we lose sight of who we really are, and what we deserve. We start to think we deserve this place, the place we find ourselves in, and we try to convince ourselves we’re OK there, even though we know we’re not. It seems easier to stay than to fight and get out, so we stay, sometimes for many years, sometimes a lifetime. And each time we stay when should go, a little part of us dies there, until one day, maybe we can’t get out, or can’t see the light we used to have inside of us. That is why it’s always important to stay true to who you are, what you desire and what you can take action on. And always take that action when you can. It’s much harder to fight your way back when you’ve gone too far. I was lucky enough to have done that, many years ago, to find that little spark of light inside of me and fight my way back, it took a lot of work, and it took many years, but here I am.
This statement now has a different meaning for me, if I’ve become something else in the moment, and it isn’t who I was, it is now a positive thing. It now means, for me, that I’ve surpassed where I was and have moved on to the next version, the 2.0 version, well, it’s probably more than 2.0 at this point, but you get the idea. That statement can also be used be positive once you’ve started to live as your authentic self and continue to push yourself to grow and expand who you are and the world around you. You know I’m one to always look for the positives in life, and this is an example of just that. I’ve had moments over the past 12 ½ years of being on this journey that have surprised me, I’ve surprised myself in who I am in a moment, because even I didn’t know I was capable of something, or of becoming someone so much bigger than who she was, or even imagined could be in terms of my capacity to love and give back. It’s amazing what you’ll find if you always make sure to stay true to yourself, to stand strong and fight for you.
It’s important to know who we are, otherwise we won’t know when we’ve lost what we’ve had, we may feel off, or different, and that can give us a sign we’re off course, but when we truly know who we are, and know we don’t feel like we are, it’s a sign to get to work and to get back to that place that lets our hearts shine. It’s also, on the flip side, a great marker for when we’ve exceeded who we were to become the beautiful people we are today. SLAY on!
SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you have a strong sense of who you are? Do you like who you are? Is that who you are today? If not, why not? How do you get back to who you are? How did you get lost? What choices did you make to get yourself there? Or have you noticed the opposite, that because of your choices and hard work that you’ve exceeded surpassed who you were to be who you are today? What changes have you noticed? What do you love about who you are today? What else can you do to keep feeding that journey, that path you’re on to becoming an even better brighter version of yourself? Who are you in this moment? Is that person who truly are? Or do you have work to do to reclaim your true self? Find that place again SLAYER and use that as a launching pad to take you to places you have only imagined. SLAY on!
S – self L – love A – appreciate Y – you
Slay Slay
Good morning SLAYER! You are the author of your own story, don’t like the story, change the narrative.
New blog goes up Friday, until then…SLAY on!
Slay Say
Good morning SLAYER! Your negative thoughts may be the only thing holding you back from becoming who you are meant to be. Look for the good in everything, and let go anything that stands in your way.
SLAY on!
Don’t Believe Everything You Think
I’ve done enough work on myself to know my thoughts don’t always speak the truth. They lie to me. My thoughts, when left on their own to run wild, always run to the negative side. They always have. And I used to believe them. Thought they told me the truth. But I know today that they don’t. They don’t want me to succeed. They want to keep me isolated. Alone. So they can continue to talk to me without interruption. And my thoughts, without any interruption, are dangerous, and very nearly, cost me my life.
It’s why it’s important to share with others. To let out what you’re thinking. Not only so it loses it’s power over you, but also so you can have a sounding board, and some feedback from someone else who can listen to those thoughts of yours and tell you if they’re telling the truth or not.
Why do your thoughts betray us? Why would we betray ourselves? Why would we not want the best for ourselves and encourage ourselves? You would think we would, but all too often that negative bullshit committee starts up and tries to tear us down, but here’s the secret…we have the power to stop it.
I didn’t know that my own thoughts were my enemy until I made a commitment to get better. I thought my problems were all outside things and once I changed my habits and my lifestyle those negative thoughts would go away. Well, that didn’t happen, in fact, they got louder because I had taken away all of things I used to self-medicate and numb and quiet those voices. So once those were all gone, those voices got louder. So, how did I counter that noise? By making peace with my past. By learning to love myself. By sharing those thoughts and ideas with others, who then shared theirs with me. By replacing all those bad habits with good ones. And by doing all of those things and building self-esteem. When I started to feel good about myself those voices got quieter, they didn’t have as much to say. And when they did pipe up, I had something to counteract those voices as I started making better choices, healthier choices, for myself. Now, that’s not to say that sometimes they don’t pop in from time to time, they do, but they don’t stay long, and, if they do start to chatter, it’s usually a sign that I need to be doing some work on something, or, need to take better care of myself, because when I’m doing good things and making sure I’m getting what I need, I don’t hear those voices.
Our thoughts can be our own worst enemies. They can destroy things for us even before we’ve started. So knowing that, make sure you are armed and ready when your thinking tries to take over and take away an opportunity, or destroy something really great in your life, don’t listen to them. And, as I always say, look at the facts. What do you know to be true? Start there, and you may just find that those voices don’t have the volume they once did. Take action, do things for yourself that you love, that shows yourself love, that shows those around you love. Those acts keep those voices quiet. Love is the counterattack to those voices and keeps them at bay. Don’t believe everything you think because what you’re thinking is probably a lie. One meant to keep you from who and where you are meant to be. SLAY on!
SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you have negative chatter in your head? Do you believe that chatter? What does it tell you? Why do you think it’s the truth? What are the facts to back up your belief? What if you stopped listening to them? What if you did the opposite of what they’re telling you? What if you stopped believing them? What if you did so many loving things for yourself that you no longer heard them? You can SLAYER, you can. Stop listening to those voices in your head, nothing good ever came from that anyway, listen to your heart, ask it what it wants, and go get it, that is a sure-fire way to put a muzzle on those negative thoughts.
S – self L – love A – appreciate Y – you
Slay Say
Good morning SLAYER! Sometimes what you are most afraid of is the very thing that will set you free.
New blog goes up Tuesday, until then…SLAY on!
Walk Up From The Basement
We forget sometimes that we have the power to walk away from a situation that no longer serves us, or maybe never did. We don’t have to stay down in the basement. In the dark. We can walk up those stairs and live the life we want, have dreamed of, and truly deserve.
We sometimes keep ourselves in the dark, thinking we deserve to be there, or don’t deserve any better, but we are the only ones who our holding ourselves back, we are the ones telling ourselves those lies that prevent us from finding our own happy ending, or maybe beginning, but finding our happy. It’s out there for the taking, but you have to have the courage to take it.
Before walking on this path I lived in the basement of my own life. And I was the only one in the house! No one was keeping me down there except myself. And I had lived there so long that I couldn’t remember living anywhere else. I didn’t like it there, but it was what I knew. I told myself it was safer there, even though I felt alone there. I thought I deserved to live in the darkness, where it was cold and damp. It clung to me when I tried to step into the light, like it was reaching out for me from the shadows, and I would let it pull me back down, retreating from the world and from my true self. I played the victim and would say that I didn’t deserve good things because I was a bad person. I wasn’t a bad person, I just wasn’t being good to myself. And didn’t believe in myself.
When I finally found the courage to reach out for help, I was told that my recovery, the improvement of my life, was in my hands, that I had the power to change, and I was the only one with the key to unlock the door and step out into the light. It had never occurred to me that I had that key. I used to blame everyone else, or just the world in general, for my life in the basement, but it was me who kept me down there all along. And once I had realized that it was my job to come up those stairs and live the life I was meant to live. Letting myself come up from the basement was the first of many big steps. Learning how to live outside of it came next, and it wasn’t always easy, as that basement was always calling me with it’s familiarity and it’s cloak of sadness a part of me still believed felt right. Change can be difficult. But it can be done. And as I kept taking more and more steps into the light, that basement didn’t seem so appealing anymore. And that feeling of familiarity started to fade. I started to crave the light, and living in it, and eventually threw away the key that opened that basement door.
We all have a choice, ever day, where we want to live, not necessarily physically, but mentally and spiritually, but we have to believe we deserve more than we have, if what we have doesn’t fill our hearts and minds with love. We are only as stuck as we allow ourselves to be, and sure, sometimes circumstances may make it difficult to extract ourselves from our current situation, but it can be done, and if need be, there are always people out there willing to lend you a hand for a better opportunity or place you can call home. Share you truth, let go of your fears and start climbing that staircase, there’s a bright future waiting for you up there. SLAY on!
SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you keep yourself locked in the basement when you should be living your life upstairs? Why do you think you do that? What do you do to keep yourself there? What can you do to get yourself out? What do you imagine your life would look like out of the basement? Have you lived in the basement so long you’ve forgotten, or don’t know? You hold the key SLAYER to your own freedom, but first you have to believe that you deserve to be set free. You also have to let go of the lies you’ve told yourself, or maybe someone else has told you, to let yourself live freely in the light. It’s all there, what you want, what you imagined, on the other side of that basement door, you locked yourself.
S – self L – love A – appreciate Y – you
Slay Say
Good morning SLAYER! No matter how low you may feel, someone else out there feels lower, and your light, even though it may feel dim, may be as bright as the sun to someone in need. Shine bright.
New bog goes up Sunday, until then…SLAY on!
