Making the Switch

I've decided to switch to a plant-based diet.  After a year of workouts, triathlon, and a spartan race, I need to do more.  After all of that work, I didn't lose that much weight.  Today, I'm finally making the switch!  I'm excited and very motivated.

I'm starting to workout again.  I'd love to have a trainer, but I'll settle for a workout partner.  The picture below was taken today (7/15/17).  I can do better.  I think moving to a plant-based diet will help with me loving me more.

Reasons Why?

Sometimes I, no wait...  I always try to solve this puzzle called life.  I  believe everything, good and bad, happens for a reason.  I am always trying to figure out why, instead of letting the situation  be and allowing things to happen without reason, I try to figure out the lesson to be learned in every moment.  I think in "If Then" statements, knowing full well that I cannot do anything to change the past.  I cannot, nor would I want to.  But I can change my present and slightly alter my future.

For example, IF I would have not placed an ad on a dating site in 2008, THEN I would have never met and gotten to know OLIVER BERNSHAUSEN, a great friend; loyal, trustworthy, and confident to the end.  I would not be missing him on the anniversary of his death, July 10, 2012.  Moments happen.  People come in and out of our lives, some stay longer than others.

At this very moment, I am trying to detach a bond that should have never happened.  In a brief moment of complete weakness, I created and forced a bond.  Now I must break it.  It doesn't nurture my soul.

Do you ever find that certain things keep happening to you and you can't figure out why?  Think about the meaning of insanity, then take a different approach is my first thought.  My second thought is to figure out why.  I've been at my current state four times in my life.  Every time I am taken to the brink of failure then something happens to save me from total destruction but not without much work and clawing my way out to set things right.

Why do I feel the need to always know the reasons why things happen, especially since it is clear I am not learning from my past mistakes (lessons)?

Message for today:  Let it be by letting it go.

Are You A Fringe Friend?

I tend to be a Fringe Friend.  I'm trusted enough to SEE the inner circle but not quite on the invite list.  Yet, I am that person EVERYONE goes to when they NEED something, namely a job or a shoulder to cry on.

Red Mink Stole

Somewhere in my childhood I remember.  It was dark yet it was morning.  Red lights were flashing and my body was whizzing by blurs of bodies standing around, staring.  I wanted very much to see what it was that everyone was looking at.  In that moment, I broke away from the arms that were taking me away.  I rushed over to see  and there it was...

And there it was.  The thing that everyone was looking at. Hanging from the broken driver's side window.

A Red Mink Stole.

Or according to my young eyes, it was an animal that was hit by the car as my mom pulled into the driveway.  It wasn't.  Nothing was as it seemed.

Reality.

It was the WHITE mink stole my mother kept in the closet.  The one I would stroke and wear when she wasn't home.

Bullets shattered the entire driver's side including the window.  The door was opened and there was blood everywhere and hanging from the opened door's window was that formerly white mink stole turned red and filled with holes.

Then I remembered.  It wasn't a mink stole at all.  It was a fur coat filled with bullet holes.

I Thought You'd Be Proud and I Was Wrong

I thought you'd be proud to find that I am the type of woman who has worked hard much of her life to achieve all I have and the things I've done.
I was wrong.

I thought you'd be proud to stand besides me in moments of joy, and behind me when I had to be strong, and in front of me to protect me when I don't have the strength to protect myself.
I was wrong.

I thought you'd be proud to hold me up when my strength wavered.
I was wrong.

I thought you'd be proud of my honestly and complete transparency.
I was wrong.

I though you'd be proud to find someone you could trust and be real with.
I was wrong.

I thought you were the one and I was wrong.

Why so much hate towards Black Women?

Black men don't want us and white men only want to have sex with us.  We are beautiful, smart and strong.  Will somebody be honest and tell me why all the hate please?

Malcolm X said it best:

The most disrespected person in America is the black woman.
The most unprotected person in America is the black woman.
The most neglected person in America is the black woman.

Beyonce brought his speech back to life from her Lemonade album last year.

If I am strong and confident it's misconstrued as angry.  If I am smart, it is being seen as wanting to be white.

Let's have a conversation.

Someone Once Told Me...

Someone once told me I wasn't worthy of his love, of his time, of his heart.
Someone once told me no.
Someone once told me I wasn't pretty enough, wasn't smart enough, wasn't thin enough to matter.

Someone once told me I didn't make a difference and my life means nothing.
Someone once told me my own worth.

If that someone wasn't me, then all this is not true.  And if that someone was me, then I need to start saying and hearing something different.

Someone once told me no, wait...
                   I told myself I am worthy, I am loved, I am good enough and that's all that matters.

Hold you're head up, smile, recover, and realize your worth. --Writer Stewie