Am I the only one who feels that it is shameful that society supports and praise some women who feel that the only quality they have to offer men is their bodies. Women are carving themselves up in the name of vanity and the practice of modesty is no longer respected. Nowadays, it’s about what women are willing to show and how much. Beauty in the kingdom of women is measured by body parts meaning, breast, buttock, and lips size, in addition to the other accessories, fake hair, nails, eye lashes, and tons of makeup this has become the norm. And elegance is determined by tight transparent clothing, cleavage, and BBL’s.
We need to stop applauding women for being exhausted due to forsaking self-care and their mental and emotional health, while supporting families, working outside the home and wearing multiple hats. I don’t believe in the myth of superwomen. Society is overwhelmed with women who are physically drained, suffering from health issues, emotionally empty, depressed, oppressed, feeling trapped and ignored. Women are told that women complain too much and are never satisfied. Women give so much and get little in return.
Dear Readers, A word from dragthepen A.K.A. J. R. creator of Conversations with J. R. Floyd. Be careful when you allow family, friends and others to dictate the path of your life or behavior. Recently, I was mentally, emotionally and physically burning out, but people kept telling me to push through, or your strong you can handle it. I was advised by my circle of girlfriend if I had a man life wouldn’t be as difficult. At the end of October, I completed a 14 day fast, and talked to God. Then I took a three-day mental break. Moving forward…the smoke has cleared, and I have clarity and arrived at this conclusion that some people, places and things need to be removed from my life. Lighting the load means more time for the things that matters to me. SELF CARE AND YOUR MENTAL HEALTH MATTERS.
It is not your responsibility to change someone or make them into someone different. People are capable of change, but that should be their decision. When we encounter people, the choice is to either accept them for who they are or move on. I know that it is not easy learning to deal with other people’s pet peeves, faults, and what we see as habits. Ladies there is no prince charming so get your head out of the fairy tales, and rethink revising that long wish list of requirements for what you think will be the perfect mate. Men stop fantasizing about Beyonce or Kim Kardashian. Those are plastic Barbie dolls surgical enhanced superficial women who will not look twice at your sagging belly and receding hairline. People snap out of your daydreams and look at the person in front of you growing with disappointment because you wish she or he would change.
There is nothing wrong with wanting to be with a physically attractive person, however sometimes beautiful people come with ugly souls and bad characteristics. It is not our responsibility to nag people into becoming the ideal mate according to the impossible Standards of beauty and materialistic needs. I have learned from years of bad choices and reading and believing self-help relationship books about ” how to have the man of my dreams” for years I worked out and starved myself to create a body that men would like, only to be ignored and ill-treated. Do not feel sorry for me this was my fault, why, because the men I encountered did not asked me to change. If they were getting their needs met, they did not care about changing me because I was already what they wanted weak and desperate.
I spent thousands on clothes, hair, make up, lingerie and time and energy to improve myself to be better, so when my prince arrived there would be nothing about me that needed to change or improve. Oh, how shallow was my thinking. I was preoccupied with my outer appearance that I was not paying attention to the fact that I was suffering from low self-worth. When people struggle with low self-esteem and self-worth that is when others prey upon them because people who struggle with lack of self-confidence will allow people to change them because of the desperation to be like, love and belong.
I strived and arrived at the age of fifty-eight. Learned many lessons through difficult experiences that did make me stronger, wiser, and proceeding with caution. I do not wish for people to change to suit me because I have learned to let people be who they are and keep checking on who I am. Remember the saying, ” be careful what you wish for because you just might get it”. When you create the monster, you must learn to live with what you created.
What do you do on the days you don’t want to push through? I get it when people say “this too shall pass, and feelings don’t come to last”, but today I don’t want to push through.
There’s not a dark cloud in the sky making me feel blue because the sun is shining through.
Why is it on this day I can’t push through? I don’t want to drag this weight on my back, This burden of emotional sack, why have you come to attack?
Yesterday, I was on the right track, but today, things just don’t seem right. I close my eyes and breathe hoping to reset, recharge, energize, only to realize today I just can’t push through.
Then a thought occured, why am I asking myself to do something I am unable to do? Maybe, I don’t need to push through. I said, ” self It’s okay to delay the deadlines or not to be all that I can be today.”
After all who am I hurting? What harm am I causing? No one will be disappointed if I can’t push through today. And even if there is a moment of disappointment, oh well, ” this to shall pass.”
To the people who arrive at a day that you can’t push through, it’s okay. It’s a burden to be strong and smile everyday. Sometimes the rain is too much to bear and when these days come it is okay not to be okay. It’s important to recognize what your feeling and why you can’t push through, most important be kind to yourself.
People will say to you push through and you will be okay, they mean well, but this is horrible advice. You don’t always have to be strong, brave, smiling, positive, superwoman or superman,or the life of the party. How you feel on the days you can’t push through is important. We live in a society that has adapted bad habits of ignoring the warning signs when our bodies and spirits signals us to slow down, and pay attention before hitting that brick wall.
On the day you can push through don’t. Take a break.The world will continue without you. It always has and will. Remember, Self Matters.
People often say, ” it’s the little things that matter.” I say the little things become the best parts of our lives. I often write about how grateful I am to experience living in peace, and for some people experiencing peace might not be such a big deal. On the contrary, for me reaching a level of clarity and understanding of how drama from outside and inside my home contributed to me sinking into depression is a very big discovery. As long as I have known myself, my life have been one long tragedy, and I didn’t know how or when I was going to get off the wild roller coaster of one traumatic experience after another. It seemed like I was a magnet for chaos. But I digress, today’s post isn’t about the emotional damage of depression, but how I’ve achieved inner peace, maintain a healthy emotional and mental balance, and why I am determined to protect the peace in my life.
I use to mistake the peace in my home as loinliness and a punishment for not settling for abusive and unhappy. relationships. I thought that the peace in my home was the costly price I’ve paid for choosing my emotional healing. I took for granted that the peace in my home was a means of me being selfish because I didn’t want others, especially a man to intrude, so I shut my doors keeping them out.
Some people think of me as being odd, an introvert, difficult to get along with, secretive, strange, and some say sneaky. I make no apologies I’ve changed, no I have been transformed, and I can’t run with the same pack anymore. In the presence of peace my creative mind is free of chatter and distractions of other people’s needs. In the moments of peace I soak in the presence of my own company, kicking up my feet and enjoying the sound of my own laugher because there is no one around to tell me that I am too loud.
My peace means freedom from the burdens of being criticize for being too much or not enough. My freedom means that I can choose to be or not to be. My peace is healing making me stronger, self reliance, and in my strength I am capable of achieving my goals, and to create the life I deserve without the burden of him or them reminding me of my limitations or should I say the limitations that others were placing on me. I respect and own my peace and freedom because I know the burden of living and only knowing chaos and dysfunctional environments. At my worse I know that there was another way to live, but I didn’t know how to get to the other side.
I write and share about my experiences because I know that there are others out there who are struggling to find peace in their homes and in their lives. There are people who claim to have it all, the home, career, money and the perfect relationship, but that’s only what we see on the outside. I personally know people who are glad for soical media to use as a means to fake and escape their unhappiness. I can’t tell you the countless times people have said to me, ” they wish for a little peace and alone time” or that ” they should have made better choices” and the big one, ” if they could turn back the hands of time they would live life differently.” Today, I am overjoyed that I am not one of those people, and l and don’t take for granted that I have the chance to live a better quality of life.
In the presence of my peace, I take my time making well throughout decisions. I don’t open the door inviting everyone into my life because I think that they are good people. My home is not just walls and floors it’s sacrificed. Everything in my home has meaning the colors, smells, the food I cook, and even the manner I clean my home represents me on the inside and outside, and all the people who I chose to enter my home will be a representative of my peace.
To be honest I never thought that I would see the day when I would be in a position of peace. And from where I sit it’s a beautiful place to be.
In an ideal world I would have loved to wake up to the warm body of the man I love and a breakfast tray brought to my bed. I grind hard and would enjoy spending this perfect cozy, lazy Saturday with my partner who appreciates me and the effort I put into life and making our partnership a priority. Unfortunately, we don’t live in an ideal world. I woke up along, but praise God for the warm bed and roof over my head. I made my own breakfast tray and enjoy resting in bed before heading out to complete the business of the day. Life would be made easier with a help mate who truly understand that a relationship is a partnership with a balance of two people sharing the daily tasks of life. I am blessed that I am able to take care of myself, but this isn’t the way the creature planned for a man and woman to be alone. Most people like myself choose singleness over settling . I haven’t given up on love I choose to love me and wait until the man who is truly right for me to enters my life. Love yourself you are worth it💖
Dear Readers, The information that we gain over time through experiences is what shapes us. How many time have you hear people say, ” I wish I knew then what I know now.” maybe I would have made better choices. I say, what you didn’t know then wasn’t for you to know. We are a result of our experiences whether negative or positive it’s because we work with the information we are given, and sometimes we work with what we think we know on our own. It is never too late to use the new information that we are given in order to make out life better. Thank you for watching and don’t forget to like this video.
Many years ago I read Self Matters by Dr. Phil, In the Meantime and Value in the Valley, by Iyanla Vanzant, this was in the 90s, at that time I was under the silly notion that reading these books was going to make me a better person for the next relationship.
Here it is 24 years later, and I revisited these same books and the message is much clearer. Why? Today, I have better understanding that seeking to be a better me for the sake of a relationship was at the root of me thinking that I needed validation as a women, and this validation depended on whether I was successfull in a relationship.
What I did not understand then was how to value my experiences even when they were painful, and emotionally damaging. I did not receive the lesson that I was supposed to be better for me. So the more I worked at being better for the next relationship the less I knew about me.
I did not know that I was supposed to learn lessons about why I seeked out men who were only interested in the physical aspect of the relationship. I did not comprehend that the time in between relationships should be used for self reflection. I did not want to be alone and I thought the cure for my loneliness was a man. I was unaware that the period of transition from one relationship to the next is called the “meantime”… a time to heal, reflect, and wait. My in the meantime meant crying, depression, drinking, and trying to figure out ways to make him come back. It was always about the relationship because I did not know that self mattered until I read Dr. Phil’s book. What I gathered is this that a dyfuncational self leads to attracting dyfuncational and abusive men.
The value in my experience taught me what wasn’t working and why. I was putting too much attention nursing my pain and thinking this isn’t going to happen again, but it did happen more times than I care to count.
I blamed men. I convinced myself that they were mean, abusive, cold, heatless, lairs, cheaters, cheap and can not be trusted. After years of soul searching, healing and learning about myself, I understand my role in opening the door for the abuse. I believed the lies because I did not want to face the truth. I knew the men I was involved with were cheaters and cheap. They weren’t heartless and cold these men did not want to be emotionally connected to me they way I desired. The men from my past knew that I had low self esteem, and that I hadn’t discovered my self worth. They saw me as an opportunity and a means to an end.
As difficult as this may be to hear there is Value in our Experiences. While we are going through the darkness we can’t see the lessons. It is when we step away from the drama, and push through to the light we can come to terms with the experiences that teach the lessons that brings awareness.
dragthepen 