How often do we find ourselves holding on to some past slight with both hands as if letting go would prove to be a sign of weakness? How often do we feel as though we need to validate every action that we take as proof that we are better than some bugger from our past treated us?
I look around at this world, at social media, at the news and I find it very difficult to see the good that I know is out there. It seems that everyone has their chip on their shoulder or their person or group or reason to blame for something not going right in their life, or their happiness not being met.
I started following a single parent group on social media and every post that they put up was some sort of male bashing, I am woman hear me roar, cliche… Now don’t get me wrong, I am all for girl power, but not at the sake of half the population, and not all single parents are women. I, personally, was raised by a single dad who belonged to that same organization.
When I commented as such and that we shouldn’t be placing blame on any specific side, the moderator responded, “well, it can be used for men too”. That wasn’t the point. Firstly, none of the posts were about men, and secondly, most of the time when a marriage falls apart there is not one side to blame. Most of the time there is plenty of blame to go around so to have a support group who posts things that fan the flames of anger seems the opposite of support.
Part of growing is understanding what we have done wrong in our past. It’s understanding our faults and our mistakes and missteps so we can learn to avoid them in the future. If we spend all of our time ranting in our “support” groups about how we were wronged, or how every bad thing that happened fell upon the shoulders of another, then we are no more prepared for our next journey than we were for our last.
When I think of empowerment I do not think of all the ways that we are better than someone else. I do not think of all the things that we can and should be doing to bring down another person or group. I think of ways that we should raise ourselves and each other up. We do not need to steps on the heads of our perceived enemies in order to rise, we just need to give each other a hand or a leg up.
There is plenty of anger and resentment in this world, and it doesn’t actually help anyone. This isn’t just a male/female issue either, it’s time we let go of all of it. That bully from 3rd grade probably either doesn’t remember you so it’s not worth letting them have power over you now, or had more issues in his life than you could have in a lifetime and didn’t know how to express is. That teacher that made learning impossible was one year… how many years ago? Your parents… oh God.. your parents were a mess.. yup.. they were human. They made mistakes. They made poor choices… maybe they were straight up a**holes, but who cares? I mean really… they messed up enough of your years as a child, now you are the adult and you have the ability to make your own choices. Are you going to be one of those adults, like your parents, who constantly makes the wrong ones, or are you going to step up and learn from those mistakes.
I see so many people who make excuses about why they can’t hold jobs, or have good relationships, or be good parents, and usually it’s because of how someone treated them in the past. How does that make any sense? You are telling me that you have the right to be a loser.. because your parents were losers and you hated them for it? Umm… not to sound to harsh, but grow up.. live YOUR life. Tomorrow your parents will be gone, that bully will be a memory, and those feelings… they can either percolate and control your future, or they can be released.. and you can understand that no one, not even parents or teachers, are perfect. That we all have our demons. We all make our own choices based on our own limited experiences… which experiences do you want to shape your life? Which life do you want to grow?
We are all aware of addiction as a horrible disease. People who suffer from it destroy not only their own lives but cause serious damage to those around them. When a person is so consumed with something outside of them-self they can’t manage to do or think about anything else.. they put other things on the back burner.. they lose them-self to that addiction that is a deadly sin.
My son was watching a cartoon… (yes.. he does that a lot.. no judgement.. it’s been snowing….. A LOT I’d never get anything done!) and the kids in the show were caught lying and were sat down and told to never lie. That lying hurts every situation and that it’s just bad to lie in general. Of course this backfired, and the kids just walked around saying what ever they were thinking, up to and including telling people they stink, they’re ugly, their cooking tastes bad.. what have you. So now the teachers had to try a new tactic and tried explaining that sometimes it’s ok to lie and sometimes it’s not and there are reasons for lying and for not.. and so on.
Unconditional love is spoken about a lot.. almost as a fairy tale. As if it were an ideal that people could never actually live up to. Relationships fall apart just as fast as they come together. Divorce rates are growing while marriage rates are dropping. No one can say forever anymore, and because of that unconditional love seems like the unicorn of feelings… but here’s the thing. Love isn’t about staying together. Love isn’t about rings. Love doesn’t even have to be romantic.
being raised in the US we celebrated all of the commercial Christian holidays: Christmas, Easter… and to a lesser extent Halloween. My father read me the children’s Bible when I was younger, but that was half out of obligation to my mother who gave it to me, and half because he felt that it was part of our modern culture and he wanted me to be educated on it.
blood sugar levels would drop to the point where he would become hypothermia and the paramedics spent a lot of time at my house. My father, however, was still working and paying most of the bills while I worked at home part-time teaching ESL online to people across the world nights after my son went to sleep .
to accept failure. Most people are much more comfortable with self deprecation than we are accepting a compliment. If someone says, “wow, you look great, have you lost weight?”. The receiver automatically feels uncomfortable and makes up some excuse about being sick, or “maybe a little”, or brushes it off as if it’s no big deal. But it is a big deal. Anything that you work hard at is.
Even those who are successful in whatever aspect of their lives still feel the need to put down anyone who wants start. Slim, healthy people make fun of overweight people who are beginning to exercise. As if “who does that person think they’re fooling?”. Why do they have to be fooling anyone? Why does their life choices to try to be better at something automatically put others on the defensive.
candles and pouring salt, it’s all very pagan traditions… which is fine, just not my cup ‘a. Anyway… the whole point is to get the person to try new things and to spend more time in their own head. There is a lot of sitting in silence and meditating.. which I do believe in.
have a strong self value. Who understand that if they work hard they can accomplish anything. Then “Positive thinking” comes up and they start commenting about how “You can’t think yourself to success… you can’t just think, ‘I’m successful’ and become successful… that’s all woo woo crap that con artists use to delude the desperate out of their money.”
Everyone wants to change.. without actually changing. These same people will see the new and improved, healthier person out at dinner or a party and say, “oh, you can have some cake”.. or the drink.. or what have you, “you have to live a little” or “a little won’t kill you” or something along those lines.
is trying to bully them or sabotage them. I think most people are just trying to include their friends. I think that most people just want to act like the food is not a big deal, but it is.. to some people, and pretending that it’s not doesn’t help anyone. That being said, there are some that go the other way. There are those “friends” that don’t want you to succeed because they haven’t. You know the old saying, “Misery loves company”.
even getting a better job, be careful of your peers. Be careful of those who seem to always lead you down the path of the dark side… with those cookies. You know the voices that you hear in your head that say it’s ok… you can just have one… well, they are hard enough to ignore. When you hear them from those who love you it’s even more challenging.
Katrina Michelle Russell 