Today is the Day. The Chase is Over.

Dear Readers, 

It all came down to today. This is the day. The chase is over. I am 56 years old and I have finally reached the moment of full clarity, peace and the healing process is getting better and better. The feelings of heaviness, fear, anger, and resentment these emotions and voices will no longer have the power to burden me and whisper to me that I am not worth it. My healing process began in 1992 and at the time I thought that it would take me about a year to heal from the damage of my childhood, an abusive marriage, and what I didn’t know was from years of more abusive relationships that included the intimate relationships and family and friends. Let me tell you this  when you find yourself on the path to healing from emotional, sexual and physical brokenness don’t expect the people closest to you to be supportive, in some cases they are the people who will become obstacles on your journey, and you will have to make the choice to leave them behind with the rest of the wreckage. 

Today is the day that I can release years of pain, suffering, anger, and the struggles of chasing after the unknown. Today is the day I understand that what kept me prisoner was how I was thinking, and becoming a slave to the idea that my life was worthless because I haven’t become the success of the American dream. I don’t own a house, a car, and I don’t make a six figure salary. I berated myself mentally for not getting it right and for having to start over and over. When I think back on how many years that I didn’t feel loved , but search for love and the whole time I didn’t love me because I thought that it was the duty of others to love me, and my anger grew when I didn’t receive love. I  used sex as a means to feel. I was dead inside, but I thought sex would make me feel something, The only result of this behavior was more emptiness and being used as an object of pleasure, and not being cherished as a whole being. 

Today, Friday, July 24, 2020 as I sit in my bedroom with tears flowing, pouring out all the suffering, pain, uncertainty, and years of dying over and over and reliving the same tragedy over and over, I was numb and bitter. I was a slave to depression, eating orders and carrying around the  negative labels that others heaped on me because I believed them. I am not ashamed to say that I never fully experienced a mother’s love, but I am no longer going to allow that to drag me down.  On July 20, 2020, we celebrated my mother’s 76th birthday and I am enjoying the relationship we presently have.  I am no longer struggling, no let me rephrase that I am no longer choosing to struggle or to see life as a struggle. There are challenges, but I don’t choose to see them as a problem or a negative experience.  

I am thankful for all the intimate relationships that did not work out because they were not the ones for me and each one taught me a lesson. I am thankful for all the friends that left me when I was at my darkest moment because these people enlighten  me how to carefully invest in true friendship. I am thankful for this time of being alone in my own space because it has prepared me to understand who I am and to never allow loneliness to rear its ugly head to force me into the fear of running into another dysfunctional relationship so that I would be distracted from continuing on my journey of healing. I am thankful for being sheltered in place, although the world continues to be in chaos I have used this time to center myself in a state of peace. I am thankful for being able to work from home. I am thankful for the gifts and talents I have discovered that keep me free from  thinking that I will spend the rest of my life a slave to punching a time clock.  I am thankful for the friends and family who stuck with me through all of my drama. I am thankful for my blogging community. 

Today is the day that I released that I have a wealth of experiences to share by publishing my books on amazon. I am thankful for the creations of Conversations with J.R. Floyd, that gives me a public voice on all major social media platforms to help others to heal.  It’s been a bumpy and  dark, but amazing journey and I know that life is better because I am making it better. 

Who am I? I am J. R. Floyd , Inspirational Coach, Author, Singer, and Educator, currently works as a College Writing Consultant. A winner of the Jacob A. Weiser play-writing award for her work The Conversation. She was a freelance writer for Street News, and appeared in the gospel play Oh Lord: Why Did I get Married?She is a member of the BMCC Downtown Chorus. Performed at Carnegie Hall in the Manhattan Concert Productions: Let you Voice Be Heard, 2019. Author of The Waiting Game, A Different Flavor of Love & 90 Days of Reflection, Discovery, & Renewal.  

Thank you for stopping by dragthepen.

Throwback Thursday

Dear Readers,

The Colonization of the Black woman

The beauty myth

                “I’m black and I’m proud” was the black woman anthem during the Black is beautiful movement in the 60s. Nubian princesses proudly sported their natural afros, cornrows, and close cropped cut like the style fashioned by South African singer Miriam Makeba.  The current trend amongst black women in America is to display the image of what white society deems is the standards of beauty for women of color by enforcing European standards of beauty, which emphasizes a lighter skin color and a concern prescribed hair type. This type of programming deprives women of color the opportunity to express and explore their true identity because they are consistently bombarded by the media with the ideal Barbie image.  Black women are brain washed into altering their appearance to mimic that of the European or Asian woman because they are foolish to believe that they are enhancing their own beauty.

There is a fine line between enhancing ones natural attributes versus surgical alterations in order to gain acceptance. Black women who choose to mask who they are, run the risk of being labeled “sell outs” and “cowards” because they prefer to conform rather than stand firm in the belief that black is beautiful.

What Say You? Than you for stopping by Drathepen.

 

 

Fed UP

Dear Readers,

Black men are accusing black women of being angry, having bad attiudes, and difficult to be in relationships. So, here is the voice of one black women speaking out. It’s not only black women who seem to be angry and have bad attitudes, Its women in general. Women are kicking back against years of mistreatment, degradation and the forceful eyes of the male gaze. Black men are oblivious to the shift of women collectively pushing back from accepting the statues quo of how women are supposed to submit to her man. Yeah, well maybe the submissive act work back in cave men day, we are living in a advanced and modern society; where women no longer have to sit down and shut up. We have risen from the days of sufferage transforming themselves into self sufficient, educated, capable women who have disconnected ourselves from the ideology that women are supposed to be bare foot and pregnant. Women have overcome the standard norm of just being somebody’s wife, housekeeper and sexual object. Women no longer choose to reside in homes where their opinions and voices are not respected because the man Is the sole financial supporter of the home. Women are told that running after children, washing tons of laundry, overseeing homework and other school projects, serving on the PTA, cooking, cleaning, organizing carpools, braiding hair, food shopping, and balancing a tight household budget is not equal to a man bringing home a paycheck. Black Women are done with being held down, keep back, control, abused, manipulated, underpaid, and underappreciated.

So, if black men perceive black women to be angry maybe its because black men have for years gotten away with running games on them, passing black women around like rent-a- chicks, over looking them for white women, dropping seeds and not staying around for financial, physical, and emotional support for their children. Instead, black men want to spend the bulk of their lives being a player, pusher, and pimp daddy drifting from one ignorant sister to the next because some young black women haven’t discovered their self worth. Most black men are afraid of black women who are strong, focused, critical thinkers, financially secure, and emotionally stable. Sistahs have risen above the slick talk and promises of a better day, we are no longer falling prey to the black man’s idea of ” lets just see where this takes us .” Black women have become wise to the game of giving brothers the best years of their lives. Black women are not angry they are fed up with irresponsible, emotional unstable, financial lacking, unfocused, non committing black men. So, we are no longer sitting and waiting for a black prince charming who may never arrive. Black women are buying homes, cars, raising children, earning college degrees, and pulling in six figure salaries. So, to all the black men in the world who accuse black women of being angry and hard to get along with, I say, from where I stand anger looks good on me. The voice of a black women.

What say you?

PodCast

Dear Readers,  Happy 4th of July.🇱🇷

 

Photo by Aaron Schwartz on Pexels.com

I have ventured out into a new area. I have a podcast, Conversations  with J. R. Floyd, on Sound Cloud. Listed below are a few topics. Happy listening.😊

• Looking for Love
• Who are you dating? Guard your heart
• Readings from my first novel, The Waiting Game
• Broken people in relationships
• Stolen Innocence
• Trends and expectation in relationships
• Guard your emotions
• I refused to allow you to steal my joy
• Childhood scares
• Be the person you want to meet
• Empower yourself
• The stages of a relationship
• My story. My journey
• How do you use your words

The you for listening.💖

J. R.  host of Conversations with J. R. Floyd on You Tube

 

Relationship 101

Dear Readers, In today’s Society there are countless broken relationships and this leads to dysfunctional homes. Couples are felling stuck and have become complacent in their routine living arrangement, and few people are making the effort to speak up. I suggest to going back to the beginning. Take a meaningful stroll down memory lane reconnect to why you committed to a partnership. You might be surprised about what you discover and this could place you on the road to healing.

Thank you for watching.

 

The Road I’ve Traveled

 

In 2016, I embarked on a journey to explore the world of creative writing and a funny thing happened I discovered that I have a knack for telling stories and blogging about life. So, here I am three years later, and my journey has been awesome to say the least. I have self-published two short novels, The Waiting Game, a memoir of my struggles with relationship myths and how believing these myths can be damaging to women’s self-esteem. A Different Flavor of Love, chronicles the journey of a young single mother search for true love. The best news is that I created a You Tube channel, Conversations with J. R. Floyd, dedicated to exploring relationships and the lack of moral values. This has been an amazing journey of up and downs, self-discovery and renewal. I have arrived at an awareness of talents that pushed me to take risks and step outside of certain limitations to understand that I am capable of so much more than settling for the status quo. So, here I am introducing myself to the world an unknown writer, blogger and talk show host. My mission is to take my readers and viewers on a journey of discovering life beyond borders. Each month I will share what’s new in the world of J. R. Floyd, offer some tidbits of knowledge and mention some good reads, healthy life style choices, and share with you my latest episode from Conversations with J. R. Floyd. In the meantime, I encourage you to purchase one of my books available on amazon. Until then, the wait is over the choice is yours. Let’s have a Conversation.

Self Reflection

Throwback Thursday

 

The Colonization of the Black woman

The beauty myth

                “I’m black and I’m proud” was the black woman anthem during the Black is beautiful movement in the 60s. Nubian princesses proudly sported their natural afros, cornrows, and close cropped cut like the style fashioned by South African singer Miriam Makeba.  The current trend amongst black women in America is to display the image of what white society deems is the standards of beauty for women of color by enforcing European standards of beauty, which emphasizes a lighter skin color and a concern prescribed hair type. This type of programming deprives women of color the opportunity to express and explore their true identity because they are consistently bombarded by the media with the ideal Barbie image.  Black women are brain washed into altering their appearance to mimic that of the European or Asian woman because they are foolish to believe that they are enhancing their own beauty.

There is a fine line between enhancing ones natural attributes versus surgical alterations in order to gain acceptance. Black women who choose to mask who they are, run the risk of being labeled “sell outs” and “cowards” because they prefer to conform rather than stand firm in the belief that black is beautiful.