Adult Tantrums

Okay, soooo… we’re all grown folks here, right? Right out the gate let me say this, we are just too old to be “actin’ a fool” when we don’t get our way. I say this tenderly and with love because I might be pointing a finger at you, and you and you but the truth is… I have 3 pointing back at myself. Can I tell you about the last tantrum I had?

While transitioning out of  being married to “Rico” (once Rico suave’ – not so much anymore…) That was bad, you know I’m just kidding old man, if you’re reading this. While staying at a dear sister’s apartment everyone was gone and I was home alone… just me and my disappointment which was the size and strength of a “black hole.”  And the “WHYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY! God” thing was welling up inside of me. I was really really frustrated and disgusted with everything in my life (coming from the woe-is-me prospective.) And a wale that wracked the depths of my soul came bounding out and onto the floor I went.  Face down on the carpet, I kicked my feet and pounded my fists on the floor and just screamed and cried. I’m not sure how long I was down there, I bet not very long … when I heard a still quiet voice in my spirit say… “Really… I thought we were past this.”  I instantly came to myself and said… “What am I, TWO?” And I laughed. Here’s the thing… I wanted to know why, for real, for real.  And this started a very enlightening conversation.

Honestly when I think about it, this might be the first time I did a full-out, body-breakdown, kicking and screaming tantrum… but emotionally I’ve been throwing tantrums and getting depressed for years when things I REALLY wanted didn’t work out the way I planned.  And I have had a lot of disappointments in my life. Even at 50 (ish) I still find it necessary to sit on my Daddy’s lap and have a “heart to heart.” You see, this is how you break out of cycles, shed old clothes that don’t fit anymore and transform. That coat of bitterness, we put on to protect ourselves from “knuckleheads.”  The boots for walking out of intolerable situations, that anti-loneliness seductive lingerie, the mask of manipulation,  that or the long-handled spoon we carry for social and relational distancing…

It’s a trip tho, that we sometimes must be immobilized, stranded, or down and out before we will have a conversation with the One Who knows us better than we know ourselves.  Just get someplace and be still… be quiet and then LET Him heal you. Transformation, however, is a CO-CREATIVE process.  I bet you want to know what was said and how it changed my life.  Ok… NEXT WEEK!

“Temper tantrums, however fun they may be to throw, rarely solve whatever problem is causing them.”

— Daniel Handler

FML 5: I'm Just Broke

Raise your hand if you’ve resolved to save money or fix your credit this year. I don’t know your experience, but most of the people I know are on one end of the spectrum or the other when it comes to saving money. Either they easily save, or money burns their pockets. I myself struggle to save money and I will tell you why… My entire childhood I watched my mother “struggle” financially.  We grew up “house poor” and it seems like my siblings and I never got anything we wanted… Mom was always “broke.” How ironic it was for me to follow in my mother’s footsteps, but for a long time I did... until I woke up.   

Don’t get me wrong… Momma (and everyone like her) just made it work, “Robbing Peter to pay Paul”!  Now I realize this may be a foreign concept for “summa” you so let me explain…  “Robbing Peter to pay Paul” is a “ghetto-ism” (I just made that up); an “urban phrase” referring to a particular type of money management.  It’s where one shifts money from one bill to pay a more vital one.  In our case vital meant… or else it’s getting shut off. As sad as it was, the only money management training we received was watching my Mother “stretch a dollar,” overspending or taking items out of the cart at the cashier station OR most often hearing “no” and getting hands slapped for touching things?  I can hear her words echoing in my past memories… “touch another thing, hear?” smh

Let me be clear poor money management comes from (#1) not understanding money, the lack of Literacy Education/Training,  NO Budgeting, Poor spending habits, and lack of discipline. LACK, LACK, LACK, the  perception of LACK or the FEAR of Lack are powerful barriers to the proper handling of money.

People often, just like I did, refer to their meager upbringing to excuse their financial irresponsibility because they don’t want to reign in their out-of-control spending habits. I mean who doesn’t love to shop and get the things they want, when they were deprived as children. But at the end of the year, after pouring Trillions of dollars into the market, have precious little to show for it and can still have the feeling of “struggling” to make it.   Let me tell you why that is… It’s called “The Poverty Mindset,” which is a GENERATIONAL CYCLE.  Not a lot of us received Money Management strategies from our parents, uh because they weren’t taught by their parents, whose parent didn’t have the knowledge to give them, nor did their parents or their parents before them. Hello, that’s GENERATIONAL.  This knowledge was withheld (or not shared) with many of our ancestors by those who believe money is POWER. I’ve heard it said “The Poor” could pull themselves up by their own bootstraps if they went to college or worked harder - but this is not always the case, especially when those people are constrained by The Poverty Mindset.   

Most poor people think winning the lottery will solve all their problems. According to an article called  Five myths about the Lottery written by Economics Professor George Loewenstein (Washington Post, 2019/12/27),  “70% of lottery winners go bankrupt within a couple of years.” I’ll give you two guesses as to why that is (Poor Money Management and/or the Poverty Mindset). Getting a better job will give you more money but how far do you think you can get with the The Poverty Mindset constantly screaming at you “OOOOO MORE MONEY!!! Yayyy! Now you can finally buy that thing (or things) you’ve been fiending for!” It’s another gerbil wheel, that must be destroyed in order to move forward. The Poverty Mindset must be replaced with sound financial knowledge, motivation to change, combined with energy, strategy, and positive producing action. Yes, it’s gonna be tough! But my question to you is…. HOW BAD DO YOU WANT IT. No more struggling and no more excuses… WANT TO FIX YOUR LIFE? First things first… make up your mind that you need a change! Then do it! Create some goals and a budget, and start with tiny steps.  

THESE FINANCIAL LITERACY RESOURCES WILL HELP

Websites

MoneyMavericks.com, MyMoney.gov, khanacademy.org, www.daveramsey.com

Podcasts

Stacking Benjamins, The Dave Ramsey Show, His and Her Money, The Fairer Cents, The Truth About Money with Ric Edelman

Also see my book 4SELF 101  (Chapter 9: Money, Money, Money).

FML Part 4: Broken Cookies

How old were you when you first did the do? By “the do” I mean had sex? Oh yeah, I’m getting right to the point this week. At first, I was going to make this blog post about money and being broke. The word “broke” as you may or may not know is slang that means “having no money.” It refers to a smashed piggy bank with its contents poured out. Not to be compared to with BROKENNESS. I do have lots to say about money, the poverty mindset, and the ridiculous amount of power we give money over our lives, that’ll come next week. BUT… because I’m feeling a bit snarky at the moment, I’ve changed my mind. This little talk is going to be about SEXUALITY, abstinence, and virginity (or loss thereof.)

I’m not sure how transparent I want to be with you regarding my own cookie-breaking experience… although I do feel my story is an important one (and so is yours.) Let me suffice it to say I was very very very young when I first had sex. I can talk about it now because I’m too old to get in trouble, lol. Not unlike most peer pressure stories, I was trying to fit into a small group much older than myself. Most believers will quote the “Thou Shall Not’s” of fornication, but in PRACTICALITY the real reason for not having sex when you’re too young for a lasting committed relationship … IS THE BURN! And by the burn, I’m not talking about a social disease… I mean HORNY-ness. Breaking the cookie for the first time is like opening Pandora’s box, uh literally.  It starts a fire that must be quenched. Simply put, sex was originally intended to be a divine glue that through desire, passion of orgasmic expression to transform two people (that belong to each other) into one person (complete unity in spirit, emotionally, and in purpose). That is why breakups, when sex was the norm, are so difficult because is like an amputation. Sex taken in the right context is good! However, when SEX is USED, it can be very damaging. Think of a raging unconstrained fire…

Nowadays sex is just a social activity, it’s no big deal. Sex has become so common… seems like it is normal expectation in dating. In DATING! I literally hesitate to say “before marriage” or “outside of marriage” because in the “world view” marriage is less popular than COVID! (smh) The “test drive” has become a real and necessary thing a prerequisite for choice-making. And I get it, I do… good sex is important. It’s both binding and freeing; both a flame and an extinguisher, a thirst and a quencher simultaneously. But the fact that society places more value on orgasms and fun, than it does on real connection, fidelity, and community is evidence of a moral decay.  The sad thing is lonely people often put themselves out there and date EVEN IF still jacked up from a previous thing. Knowing that they are not in the position (mentally or emotionally) to hold down a real relationship.  Baby if you’re broken… get your ish straight before bringing other people into your mix! OR BE HONEST upfront! I’m sorry (not sorry) but if sex is your main motive and you have no intention of having a relationship, it is your responsibility to let the object of your attention know - anything else is just wrong, I don’t care how you justify it.  

Whole people (with nothing broken and nothing missing) should do better. Remember the golden rule, “Do unto others …” blah blah blah you know the rest.  Let’s retool it to say:  Honor your SELF by valuing other people (everybody) as if they were an extension of your own person.  If you aren’t ready to deal with other people… don’t. If your flame is burning like that, don’t be shady find a SUBSTITUTION (side-eye) … I’m sure you know what I mean. Happy endings are best when you’re in a focused, committed, joyous relationship that has purpose. (Notice I said joyous and not happy) see previous blog post: FML 2: Unhappy

Decide today, I have, not to accept any more broken cookies. Either come whole or stay at home. That’s all I got to say. OH, I ALMOST FORGOT!!! The most important part! How to FML (FIX My Life)… You’ve given a piece of your SELF to every person you’ve had sex with and they’ve with you. So imagine giving&receiving with 10, 20…. 100 sexual partners. Talk about BROKEN COOKIES (and crumbs) yikes! To be WHOLE (and happy) you must reclaim all those pieces, and break the SOUL-TIES, which is the reason you can't get over him/her - your souls are tied… the sex did that. If you need help click here, I got you!

Happy New Years! and Resolutions

Are you still making “New Year’s Resolutions”? New Year’s Resolutions are so… so… 2 generations ago.  In December I look over the state of my life for the past year like I think most people do.  By December 31st how many of us can say, “ ahhhhhhhhh, my life is right where I hoped I’d be”?  Can I say this out loud… 2020 “SUCKED!” for a whole lot of people. And for some, it didn’t. Hello COVID, and with it came a whole lot of issues: businesses shutting down, financial issues and the stress and strains of isolation, and HOME-SCHOOLING. Parents are appreciating teachers a lot more, I betcha! And of course, there’s the pandemic (aka the end-o-year) weight gain thing.

Raise your hand if you’re already resolving to get to the gym, maybe get a new membership as soon as those doors open? That’s pretty much me every year.  I started off pretty good this year.  I fasted for the first couple of weeks (as I usually do), then I went on the Keto Diet. I gave up sugar , can you believe it! I started losing weight and then… I missed my Little Cesar’s flat crust pizza. Keto crashed and burned with the “I’m not depriving myself; I work too hard” mantra & mindset. It was just an excuse really…  ANYWAYYYY, hhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh… It’s a horrible cycle. Like the one Cap’t Jack Sparrow, Will Turner and Norrington (Pirates of the Caribbean, 3) were on, it was more like a giant gerbil wheel, they were fighting, and striving to get the key “what unlocked the treasure chest containing Davy Jones’ heart.) Until BAMMM Cap’t got knocked in the head (he didnt see that bar coming) and fell off the wheel. While the others kept striving. RESOLUTIONS are just like that! But when we fall off, our “SELF” is impacted (Self-esteem, Self-trust, Self-image.) Man, that type of hurt lasts a lot longer than physically falling off the wheel. RESOLUTIONS have a shelf-life and expiration usually means failure. And failure can lead to SELF-loathing and SELF-abuse. Who needs toxic relationships when you literally beat your own SELF black and blue for these failures… I say we stop and stop NOW making these SELF-promises which we never keep.

Wanna know how to get over that depressing hump as you go into a new year? See and acknowledge where you are and be thankful that you are not as bad off as some other folks. There is LITERALLY always something to be thankful for. Think about it.  If you are reading this, you are alive, that’s one. After that, you can see, and process things. You can move your arms, legs, and can wiggle your toes, pschhhh… how many people woke up ill, incapacitated or even dead. Just saying… Scooch up close and listen to me for a second. If you woke up at all, IT’S A NEW DAY, make it count or don’t - that’s up to you.

Listen every year I heard my Mom, Lenora say… Next year will be better, with cigarette in one hand and a drink in the other. It never mattered if she partied New Year’s Eve away or stayed home depressed… her best day, came the day she died… at least she got an upgrade. Things never changed because she relied on luck instead of doing little things or slightly veering to the left or right to alter her course. Laozi, said “A journey of a thousand miles starts with one step.” But have you heard it this way? “A journey of a thousand[ [Chinese] miles start beneath one's feet.” Meaning all you have to do is take a step, get on a roll… walk it out! Um get off you’re a%$ and just do it, make one step (in a different direction.) Stop complaining, over thinking/freaking out and rehearsing failure. STAND UP. If you’ve fallen and can’t get up, get an accountability partner. Even before that, though … you gotta make up your mind. Get serious, for real. Make 1 Intention and add some action steps to accomplish it.  Start and stop as many times as you need to.  If you start over a 100 times, it’s ok. But doing the same old things the same old way and expecting a different outcome is what… INSANITY. Stop the insanity. I want you to take one moment, yes right now… and think about what you are thankful for. Write down all the things that you DO HAVE, and what it would be like without them… and then “give thanks.”

For more information on Accountability Partners see my book 4SELF 101

FML Part 3: Stinkin' Thinkin'

Last week we learned that most people have around 6,000 thoughts each day (Newsweek, 2020) and being stuck in Wild-mind or Doublemindedness can wreak havoc on your life.  Negativity is ugly, and it draws the same into your life. Just think about that one super negative person in your life… how fun are they to be around? What’s that feeling you get when you see their name on your Caller ID? Uh-huh… were having a great day until _____ called.  I don’t have to tell you, I’m sure you get my point.

If negativity vibrates at a frequency that draws bad, then it follows that positivity which is on the oppositive end of the spectrum must draw good.  Let me tell you why thoughts attract… When you think on a thing and you can’t get it off your mind it’s like meditation. When you meditate on a thing you add energy to it (like or dislike/love or fear/hate) and it begins to pull from the atmosphere.  The more energy you add to it, the harder the pull.  Think of your thoughts as a seed, the more you water that seed… eventually you will get a plant, a growth… a thing. (This is the Law of Seed time and harvest.) Your thoughts create, they manifest… whether good or bad, that’s up to you. 

Take a moment, look at your life… what things are good, that make you happy and what things are not.  Do you know that you can change your life just by changing what you focus on, how you think, what you talk about (or confess/declare)… what you believe? But you must be intentional. If you’ve determined “EVERYTHING IN MY LIFE IS SH%T” you meditate, confess, and expect things to go that way… then they will. You not only create a SELF-fulfilling prophecy…

What people tend to do is hope, daydream, fret and complain over things they don’t like in their lives.  Some may even pray (but they neglect to take actions to bring that change forward.) If you just hope for a change but don’t do the work, it will remain a fantasy.  Wanna know something funny? It’s just an observation, EVERY single thing I’ve obsessed over, was never received at the time that I was obsessing over it.  I prayed about those things (believed that I was worthy to receive) and followed the steps above and went on with my life … trusting that things would work out when it was it’s time to… and they did. I look back over my life and realize EVERYTHING I have deeply wanted, I have received. 

For those who pray and pray, and it seems like nothing is happening (or your deadline came and went, and your prayer wasn’t answered) … try this: USE FAITH 1) Understand when you pray, you are asking Someone Who has the power to make that thing happen and know it is in Their hands (and timing.)  2) Pray on target (not amiss or for the wrong reasons.) And then trust you were heard, believe you were heard, and thank God as if the thing has already been done. 3) When those nagging thoughts hit your mind - CONFESS/DECLARE (out loud) All is well, even if it doesn’t look like it. I dare you to pick one negative thing in your life... Don’t put a time limit on it, and don’t obsess… release it and just see what happens.

If your thoughts slay you…. renew your mind. Think on, focus on what is good.  Reflect on previously answered prayers and be thankful. *IF YOU DON’T HAVE FAITH…connect with someone who does and let their faith work on your behalf.  One thing you must do, and it may be hard, is put your lack of faith in neutral. Doubt pushes to the left, it screams NOOOO it just ain’t gonna happen. But if you relax and just keep a “Yes on your lips and in your thoughts…” all things are possible… your vehicle of faith will keep rolling forward (even if slow, it won’t stall.) And if you need help… click here.  Without faith, it’s impossible to get joy and it’s impossible to move your circumstances in the direction you want your life to go and your happiness will always be dependent on circumstances and “luck.” Faith is your anchor, your boat; the very access to the life you deserve. Ok, raise your hand if you think money will bring happiness. Will it? Let talk about it. Join me next week (same place; same time) for: FML Part 4: Just Broke

FML Part 2: Unhappy

When you look at your life, would you say that you are “happy” with it?  Happiness is a fickle thing… it’s unstable. If things are going well, you’re happy if they aren’t, you’re not. Ever said, “Under the circumstances I am good…” obviously something funky was happening in your world. Wouldn’t it be nice if you could just wish or pray all your bad circumstances away? Most often though, stressful things, trying people, bills, health issues, etc. don’t go away just because you wish them to.

Positive thinking is very important but alone they don’t do the trick. What positive thinking can do is strengthen you to make it until your change does come.  Even if there is an element of “fake it until you make it.”  And here’s why, persisting thoughts produce congruent language and creates a belief system.  What we speak aloud, what we confess becomes our declaration.  And what we declare, we establish within.  What is established within will also manifest in our world.  That’s the Law of Attraction.” Soooo, for those of you that aren’t familiar with the Law of Attraction, it is a “New Thought” philosophy brought to light by the film and book The Secret (Rhonda Byre, 2006).  Who doesn’t want the power to create whatever they focus on? It’s not what you think that makes the difference, its howwww you think what you think… I know that sounds stretchy and it kind of is, but we are creators by nature.  Obviously, the power is being intentional with your thought life.  Grab “The Secret” it’s a fun read.

Did you know that the latest Psychological studies (by Queens University in Canada) show the average person has over 6,000 thoughts per day (Newsweek, July 15, 2020.)  If you are like me, a creative,  you tend to have wild-mind a lot and you find yourself bringing your thoughts under control several times each day.  SELF-talk is huge! Most people don’t realize how much self-talk they actually do until they FOCUS on it. In 4SELF 101 we do an exercise with Self-Talk that may blow your mind.  Something that is quite common is “double-mindedness.”  Double-mindedness is deciding to go left and right at the same time.  Crazy right? Let me explain, I’m going to offer you one of my own (and very personal) examples… I want to get married again one day… and then at the same time I don’t. This is classic because the idea of marriage is nice, in a rose-colored-glasses kind of way.  You get - not to be lonely, intimacy, being part of a team, financial perks, a house, picket fence and … whatever.  But then subconsciously I loathe the idea of arguments, having to discuss and get approval from my partner for my decisions, being responsible to another person, cleaning up after, cooking for another and expectations, expectations, and uhhhh possibly divorce if we are not a good fit. The fear … of being misunderstood, rejection, and heartbreak of the latter screams “NOOOOO girl don’t do it!!!!” #Doublemindedness… And the Good Book says, if you are double-minded you should not expect ANY good thing because you are UNSTABLE in all your ways. The first part of getting happy is MAKING UP YOUR MIND and sticking to it. Of course, this can be difficult, especially if while you’re awake you crave a thing that subconsciously you’re running from. Essentially you place yoursSELF in a STALLED (neutral) position. You build a wall where HAPPINESS is just on the other side. Want to learn how to BREAK DOWN THAT WALL and how to move forward into happiness? Come back next week for: FML Part 3: STINKIN’ THINKIN.

FML Part 1: Relationships

Ok, ok, it’s not exactly how it sounds, I promise. That shocking foul 4-letter word above, is not really a word. Look closely it’s an acronym. Waaaay back in the day F (found) U (under) C (carnal) K (knowledge) was etched onto a sign and hung over the heads of men and women’s arrested and placed in stocks for committing sexual sin (aka fornication or adultery.) But! when I say “FML,” thaaaaat is NOT what I mean… keep reading.

If you’ve ever been in that “I’m sick and tired of being sick and tired” place (Fannie Lou Hamer, 1964)? Listen…. I’ve been there too. And although people have this mental dissidence against marriage (yeah I know, divorces are more common than marriages that last) so they say… but I have to wonder if that’s not just the excuse people like to give to cover up their poor decisions and unwillingness to truly commit to that “until death do we part” kind of love. I’ve been married and have also “shacked up” and I have to tell you… they are not the same. Marriage is more than a “piece of paper” or living together. The mindset is different, idk, it’s scary… maybe that’s because it’s a “man swearing before God” type of thing. Ehhh it’s not like it used to be. We are a disposable generation… folks are always looking for bigger or better. The sad thing is nothing is not disposable, even people. Anyway marriage should be for ADULTS, and when I say adults I mean mature and whole ADULTS.

I should know, I married the same man twice, when were 18 and 19 years old. Although I was emotionally and intellectually more mature than he was, neither one of us was prepared for what lied ahead. Pregnant from the honeymoon, I grew up (had to) and he backslid to the streets and he returned to gang-banging. Ricky was handsome and charming and “God’s gift to women” so he thought. He made my life a living hell and when we broke up I hated his stinkin’ guts, for a long long time. I can admit now, that it was a REAL relief (and blessing) for him to leave me for his “around the way” girlfriend, which he later married and had 2 kids with. After shakin’ up with the same type of man and two kids later I realized thangs needed to change. Fourteen years later, through counseling, I forgave and remarried “Suave.” (It’s a very long story - we’ll leave the details for another time.) Fast forward ten years I found myself hating life and hating Rico. I knew the problem was mine when… on that “last-straw” day I basically told him to stop breathing… NOT my finest day, I know.

Rico was fighting a cold, and every time he exhaled there was a little whistle that grated my nerves, like nails on a chalkboard. It drove me to the edge of sanity and I snapped… Between clinched teeth I spit… “WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!!!” He said, “Nothing, just breathing…” And that’s when I said … ‘WELL STOP IT!!!” Hhhhhhh… there’s no justifying my actions. But I knew at that moment I had sunken to a new low. This wasn’t the person I wanted to be… I needed something, I don’t know what, but I couldn’t live another day like this. Nothing I tried worked. So I screamed to my Maker: “God FIX MY LIFE (FML). After fasting and praying, these answers came to me:

1) I literally expected the marriage to fail and had an emotional bag packed just waiting for him to “give me a reason.” 2) I made the relationship an IDOL, (which is anything you focus on more than God.) I worried about us and him all the time, could think of nothing else. 3) Clearly I couldn’t fix things myself and he wasn’t cooperating, so I needed Divine Intervention. 4) This dissatisfaction I felt was stimulus to make change. I went hard after God for ANSWERS, and a plan, and then… the The DeVos Urban Leadership Initiative, a Divine intervention and learning opportunity, showed up right in the knick of time, saved me and changed my life.

Let me give you a little secret: When EVERYTHING IN YOUR LIFE GETS ON YOUR NERVES, don’t hate your life… take the hint and push for your next level. If you need help… CLICK HERE .