Time Travel>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Let's travel 15 years into the future! Boom......were here. I sit in the same living room as I type out this blog and can also see the young woman that I was at the time of purchasing this place. What a gift to have been able to achieve such a wonderfully small place to call my own. I have had so many great memories here that the few bad ones just fade into the dust. I love this house so much! Not so much because it's extravagant, rather because it is simplistic. It is enough. It is just right. I can't explain the contentment. It's ability to hold me safe at night, be close to all things me and yet still fit my style and continual need to change. My condo was going to be this sweet consistent tool for my life very much like my spiritual walk. Always here, always growing, changing and helping others do the same. It is an extension of me. You have to be able to get outside of any comfort zone to really understand why I can compare my faith to an actual item or space in my human life. This home represents the faith that I have as a woman. This home from the moment you arrive is set up in a way to give life, love, laughter and a bit of elegance among the status quo that is right outside. My streets are lined with the most beautiful of trees and each driveway carefully placed outside each home. Each night when I drive home from work exhausted and hangry, I am just minutes from my sweet little escape. I have loved sharing this story with so many people over the years. It's connection to me isn't like most considering it was bought at such a young age of 21 and single. It's more of me than anyone else that comes into it, but just like me, anything I have is open. I always want people to feel comfortable and welcome when they come into my house. I have felt the other side of being unwelcome and uncomfortable the entire time I was growing up or how my ex controlled how long people stayed because he couldn't let anyone in. The journey to reveal who I wanted to be started very young for me. 17 choosing my career and then moving out at 18, then buying my first house at the age of 21. Life was going so quickly. I loved every minute of it. Yet I still have this little piece of property and am as content as can be. My husband and I now have goals that include this condo one day being rented, but never sold. Never thrown away. I would never sell this place. It is not a stepping stone, rather part of the whole picture. When you have no regrets you can understand everything in your life is for a reason. If a painter were to paint my life some of the most beautiful parts would be the dark areas. Where the black and shadows change the way a person sees the Light and all it's reflection! See without it you can't understand the beauty in it's entirety. Before I knew it I was in my house and loving every minute of it. I enjoyed the hustle bustle of everyday. I knew then I was a person of structure. I love to be in control of my environment. I can arrange and rearrange and tidy and nap and just "be". It really is great when you understand your single life is as good as it gets when you're not in a relationship. You need to know who that person is before you can really represent yourself in a healthy way, and know your boundaries. It was tough for me in the beginning with my relationships because as much as I love to be single I also love to be in a relationship. Go figure. I'm a go either way. The real issue is my love language is words of affirmation and quality conversation. Since I had been neglected as a young girl and woman when it came time and of age to be able to really gauge that for myself I longed for it. I always was and am still looking for those words to see if people see what I see. The greatness that I see in life, my career and myself. For years I starved for any nurturing at all. So once I was in a position to be in a relationship I took it. Luis was someone I thought I'd never achieve. From chubby conervative to fashion forward Designer was a huge change. I was much safer in my own environment, but not for long. As is and you will see throughout the blog. The minute I settle in, someone is right around the corner waiting to ruffle my feathers.

let's be honest

I try to be honest. I mean I am honest to a fault my husband says. I have this desire to search for truth and be apart of people who tell the truth. I just love looking back on my life and sharing what was running through my head and why I so desire to share it. It shouldn't surprise you that I loved being on my own unless you have the information that I was afraid of the dark my entire childhood. The dark symbolizes a lot of things wicked or evil, nothing usually good let's put it that way. I was always so sensitive and still am til this day. So you might think I would never make it on my own. That's where the truth comes in. The truth is(based on multiple experiences throughout my life) that when you choose to love yourself and give that glory to the creator God most high, you can create an environment that has the Holy Spirit running through it. This does not mean that there won't be mistakes, sin, obstacles you get my drift. What I'm saying is you have to take into consideration that the real "Heart" of the home is where the warm and inviting nature comes in. I never felt like when I was growing up we could take anyone inside and talk to them about whatever they were going through without a judgement of what we really thought once they left. I am not naive in thinking that people don't talk.

Old habits are hard to break.

They may be hard to break but they are not impossible to conquer. I was learning the hard way that no matter what new thing you put in front of your face, you still need to deal with what is not right for your life. I had made mistakes and I am grateful that I learned from them, but do not be confused about the fact that I needed guidance and support just like anyone. It was a hard road, taking steps even my own parents hadn't taken. I never heard their dreams about what they had wanted to be, on the contrary I heard how they had never achieved the dreams they had for themselves before they met. I do not need to unravel every yucky thing about that, but we do need to understand that it isn't easy to just take a step you've never actually seen or heard anyone take. If it was that easy to acquire information for our lives, we wouldn't need parents or schooling to learn what is basic essential needs. I was continually taking steps ahead without looking back and moving through life so quickly that often people would describe me as a bull in a china closet or "she moves at a thousand miles an hour". What does that stuff mean anyway? The people around me sensed something in me that they could only describe as a speed not a way of thinking. I have had few people that I could identify with which made it hard to trust people with my questions. I definitely didn't feel like my parents wanted me to achieve. We did not have family dinners where everyone sat down and talked about how we were going to be healthier, wealthier and wise by the following year(sigh). My dream conversations. I was trying to kick the Luis thing. I missed the drama on some level but didn't understand why. I was slowly peeling back the layers of my brain to reveal I liked controlling things. I thought if I could control his actions maybe he would notice life actually got better and choose to live like I did. Maybe he would even find God in the process because he wanted so badly to be with me. Not so much. That's just not how relationships work. I had no basis of information for what a REAL relationship looked like. All I had was the dysfunction that I had been raised in which allowed me to know what NOT to do. So why not try this route? I mean think about it. I wasn't trying to hide that he was messed up, or that he needed to change to find the Lord, I just wanted to see if you could really talk someone into changing. I crack up reading the words I type now because it's so trivial to think talking to someone could genuinely change them. THEY HAVE TO WANT TO CHANGE. The key to understanding was that my loneliness was linked to my family tree. I did believe in God, had accepted salvation for my self and wanted to be a great person. Along the way I hit obstacles that revealed a lot of the trouble that I ran into was because we had made a mockery of God's design. We had not been accountable to submit to God's will in our lives or to be intentional about all things. More importantly the things we were hiding and not working on were things like food, debt, laziness, separation, silent treatment, disrespect, & lies. I could go on and on and on about what we were doing as a family but that's not the real point. It would not have mattered exactly what we were dealing with but how we went about it because we claimed CHRIST. I'm just glad that I was willing to take steps in the dark rather than stay in the wretchedness I could see clearly. I decided it would be better to go on without them than to ask them to change. I also learned along the way that even though I could make changes in my food choices, debt or how I conducted my everyday life, that does not mean anyone or everyone will come along and change with you, even if they can see it's helping you become a much happier person. I can still remember all the times that they would mock me for dating the wrong guy, but not speak on the subject that it takes time to learn what is the right guy, and how to behave like the right girl. It was always perplexing to me that you could pick on your own kin rather than build them up and teach them to come along side of one another and to hold each other in great reverence. I am still on that journey today. To reveal why we do things in our families that bring no good outcomes, and yet we seem to trudge on as if we can not see it.

Welcome mat

I'd like to think the welcome mat at one time meant just that. Welcome. I was a bit naive in thinking that once you move into a home that everyone you know will rush to see what success has become you. Not so much. Was it that I was young? A good five years ahead of my peer group didn't help any. I had managed to welcome people right out of my life. It wasn't that I tried it or anything. I just naturally learned to be independent from others. I never even thought it could be that I was an oldest child or that my job created an independent thinking in me. I had to stand behind the chair and help lead another person down a road of style and definition. I loved that my work had me surrounded by people all day long, that when it came time to come home, peace and quiet was all I needed. I really only made friends at the gym I went to. It was great to go and connect with people there that had a common interest with me to keep their chub in check. I was still on the path to defining my shape. I went every day to unwind and see the cute boys. No lie there, I was a goner when it came to muscles. The only thing I think I had in comparison was my love for Pizza. Go figure. I was always beaming when I walked through the doors. I was so eager to become someone and to change my life. It was written right on my sleeve. I was always chatty at the door where you checked in and soon became friends with the managers. I would soon learn I had a fond interest in the step classes. I would fly across those steps like I was meant for dancing. It was intense to hear everyone's feet hitting the floor and to see us all glistening from the sweat running down our faces. You were soaked by the time you were done. You worked out every bit of stress a girl could have by the end of class. I loved the high you got from pushing yourself. It was an incredible feeling to be a part of something outside of work. It was great we were all welcome to be right beside each other. It wasn't like we all knew one another like best friends, but it didn't matter. We came there to have fun and that's what we did. I still long for that part of society to catch up with the rest of the world. The kind of welcome that we have when we all have something in common. We create our own kind of families that learn to have fun in a room full of different expectations. It was an incredible part of my life and I'll never forget how I felt. I wanted that feeling to be something that I gave to others every day for the rest of my life. I didn't always manage this. in part due to the fact that I hadn't factored in the haters that would almost make it impossible for me to give my best. I guess I was under the assumption that everyone would "welcome" me. I was going to learn the hard way that was not the case. I hadn't learned yet that I was going to have to make them feel welcome first. I have this intense personality that leaves one of two options. Love me or Hate me. Take your pick. Don't worry, over the years I've learned to harness that intensity and on some level accept that it's who I am. I just had this rosy colored outlook that if I was welcoming that people would be welcoming back. I have come to understand that my belief and faith in Jesus Christ had set me apart from others. Oh! Not on the sin level or anything. No I was just as much a sinner as everyone else. I mean in a bigger picture sort of way. I saw and still see life as welcoming. I am still desiring every day to be pleasant and super friendly to everyone I meet. I just believe that my ability to feel the presence of God allows me to understand my value in life isn't hinged on what things we have in this life rather who we spend it with and how. People have always been the most important thing to me. As my journey would continue and still does today, I would come to understand that my ability to talk to anyone would then have me witnessing one on one with people on a daily basis. I am still searching for that perfect world where everyone's welcome mat means just that. WELCOME.

house or home?

A house is a structure of walls, a home is what lives inside those walls. I was looking for something special when I bought my house. I eventually wanted to turn it into a home with laughter inside of it and love growing in it each and every day. I had a long way to go considering that I had grown up in a home where the attitude was to persuade the people who entered that we were great people that had everything together. BUNK. My parents had a hard time allowing people to see the truth. They assumed that if people saw what we were struggling with then they would think poorly of us. We rarely remained friends with people for too long because we couldn't let anyone in. My parents hadn't cultivated a relationship where there was much in common other than remaining alive for the day and where those people chose to rest their heads after said day. The address was what made them victim to the same environment each and every day. I swore to myself I would not create such a place for me to rest at the end of each long day and call it a "HOME". MORE LIKE A HELL HOLE IF YOU ASK ME. There's nothing worse than being a victim to a place where no one believes in the power of working things out. I started out with just one kitty cat in my new place so there wasn't an abundance of life running around, and since I didn't have much furniture there wasn't much to piss on & destroy while I was at work. My cat hadn't been neutered and was still able to mark his territory. He didn't like it too much that I wasn't home much. Little did he know that was my life from here on out. As a stylist there's never much time at home at all. You're always meeting the need of someone else above your own. I am an extreme people person and desire to make people feel good and most importantly feel like they can open up and talk any thing through. It's special to do someone's hair and all the while talk life and work it through to another level of intimacy in the community. But....when I came home there was something that I wanted. Something I wanted to discover, to be a part of and maybe that was family, maybe it was that I really needed a roommate or even that I needed to be able to be home without any expectation of my own about what it should be or feel like. The minute you get in your head that you need something money is bound to be spent, maybe not in large lump sums, but spent. I wasn't strong enough to fight the urge to walk around the local Walmart at the other end of town, after work late at night and gather up whatever I thought I needed to make things work at home for me. I started to rack up debt on my credit card that I had and soon it became my go to piece to swipe out of my purse to cover the needs I had. I was always aware just how much I was putting on credit and every time I used it, it hurt inside where no one else could see. It never kept me from using it. I can remember buying shoes for the gym on it and swiping the $165 for the white Nike shocks that I thought I so needed to be cool and uber workouty at my gym later that week. I ended up paying 7 times what I paid for them originally when it was all said and done 5 years later when I wanted to pay my credit card off and never again own one. Yes, you saw it correctly. In a total of 5 years I had managed to rack up debt that had accumulated to $10,000 at 30% interest each pay period. The interest kept growing as the total had not been added to. I was racking up debt to the tune of $250 a month. Some people don't pay that for a car payment. I was sunk. Or it felt like it. I was putting things on my credit card that I did not need to survive yet I continued to purchase them anyway. This is the time in my life that I wish I had saved that money and just learned to understand not all feelings needed to be acted on, rather I should have tried to fill that void with giving back instead of finding more trouble for myself. I began to feel connected to the spending, as if it was a part of me. I needed to go back into counseling to figure out what exactly was my issue with my choices. I naturally paid cash for my counseling visits and asked her what could make a girl like me, that was so head strong, struggle to make the right choices when I could see the outcome so clearly in my head??? I wanted the rational side of things to be stronger than the emotional side of things. I wanted to act in a way that allowed me to be in control of my choices. I wanted to behave in a way where men and money were not my go to. I would eventually beat the battle of the debt and men but it wouldn't be for a few more years. I would learn in the end to control my spending and to not act on every urge I had just because my age was telling me I had interest to buy things. I value now not purchasing everything I see or pick up. At the time it was par for the course to learn my behavior was coming from a side of me that had not been mentored or developed to see all the choices and all the consequences. I am grateful for the hardships I was going through because they have made me the women I am today. I just wish I would have been able to discover her before the consequence of $1500 payments a month on my debt became my reality......

Work Harder

I had learned to work harder but not smarter. I was unable to gather the intensity I had in my personality to understand I did not need to work harder. I needed to work smarter. The same remains true today as I run my own business and love doing so. I enjoy the time I get to spend with my clients and I love to do hair. I always have. I just needed to learn the lesson that I was going to have to work much much much more intentionally NOT to just work. I needed to also include in my growing up process that I had to learn not to spend. The spending was what was continually causing me to need to work. YOU can laugh but that's our society today as a whole. We want things so we buy them and then we become victims to not having large sums of money saved to retire on. Now why is it so hard to turn off the desire to buy? That's easy enough to answer. It is what our faith is based on. When we are on a tough journey especially in our 20's we are trying to define ourselves through work and things. It is difficult to turn all of that off to worship a Christ we have never seen. I am not giving myself any excuses. I am just totally aware of what was happening to me back then. I was having a difficult time learning how important it was not to "want" things. I wish I could have applied the same innocent fear of running out of money to myself at an older age. I knew better when I first moved out. I had nothing to compare it to. The minute I stepped outside of my parents rule I had to learn that I had to come with the money to survive. So I didn't NEED so much then. I just needed the basics. I can actually survive on less. I am more content on less. I was coming into an age where those innocent feelings were no longer what was the strongest. In my experience by the time I bought my house I had 3 years under my belt to see I hadn't run out of money and I was always able to work harder and make more. I haven't run out since. I was always able to catch my buying habits with cash. If there is one lesson I could teach my younger self it would be to save half of what I actually spent. I would go back and reason with her and explain to her that even though she felt something, it would have been better to figure out another way to acquire the things I wanted without spending so much money. I am not angry that I was that kind of young woman back then. I am not bitter over the money I have spent even when I shouldn't have. I am not embarrassed about the things I did incorrectly. I am accepting of those things and I have chosen to live differently now. I am very much aware there was so much learning on my end that hadn't happened yet. It was going to take me a few years before I realized my spending was linked to the lessons I wasn't taught as a child or teenager. I was still trying to find out whether or not those "things" really mattered at all. As you will learn spending money is easier than NOT spending money. WHY? I mean if we are really in control of what we are doing then why is it much harder to go without? Here pivots a huge changing point in my life where I learned I was not at a place to go without. I racked up debt on a credit card because not having "things" in my life was more important to me than paying for it with cash. I needed to learn a hard lesson that the only thing I ever truly needed was Jesus.

"DEBT"

I had started out the first couple years of my life not using anything but cash....cold hard cash. When I had moved into the apartment in our nearby town I put a couch set and coffee table on layaway where they allowed me to make $19 payments on them until I had paid it in full. I mean let that sink in a bit. I made payments while sitting on the floor or just using my bed as a way to have a table. I realized early on that everything in a house makes sense when a family is in the HOME. I was just one person always working and didn't really have time to invest yet in having people over. I had paid everything off, and moved my furniture in to my apartment just a few short months later and it was perfect. SO what happened when I bought my house? I guess you could say the age old tale of "everyone's doing it" set in. I was 21 years old with the rest of my life ahead of me. I mean what could possibly go wrong? I wasn't married yet, I didn't even have a roommate to live with, I wasn't sharing any responsibilities. I was handling it all on my own. I had no idea the thought process would change as I got older and expected myself to have things I hadn't actually earned yet. The undertone of "things" in our lives is hard to fight when you have nothing left to hold onto. I didn't have the family strength behind me pushing me to be better, if anything I had the grumbling of when is she going to fail and run home to beg to be taken back. WHEN HELL FREEZES OVER. I have learned so much over the years about what "DEBT" is and what it isn't. It mirror images where your relationship with the Lord really is. It has taken on many faces throughout the years but one thing remains true. If you allow it in your life it will change everything. If you accept the challenge to face your wants and needs with money you will be a happier person in the end. EVERY DOLLAR YOU SPEND IS A DECISION YOU MADE, IT DOES NOTHING WITHOUT YOUR SAY SO. I moved into the cutest neighborhood around town. I have an eye for what is and what is to come. I can see the surrounding elements and know it will be the prime location. I chose wisely. 15 years later where I live is almost impossible to buy into. It's the prime location. I wanted my place to look like how I felt inside. I wanted my sanctuary to be the kind of place anyone could come into and feel like they were welcome. I let people's perception of me get in the way of making the best decisions for my life. I decided to put things on a credit card instead of paying CASH. I had to go down this road to understand what types of changes can happen when you decide to spend money you do not have for items you don't necessarily need. Like a new pair of Nike's, a blanket or wicker hamper set. You laugh but spending $100's here and there adds up and at the end of a month you don't have enough money to pay the bills and the debt on the credit card. I wasn't good at managing what I was making. I thought I could just earn more money and pay it off in the long run. It's not far off from what most people think like today. I wasn't unaware that earlier in my life when I was just starting out I was much more in control of what I really needed versus what I wanted. I was careful in the beginning and now I hadn't become careless as to how much I wanted and why. It's the intention to always be in control of what you're spending and what you're making because you care to control your appetite for greed. I wasn't walking with God in a tangible way. I was more interested in controlling things my own way, hoping my age and relationships in the future could help undo anything I had not been in control of. How stupid. I mean come on, let's get real here. I was hoping to become a woman who would be in control of her debt while also being the woman who had made the decisions about accumulating the debt and then miraculously find my new, in control self????? It's not that silly considering that isn't that what we all do when we throw caution to the wind? Or what we're really saying is the debt is not ours to control, to payback, to accept, to manage, or to wipe out. Then who's responsibility is it? See I was learning a very valuable lesson at a young age. If it was so easy to just not put things on a credit card it would be the same as cutting the card up and not allowing it to exist in your purse to begin with. It would be wiser to say save the money first then see if the desire or more importantly the need is still there when the time comes you're able to purchase it. At the age of 21 you're not interested in patience or waiting to see if that desire is selfish or greedy. It's a time in your life where it is extremely hard to be in control and wanting for nothing. I am grateful to have gone through so many different facets of money in the 3 decades I've been alive, and I'll go through more until my last breath. The story doesn't end there. It was a long 2 years of buying what ever I wanted and doing exactly what I wanted while slowly climbing the debt ladder to my credit card limit line. Some of you do not know where the limit is and the card will allow you to believe you have a "LIMIT" that is preset for your life existence. No. The limit is a lie. It will devour you. While you try to pay down what you've already spent and bought that is long gone and used up, your new day desires and requirements will continue to nag at you. You will need to be in control of your money over night while paying back years of unwarranted spending. It doesn't get easier until you decide to turn off the lie.

First time home buyer

I can see it in my head now.....the moment when I realized there was a new condo development going in on one of the main drags near my hometown. It was a road I knew well and I wanted so badly to live in a location that wasn't over top of the salon anymore. People think it is great when you're in a service industry to be so close to your workplace but I was finding it can also lead to more issues with boundaries. You're always expected to work if you're that close. There's no separation from your job and it was time for another change in my life. I was good at talking to my father if my timing was right.(What I really mean is when my mother wasn't in the same room) I approached him about helping me try my hand at home ownership, remember this is the same man who didn't want me to move into an apartment. I was desperate for a sounding board to help me with direction. I hadn't saved enough money but I did own my car and it was worth $40,000 so they let me check out one of their smaller models on the ground floor of the development. I fell in love. I instantly knew it was a great place for me to live and I just lucked out that one of the corner units was available. I started to dream big and just had to work harder at moving on with my life now that Luis wasn't around to influence me in any way. I guess I sort of always knew I was a mover and a shaker. I mean I always need something to be focusing on or doing to feel like I'm worth something. It doesn't really matter to me what I'm doing as long as it is something to reach for. It never fails with me if it isn't a boy it's a project. I had my parents help on this one oddly enough, they lent me money to get started with my house and I needed it. This was one of those moments where God allows people into your life to help take you to your next level of your life journey. It wasn't so much that my parents "wanted" this for me but they didn't stand in my way. It was refreshing to say the least. I've had a lot of people share with me that I was always the type who seemed likely to move away from home. I don't seem to fit the mindset of the people around me. I never thought about leaving just putting distance between me and the obscene amount of control. I wanted to serve my hometown. I never wanted to leave and give up. I was and am a stone's throw away and yet it can be like I am 50 states away. I found out very quickly I had nothing in common with the family I was born into. I mean how does that happen? I had a feeling it was because our identity was in portraying a picture we hadn't actually drawn. We were so into making it look like everything was okay that it became overwhelming to let anything real come in. We still don't know how to deal with insecurities. I was finding out that although I loved projects, it didn't keep me from finding new levels of my own insecurities. I had more layers to uncover in myself and learn to develop new ways of dealing with fears and how to approach them. I didn't have the help from my parents because neither one of them knew what it was like to buy a home all by yourself. I think back now and the jealousy and almost bizarre disconnection my mother had to me since the day I signed the papers gives me a keen insight to how hard life must have been for her. Every step I was taking she had no idea what it was like or what it felt like and that left an even bigger hole between us. It seemed the gap was getting bigger between my parents and I and there was no turning back.

Goal!

After Luis, what was there for me? I had just spent the last 2 years of my life trying to stay out of trouble with my job, parents, church, and boyfriend. I wasn't exactly hitting the goal I had for myself to be "AWESOME". On some level I was doing great. I just wasn't getting the pat on the back that I was. There was no getting around the issue of growing up and having to try my hand at not picking the right boyfriends, or doing everything there is to please your parents(there was no pleasing them). How about being perfect at cutting hair? I wasn't half bad actually. I managed to make enough people happy all the time that cutting hair was the easiest thing I did. Imagine.........right now standing behind a chair, a client coming in and you needing to make all their dreams come true by cutting on a round surface all in half an hour. Yes. That was the easiest thing in my life. Hmmmmm. I was missing something. Yes. A NEW GOAL. I always had in my mind goals to meet like, losing weight. No I lie. It was not to gain weight, while I was still trying to figure out how the heck you get this bulge off. Oh gosh, how did I get out of bed each day? There were other goals like to own a home, start my own salon... LOL Like I said I look back now and I was doing a pretty good job despite not having others around me be goal oriented. I was reaching for the surrealism. I was looking at tomorrow with rosy colored glasses. No I mean it, I really had rosy colored glasses. I needed more direction for my goal. It needed to be about finding the best "me". The goal of "me". Doesn't that sound nice? It isn't that easy to start or finish, I tell you. I really thought I had started to figure out that goal when I was dating. I started to feel differently about myself. You know what I'm talking about. Like I had something. I mean really something. I started to feel more alive and more able to push through anything because someone was there for me at the end of the day. Not always literally there but more in essence. I wasn't worthless. No not at all, it's just until I had a boyfriend I didn't feel like I was valuable. I felt not important. I didn't feel like I was made for something amazing based on what my family life had been like. I mean I had already pushed through the humdrum of the school years and picked my career even though my own mother didn't think I had it in me. I had then found a job and started to earn a fantastic income but not one person would tell me anything positive based on what I was accomplishing. I then began a journey to slough off the extra chub and no one even refilled my water bottle. (just a joke) What the heck world???? I then finally get some feed back from a boy that I'm not invisible and I can have what I want and it's all smoke and mirrors. Was it all for nothing to have a goal to be attractive (feel attractive) and get a boyfriend? No. I just didn't have it in the right frame of mind. I was still trying to fill all the gaps from my childhood with my young adult years and to explain it in laymen's terms they needed 2 different sets of understanding and valuable data to work synergistically. I was trying to grow without the right information in my brain. It's a little like growing a garden without all the nutrition in the soil. Oh you'll grow some things, but mostly weeds. I just needed the right nutrition for myself before I started filling in all the gaps with all the wrong goals. Life was a bitch. Excuse my honesty. My twenties belong in a novel. It's much better when read over a period of hours rather than lived one painful minute after painful minute over a period of ten years. Now there isn't enough money in the world to have me relive them. Isn't that the truth though. Once we've gone through something there isn't many of us who've had such an easy peezy ride. It's the reality of life. Living it once was E. nough. I am not complaining or venting. Rather a sharing of what the Goal of "me" has looked like over time. I managed to get through the break up with Luis relatively unharmed for the moment. More bruised. I now needed to focus on the future me. This girl needs a new goal. Sounds like a good time to buy a house.

There's no denying my intrigue

When it comes to different cultures I am hooked. I love to hear and smell all the different kinds of music and foods that other cultures have. I was exposed to so much after high school that opened up a whole new door of possibilities for me. I wasn't even aware that I was into other cultures until beauty school came around. I am so taken by the slants of the eyes or the way the bone structure is set up. I loved seeing the differences among the similarities. I was pulled in right away when I left work in a small structured town to a huge melting pot of different cultures at the gym. It was as soon as you walked in you were overwhelmed by the intense modge-podge of ethnic backgrounds. I was in love. The only way to describe it is like a kid in a candy store. I wasn't particularly attracted to any one type. I liked it all. I have always been sensitive to seeing everything all at one time as if my sense of sight is like an X-men super power. I desired the intensity one look at a time. Have you ever been that real with yourself that you can describe what goes on in that noggin? I mean really comprehend what comes over the human body that allows us to develop an understanding of who we are at the core of our thoughts. I am enthralled by the younger version of me, (which really was held back for so long) finding out what I liked and didn't like about different types of ethnic backgrounds came late in my life. God forbid I had been taught anything outside of going to school and church. I was thrown into fending for myself at such a young age that whether I liked it or not my ability to have too much to choose from just offered up more fun for "ME". I am 35 now and when I look back at how innocent my thoughts were at the age of 21 I also see how easily I was set up to fail. Not because any one person, my parents or mentors had control over me. No, because I wasn't taught to love myself in a healthy way. Above all else, to keep myself healthy so that I could take that healthy vibrant woman to everyone I met. Life isn't about control. It's about connection. To connect to the mind & body, then to learn to make decisions based on learning the best of those things. Sure I would have made mistakes and I did. It wouldn't have come out of spite or ignorance. (That's the whole key right there) You can fight me all you want on the subject, but my mission now is to offer up what I've experienced in my life time about 6 months ahead of schedule for someone like my step son, who is about to go through similar situations. Now he has someone he can honestly say has offered up some sort of concept of what he is about to face as his body grows, he develops sexually, he is learning his interests etc.. I don't just wait til the situation arises, I offer up a gentle awareness for him so he doesn't step into something that would force him to be secretive or ashamed. I want him to know he isn't alone. I want him to know there's a process to everything and a reason for fighting the urge to live in secret or shame. To come up out of that undertone of our society and to work against the confusion. The only way to truly learn about yourself is to make a mistake but to also have the opportunity to have someone talk you through it. Have open communication for learning purposes. I love the conversations I have with this young vibrant boy, who any minute now will be walking the young teen years with me. I know what it was like not knowing how to handle all the changes in my body or my mind. I will always offer up my experience first so he knows there's someone out there who cares about how he may or may not feel. It's life changing when you spend time being introspective for the sole purpose of sharing what you've learned with others. My life has changed into a proactive plan as opposed to a reactive plan. I want to be intentional to think before I do. You might sit there and think as adults we all do that or you feel bad for me that I do not. Hello! Our entire country is in need of proactive thought, so there's no way more of us are thinking before we are doing. No no....We need an over haul in families to see the value of a human being the minute they are born. The human being is valuable to us all. Not just the immediate family structure. We need to be taught everything has an outcome. So when we are making decisions, it has long term affects that can come to haunt us in the future..... I saw the world with rose colored glasses and enjoyed the growth of my twenties. I look back on that decade with delight. It wasn't always a delight to go through it but it's entirety is beautiful. I am seeing my thirties in a similar light. Each day isn't easy to accomplish every goal you've set, or to be intentional to do all that is on your to do list. I just hope that as I look back on my thirties one day I'll have the same satisfaction I do over my 20's. I'm only half way through. Stay tuned.