Category: Encountering New Experiences

Stop Being Toxic!

Stop being toxic to yourself. I know it is easy to blame others for the way you are and the way your life turned out so far but doesn’t mean that it is right and true. What would be good is if many of us stopped paying so much attention to what someone else is doing. If we stopped getting our courage from what someone else does and start finding our own way.

I use to be in a panic when I realised that other persons were action, while I was sitting in the dark and now had to figure things out for myself, by myself. However, if we stopped looking, we wouldn’t trip ourselves up on someone else’s mess. It is quite necessary to stop and ask ourselves some important questions before we take action; questions such as:

  • who do I hope to impress here?
  • where will this take me?
  • am I acting out of desperation?
  • is this really based on my particular skill set?
  • have I been influenced by what others have said or done?
  • am I competing with real or imagined adversaries?
  • can I commit to seeing this out til the end?

If you really want to work on always being anxious and fearful, stop living your life based on the shortcomings you had ten years ago. I have tried the personality trait test about three times and I realise that nobody is destined to stay the same all their lives, unless they want to. No one is a fixed entity incapable of change, it is just that some do not want to change even when it is for their own good.

There is never anything good about copying and pasting someone’s life over your own and so those who do, need to stop trying to do so. There are many toxic persons out there and many are toxic to themselves. They don’t need anyone to talk them out of a good idea because they are faster, sharper and more deadly than their critics. Before an idea is formed they quickly shoot it down and when the opportunity passes they drag themselves from pillow to post until they are a nervous wreck.

So do yourself a favour and stop being toxic to yourself. Take the time to slow down before you take that next step and do not move, if not moved by the Spirit. Be kind with yourself and practise a little selfcare.

If we must Die…

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I was speaking to my students recently about Caribbean poets and Claude McKay came up. Unsurprisingly, they were only vaguely familiar with his name. In some instances I have seen him listed as an American poet, an error which sought to erase his humble Jamaican origins. Born September 15, 1889, in Sunny Ville Clarendon, he eventually made his way across America and Europe, gathering worlds of experiences to himself. He was best known for his invaluable contribution to the Harlem Renaissance in New York and was considered a literary voice for social justice. More than any of his masterfully crafted poems, the one that resonates with me today, is the poem, “If We Must Die”.

A poem that never fails to shake me out of a defeated mindset.

“Though far outnumbered let us show us brave”

“Pressed to the wall, dying, but fighting back

Though this Shakespearean sonnet…

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Lessons From My Garden.

A Garden brings a sense of purpose to many, it means a little exercise for some and to me I realise we the right mindset, there is so much we can learn…

Now let’s start from the top. The lesson I learned from the first photo is to see the beauty in everything. This dilapidated plant stand was once beautiful and strong. It was once relied on to hold all those plants that surround it. Now, it has lost its original purpose but it adds a rustic beauty to the scene. Also those plants now help its beauty to shine even brighter.

Next, is my peace spot. plants of different lengths and strength intertwined to offer a shield of peace in a place that offers little shelter from the real world. It teaches me that when you find that peaceful spot you must take the time to appreciate it. It also reminds me of the importance of having that oasis in a seemingly barren land, one that gives joy peace and happiness.

After this, there is the star fruit tree. Though small and young it has provided six crops already! It reminds me that age was never a limitation. The limitation comes from the impositions placed on age by society. The tree cares little for expectations and bears when it is ready. It doesn’t care for anyone’s timeline, except its own and because of this we can appreciate both its generosity and beauty in both bloom and bearing.

These two stalk of scallion were planted by untrained hands. There was little expectation and yet they decided to live. It reminds me that it is not whether others belief in you but if you believe in yourself. If you believe in yourself enough for everyone else there is nothing you can’t do or be. Your strength comes from within and is dependent on your will given to you by the Almighty. Though few will be there who really believe in you, believe in yourself and forget about the rest. You will get there in time.

Then there is this yam tree that thrives in a once barren space. It was the site of a traumatic event. A coconut tree struck by lightning, never to recover. Before it was planted by my aunt noone thought it could ever be redeemed, no one deemed it useful. Now this once barren hole brings forth life once, life that will feed nourish and make whole.

surrounded by a bean tree is the ruins of a limes tree. It was once tall, full and fluffy and bore limes until all its branches bowed to the ground. The limes on that tree was almost the size of a good sized lemon! Many persons benefited from that lime tree and we thought it would never stop giving. Then last year it became one of the many victims of the drought season. Of course we were in denial of its dying because it had been so strong and generous. Weaker trees had survived, why could it not? However, it still died even though we tried to save it, it was its time. However it still stands because it was needed. It was needed to offer support to things still alive. Death is always in the middle of the living and vice versa and sometimes the dead become the shoulder that the living stands on to realise its potential.

The final picture is that of a beautiful flower that fell down, we thought it was dead. Though it fell it did not die. It found a way to thrive where it had fallen and to not only add even more beauty, but more importantly hope. I gathered hope that if I fall I can still shine. If I fall where I did not begin or hope to be, I can still thrive and flourish. It is not where you end up but what you do while you are there.

There are many lessons we can learn from so many unassuming things, if we only take the time to really look closely.

I Don’t Want to Exist, I Want to Live!

If you died today what would your legacy be? I have thought about this and for me it is still up in the air. I guess it’s not up to me to answer that question; time will tell and so will my eulogy. I realise that sometimes the view we have ourselves differ greatly from the view others have of us. Some feel the need to write their own eulogy, just to be sure. I have been teaching for thirteen years and I often wonder if I have done enough with all the wonderful talents I have been blessed. Have I done enough? Been enough, seen enough, lived enpugh!? Can these questions ever be satisfactorily answered?

There was a time that I was so passionate about what I did and I did my best to do what I did. However, as time goes by and the expectations of critics are not met, they begin to chip away at the budding confidence you had in your ability. They look and note that you have not ascended to the lofty heights they thought you would reach and they tell you; so, you begin to question whether or not you really did anything, whether what you did was enough. It becomes especially hard when you see others who have done so many things that they have been recognised for and you begin to lose confidence in the little things you once thought were so great. May, you now feel, you are placed in a waiting room, because you disobeyed your call to action from God, then you begin to wonder if you are just drifting away.

But all I want to do is just live. I just want to live the kind of life I was intended to live, without fear worry or tears to cloud my vision. That is it, that is all. I don’t want the fame and I don’t want the fortune and don’t need the empty promises of who I could have been. In this moment without any more regrets and doubts about my place here at this time in history, I just want to live. This desire comes from a place that has never had time to heal properly from past wounds, it is too raw to touch, yet it yearns for sunlight. Above everything that this world could offer, all I desire is a chance to truly live a life free of expectations and perceptions, stereotypes and stereotypes. I want to inhale deeply and exhale freely and feel my heart swell with the joy of knowing that I have this gift that is worth more than silver and gold. We all need to just live and be allowed to live and any attempt to derail this is a crime against our humanity

There are so many landmines that people have to go through in this world, and many do not make it. There are unique problems that we each face that threaten our ability to live, some more than others. It is easy to become disenchanted by all the rocky mountains with loose rocks that come at our heads before we thinking about climbing those mountains. At the heart of everything is the one unchangeable truth, nothing is more precious than life. Nothing requires our full attention, but the desire to live.

Before we think of death, we have to deal with the business of how we will keep on living. We have to be aware of the value not only of our right to live but the right of all persons to live the life they have been given by God. It is a right that many are denied , a right that many do not know they have, right that should never be hijacked or denied. We should also keep in mind that we do not only fight to live, we also fight to realise the joy of truly be alive!

Think Tank

Someone’s journey begins with this verse. How does this apply to you? It is a beautiful door isn’t it? Many of us have such beautiful doors that we not only lock, but we also batten down tight. It takes many errors sometimes to realise that all we have to do is surrender when we are in doubt and wait for what’s to come. We need to breathe, let some cool breeze in that will give life and light. When we close ourselves off from all possibility, why do we expect to get a miracle. We have to open ourselves, though we may be afraid, though we may be cynical to the possibilities of miracles and a gentle voice that guides, instead of confuses.

Watching... waiting for His coming

Someone needs the reassurance of these words as they face the hail storm that lie ahead after coming through the fire that is now behind them. There is always a period when there is perfect peace and in those times we have to grab a hold of sanity and let it lead the way. Sometimes we stand alone ot among a few and realise that pain will lead to pleasure and sadness will give way to joy. To mould you He had to break you ans to smooth you out you had to burn. A promise is a promise and will come true if you believe.

Revelation 3:10 (ESV) - Revelation 3:10 ESV - Because you have ...

A season is only for a moment, a moment that may seem too long for you to bear. So just when you feel that this is it, then comes the shower of rain. All you need to do is to wait for it and let it happen. There is no potion you can brew that can get you where you want to be or need to be. Healing comes after the wound and not before. There is a process that must take place before you can come out on the other side.

god restores health

But you will and when you do, all you can say is Thank you Lord, I made it through.

Emotions.

Being emotional is often associated with being weak mentally and impulsive in many instances. However, emotions are necessary in order to be intuned with reality. Or, at least that is what I belief.

Is it really as simple as changing your thoughts in order to change your feelings and emotion? There are some people who are identified as being highly emotional, which on sight implies that they act oftens based on how they feel and may not cope well with reality. However, as someone who would like to lump myself in the category of highly emotional people, I think we tend to see the truth way ahead of most and therefore are more in tuned with reality.

I can often tell when someone has a negative reaction to me even if they appear to be so kind and so nice to me and ten times out of ten I am proven right. It does help that they cannot keep up the charade for long and long before the big reveal, there a evident cracks in the nice guy facade. It seems that we can tell when someone is not as emotionally connected, lacks compassion and seems detached from everything happening around them.

It is true that people who are highly emotional do get tired and anxious in extremely tense situations, especially when the situation is allowed to continue indefinitely. However, we welcome and need change and when it does not happen we get anxious, we want to break down the barriers that refuse us from experiencing it.

The trick is to understand why we feel the way we feel in a certain situation and be patient with others and ourselves. We experience emotions whether we like it i not, whether we care to admit it or not, but we can take the time to find a means by which we can channel these emotions to our good. It really is important that we embrace and are honest about how we feel moment by moment. I have learned the hard way how dangerous and anti-productive it can be to ignore how you feel and in instances try to suppress them. I have felt the sharp teeth of regret because I have reacted in the wrong way at the wrong time because of years of suppressed emotion. While there are persons who may feel uncomfort at your display, it is better that they experience honest emotion instead of those tainted by time that had not healed all wounds.

I am slowly learning how to be honest about how and why I feel the way I do and I see that there is no better cure for a peace of mind than this.

The Heart is Deceitful…

Just when you think you are getting out of that dark place, cold callous and wicked tentacles threaten to drag you back into the abyss. When we isolate ourselves from the things that make the heart heavy and the spirit low are we not able to operate from a better place?

We all want to have only the good things and not the bad but are we okay with getting it by any means necessary? Should we feel justified at someone’s suffering because they or someone they know have done bad things?

if we really stop and think about how we think, we will realise that we are far from being the “good” person we want to be. We realise that we may still take pleasure in seeing justice being served or someone, “getting what’s coming to them because it is justified”. However, if we are truly honest, we will admit that we all have done questionable and outright bad things at some degree or another. If we really search our heart we will find things about ourselves hidden in the shadows that we would not like to come to light. The person we are thrilled to see defeated, may have been crying out for help but we never took the time to help but skipped straight to condemning.

The heart is deceitful, because if we allow it to rule us, we may end up doing that which is not of the Spirit but that which is of the flesh. We may become distracted by superficial matters that do not address real problems. We can allow ourselves to be influenced by forces that work for evil and not for good. We may find ourselves championing causes that have nothing to do with doing what is right and everything that is wrong.

“The heart is deceitful and desperately wicked” (Jeremiah 17: 9)

There is no one here on this earth that has not struggled with this. While there are those who are winning the battle there are many more who have lost, and who take pleasure in the losing of their soul to wickedness. We have to be constantly on guard for the moments when our weaknesses threaten to overtake the logics of our spirit. It is a spirit that gives us this sense that we are still under construction, even while there are things around us that say otherwise. The Spirit that reminds us that we are not perfect nor are we expected to be perfect. A Spirit that reminds us that we should not think of ourselves as the saviour of anyone, because all we can do, is the best that we can do as imperfect beings.

For there is truth in the fact that in our weakness we see the unrelenting power of the Almighty. It is a power that speaks to the deceitful heart and brings peace to a tormented spirit.

7 “Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord,
And whose hope is the Lord.
8 For he shall be like a tree planted by the waters,
Which spreads out its roots by the river,
And will not fear when heat comes;
But its leaf will be green,
And will not be anxious in the year of drought,
Nor will cease from yielding fruit. (Jeremiah 17:7-8)