You are stronger than you know

Are you hurting? 

Well you are not alone!

Does it hurt really bad? 

Cry! But then get back up once you are done crying and get back in the game (whatever it is).
Don't waste your pain but reward yourself for the hurt by getting to the next level.
Every time I am hurt I make it a point to shift myself to a higher level than I was before the pain happened. I no longer play a pity party every time I experience pain but take it as an opportunity to grow. 

What you are made up of is not judged by how well you celebrate the good times but by how well you handle your bad days. 

No matter how painful the pain, how great the set back, how bad the failure  or how great the loss, feel the pain but don't give up. 

 Don't judge your future based on what's going on in your life right now. Whatever you are going through has not come to stay but to test you and pass by. Have an attitude that says no matter how tough it gets or how much it hurts I am going to pass the test.  Don't let the cloudy days and the storms intimidate you.

The storm in your life right now is trying to teach you something very important but  you are so busy being mad and feeling sorry for yourself that you are about to miss out the hidden blessings.

What if you let few people walk away and you wave them good bye when they leave instead of hanging onto the memory of who you wanted someone to be?
Trust me it will all be worth it. You are going to look back on things you are crying about and be grateful that you went through it all.

You are so much stronger than you know but how are you going to figure that out unless you are tested by the challenges.
Trust me when this storm in your life is over and if you do not give up, you are going to find yourself in next level (much higher).
The very reason many of us get stuck at one point in life is because of our feelings and emotions that is filled with bitterness toward the world. When we are bitter it mostly hinders our growth.

The pain that used to bug me yesterday doesn't affect me anymore because I made it a point to learn my lessons instead of whining over the pain.
I have learned that it is always darkest  before the dawn so when you think you can no more tolerate the pain just hang in there a little longer because you never know how close you are to the light.

Don't stop fighting as long as you  have life to live. You got to have a vision that pulls you because the pull is what helps you go long way.
All the people I know who are(were) great and are doing (did) great things, the ones I have seen, read about and heard of are (were) the ones who despite the pain walked that extra mile when the others gave up.

When it hurts keep going because the very fact that it's hurting is because you are going to the next level. There is always another level so you got push yourself and raise the bar. Whenever you are tempted to give up remember that in that very moment you are writing your legacy. The key is believing in yourself when no one believes in you and your abilities.

Get out of the comfort zone and be tough. Use your pain as the fuel to drive you to your success and to better version of you.

Keep up the good fight!
 Live beautiful!

The lesson my wounded fingers taught me

Last Wednesday was a holiday for me and I was home. I wanted to make myself a glass of lemonade so I went to the kitchen and as I was trying to cut the lemon in two halves  I cut my index finger and middle finger instead. The cut was pretty deep, my fingers started bleeding real bad and the pain was quite severe. I was mad at myself for not being able to cut just a lemon without hurting myself. As I ran to get some antiseptic and band-aid I was cursing myself for being so clumsy.

Suddenly I realized that I was being so harsh on myself, it was as if my wounded fingers were trying to tell me that instead of getting mad I should be taking care of my fingers at this moment.  I immediately stopped for a moment and pondered upon it. I then apologized my fingers for hurting and as soon as I did that the pain somehow started subsiding. 

 In that moment I became mindful of the way I was treating myself for every mistake. As I was thinking about it, I went into the flash back, to all those times when I failed, got my heart broken,  made wrong choices , etc. I am very good at forgiving others but when it comes forgiving myself I I have not been able to do the same.

 I had to understand that every mistake I made along the way was based on the best of my knowledge and circumstances at that point and time. My intention was always right but I lacked the knowledge. I have talked about this is in one of my previous posts titled 'I didn't know any better'.

We all grow with time so we got to learn to be patient and gentle with ourselves. Being patient and gentle doesn't mean you just sit and suffer, but it means that you carry your hurt with grace without waiting to be pulled out of it. If you are just sitting with pain and waiting to be pulled out, then there is a danger that you may end up playing the blame game. I have learned to take complete responsibility for my life. Whatever I went through in my life I have no one to blame, not even myself, but I believe I needed every challenges, failures, heartbreaks and difficulties to be the person I am today.
I believe so strongly that,  'whatever happens in life doesn't happen to us but happens for us'.

I also believe that each one of us is better and stronger than we think.

Life has thrown many tests in each of our lives in the form of challenges, hurt, betrayal, discouragement or disappointments but the very fact that we are still breathing and living our lives in itself is a proof that we are not defeated. We are the victors and not the victims.We got to stop feeling sorry for ourselves and start being proud instead.
We all have made many mistakes along the the way but life changes every single second so we can start over with a new beginning any time.  It's all about shifting focus and understanding that we are exactly where we need to be in our life right now.

Life is a beautiful journey but it's not always easy. We go through difficult situations in life so that we grow and understand ourselves better. When we understand ourselves better we find the strength to grow up into a more stronger, confident and better humans.

Our capacity to love others and ourselves is defined by how much we have healed our past hurts, forgiven others and ourselves, and let our hearts expand to hold love. If we accumulate all of our past hurts, our capacity to love shrinks.

So the lesson my wounded fingers taught me was that I got to love, forgive and accept myself not only others because living a beautiful life without being able to do so is impossible. I hope we all learn to love, forgive and accept ourselves wherever we are in life.

Live beautiful!!!

Keep the dream alive

I like the the fact that faith is believing in what you don't see and it sounds so very true. Many people  changed the world because they saw the world differently, way before any one could.  There are many great people who inspire me to keep my dream alive, one of them is Martin Luther King Jr.  

Martin Luther King Jr. was a Civil Rights Leader who was best known for his non-violent ways and fought for equality. Though slavery was made illegal in the United States but life was very difficult  for the black Americans in those days.

 In Martin Luther King Jr.'s most memorable speech, 'I have a dream', he expresses his dream where people will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character and that was back in the days when it seemed almost impossible that his dream would come true. He saw and believed way before anyone could see what he was dreaming of. Today it is nothing unusual, he saw years into the future. He didn't even live to see his dream come true but no one can take away his contribution to the world. We know how great a man he was and though it's been almost 50 years since he has left the earth but he has not been forgotten by the world. 

For sure it didn't always go well with him but he never gave up on his dream.
He ended up in prison, 

some people didn't like him , he was jailed over 20 times, he was stabbed , his house was bombed, he was threatened very often and most of his days were hard but he never gave up fighting for equality. 

Yes he was shot but he died a hero and lived a life worth remembering for generations to come. His accomplishments are known world wide today. A bullet couldn't stop his message or his dream to come true. 

His 'mountaintop speech' which was his last speech was filled with words of a true hero and it goes like this,

"Well I don't know what will happen now. But I am not concerned about that now. I just want to do God's will. He's allowed me to go to the mountain. And I've looked over. And I've seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the Promised Land! 

And I am so happy, tonight.

I am not worried about anything

I am not fearing any man!

Mine eyes have seen the Glory of the coming of the Lord!!!"

You and I may not have a dream as big as Martin Luther King Jr.'s  but whatever our dreams may be we got to keep them alive. We may not be able to see our dreams come true any time soon but that doesn't mean we give up.
If only we can say "I have seen the promised Land" when we come to the end of our lives, I believe we can leave the earth in peace knowing we did our part and did not waste our life in vain. 

So what's your dream?
Whatever it may be, irrespective of how big or small I hope you keep it alive and not let it die specially when you are most tempted to give up. Remember that everybody who has ever been great had an option to give up several times and faced many obstacles along the way. It is not easy to keep going when the going gets tough so we got to have enough faith to see into the future.

Although it maybe painful and tiring, you may feel like quitting because you don't see any progress but  keep pushing forward believing that you are going to see your dream come true somewhere down the line. If you give up and let your dream die you are not going see the beauty of your dream come true. You got to be able to see something you are not before you can be it. Wherever you are in your life is temporary, you are not going stay there forever.

You got to do what you were born to do because it's who you are. You are going to get knocked down every now and then but don't you dare give up, get back up, continue to keep up the good fight and keep your dream alive. It will all be worth at the end.

Keep your dream alive!!

Are you using your time to learn?

Steve Jobs was terminally ill and he was going to die when he spoke at Stanford University to the graduating students. He said to the students "Your time is limited so don't waste it living someone else's life". 

How are you living your life today? Are you making good use of your time? 

I wish I would have known what I am writing today when I was much younger but never the less I am grateful I know it now. 

I wish I would have utilized my time more productively. I see people disappearing from the phase of earth just like that. We recently lost a great man Muhammad Ali and like all the people who leave, we all will have to leave some day or the other. Life is too short and so we don't have eternity on earth to take all the time we want to learn. 

Just imagine how would your life be if you could learn things much faster than an average person. An average person has to make the same mistake at least 10 times to learn the lesson from the mistake, what if you could learn your lesson the first time? An average person takes years to quit smoking, what if you you could quit right away? The average person struggles with their weight their whole life, what if you could learn to lose weight right away?

I know it is going to bring amazing results and there are ways to learn to do everything. All we got to do is try and find the answer for every how. We might die without knowing the answers to the
 simple 'hows' and the worst thing would be if we never bothered to find the answers. 

To quote from the Bible, Hosea 4:6 says, "My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge". Many of us make wrong choices and decisions because we do not know any better.  We do what we know is the best but what if what we know is not the best? 

For most of the history people thought that the world was flat, smart people like Socrates, Plato, Aristotle lived their whole life not knowing that the earth is round, but you and I discovered the that fact by time we were 6 or 7 years of age or maybe even younger. 

We are living at the right time and everything that we need is within our reach, it's just the matter of learning to get them. You may ultimately learn the little secrets of life and you are definitely going to live a better life once you start learning the secrets. I don't know about you but I don't want to be 70 years of age and then be wise, smart or happy, I want to be all these while I am still young because what if I don't get to live that long. 

The person who is able to learn quickly is always ahead.

So how do we learn then? To be a learner we got to be humble because without true humility it is impossible to get to the truth. I like to take every opportunity to learn. Learn from everyone and every moment. Don't let go of anything or any person without getting a lesson from them. 

What are you doing to learn?
Do you know that there are answers for most of your questions?
Are you listening to the wise and the experts who have figured out the answers to your questions?

I definitely don't want to waste my time trying to figure out if the earth is really round but I am going to trust the experts on that. 

Issac Newton once said , "If I have seen further it is only by standing on the shoulders of giants." So are you standing on the shoulders of giants? If not You better start. We are living in a generation when it is not so difficult to find mentors and learn from the experts. I am taking full advantage of the modern facilities, reading from the best sources, listening to the best, looking up to people who are way ahead of me. 

I try not to worry about making mistakes because I learn from the mistakes, but  I don't have time to make all the mistakes and then learn, so I would rather learn from the mistakes of others. So I take every opportunity to learn from peoples' mistakes not just mine. 

From what I have learned, we can get out of a relationship not worth staying right away, we can let go of toxic people right away and we can stop making unhealthy choices right away. Our lives are the cumulative effect of every decision we make and so we got to learn to make good decisions. The good decisions can only be made if we have good knowledge and so we got to take every opportunity to gain good knowledge/information.

Shun the arrogance and learn,  you are going to end up happier and more satisfied. Be humble and be smart at the right time. What are you waiting for? Start learning whatever it is you are trying to learn. Remember your time is limited so you can not afford to waste it.

"The beautiful thing about learning is no body can take it away from you." ~B.B King

Begin now !!!
Live Beautiful!!!

Perfect fit at the right season

 On this journey of life I have learned many great lessons and one lesson I am really grateful for in particular is learning to let go. I have learned that every time I am stepping into a new season I have to let go of certain things and some people from my life. I am grateful for each and every person and situation that crossed my way but I am also grateful that they left at the right time making space for the new ones. There was a time when it used to bother me every time I had to let go of people who I really loved but now I have come to understand that it's not a bad thing after all. I am especially grateful for those who walked with me some distance and then made an exit at the RIGHT time. 

Recently I was rearranging my clothes from my wardrobe. I had so many clothes many of which I don't wear anymore because they don't fit my current style. My wardrobe was pretty messy and it didn't look good at all. So I finally decided to rearrange and I found so many clothes that I wouldn't wear anymore. There was time when those clothes were perfect for me but I have grown and my taste in clothes have changed with time. I was however keeping them lying there in the wardrobe hoping that I might wear them someday. I didn't even realize that I had no space for the clothes that fit my current taste because the space was all occupied by clothes that doesn't fit my taste any more.  So I had to dispose of more than 60% of my wardrobe  and now it is much easier for me to find a comfortable wear.  

Like me most of us have this tendency of keeping things and people even when their part in our life is over. It's very important to clear up the mess in our life every now and then, be it people or stuffs. The people who walked with you yesterday may not be able to walk with you today and if you do not let go then just like my wardrobe someday suddenly you will realize that all the people you have been trying to drag along are nothing but mess. They are going to occupy all the space that there will be no space for those who fit in your life in this new season. 

Just like I can't be mad at clothes that doesn't fit me anymore, I can't be mad at people who doesn't fit into my life in this new season. I have to understand that there was a time when they did fit in perfectly and be grateful to them for that but in this new season it's wise to let go.  I have had many people (people I really loved) who left me and some I had to leave. To be honest it was never easy, it did hurt but when I look back today I am grateful that some left on their own and some I had the strength to leave. Today I have no complaints against those who left me and also no regrets that I was the one to leave some. I am grateful for each and every person who came into my life, taught me some important lessons and then left at the right time.  

Steve Jobs was so right in saying, "You can't connect the dots looking forward you can only connect them looking backwards."

Just because people leave doesn't mean they are bad people, it just means their part in your story is over and so you got to move on to the next part without them.  If someone was meant for you they would have been with you and if they are not then you got to understand they are not meant for you in this new season.   Let go and wait for the next best thing that is about happen in your life.

 Live beautiful!!!!!

Beauty of brokenness

"Our life is full of brokenness - broken relationships, broken promises, broken expectations. How can we live with that brokenness without becoming bitter and resentful except by returning again and again to God's faithful presence in our lives. " ~ Henry Nouwen

 I am sure each one of us have been through that phase of life when we were completely broken. I have been through it several times and I keep going through that process, as weird as it may sound, there is a part of me that gets excited every time I am broken. I have a love-hate kind of relationship with brokenness. I am not denying the fact that it is indeed a very painful process but I feel so close to God in my brokenness. At times I ask God to keep me broken if that's the only way I am going to be close to Him because I can not express the joy I feel in His presence.

I no longer think there is anything wrong with feeling hurt, crying, doubting, worrying and making mistakes. I wouldn't try and resist brokenness because it keeps me humble and helps me grow.  I am not trying to fix myself anymore. I have learned to accept and love myself irrespective of my brokenness, mistakes and the imperfections.

If you have never hit the rock bottom in your life you will never understand what I am talking about but if you are able to relate to me, I would like to acknowledge you for being so brave and for never giving up on life.

Only when everything falls apart you get to witness your true strength.  Every brokenness in my life has brought out the best in me and revealed to me things I never knew about myself. I never came out on the other side of my brokenness as the same old me but I always met with a better version of myself.
 I never want to stop growing and being a better version of myself so I am constantly preparing myself for the trials I may face. I don't want to be unprepared and give in when I face the difficult situations but I want to be brave enough and stand strong. 

Learn to accept and appreciate the brokenness in life and trust me you will be able to witness the true beauty of brokenness.

Yes I am broken and my brokenness is my blessing and my badge of honor!

Live beautiful and stay broken. 

I didn't know any better

One of Maya Angelou's greatest lessons to Oprah was "when You know better, You do better" and this has been one of the best lessons for me as well.

I have made many mistakes along the way be it  a small or a big one but I have come to understand that all I did yesterday was because that was the best I knew.

I have learnt not to be a prisoner to my mistakes and the guilt that comes along.  

I look back and laugh at myself for the choices I  made along the way but I have no regrets because I did what I knew best at that point of time. I am grateful for today because I realize how far I have come and how much I have grown. As I laugh at the choices I have made in the past, I realize that the future me is going to do the same at the present me. That's how I am going to know that I have grown. In the process of growing up I am not going to keep myself from experiencing life. I am going to live my life to the fullest and I know I will make many mistakes along the way but I am gonna keep doing what I know best to do at a point of time. 

I know if I write this post tomorrow it will be much better than what I am writing today because I will know better tomorrow than what i know today but I am not going to wait till tomorrow . I know I will see lot of mistakes in my post when i read it tomorrow but I am not going to try and edit it but I am just gonna let it be and laugh at it and tell my self I didn't know any better. 

Wow! it's such a relief knowing that it doesn't have to be perfect. All I got to say is "I didn't know any better." Ha ha ha ha

I am just gonna live my life today not worrying if I am going to regret about it tomorrow. If tomorrow I don't like the way I lived my life or the way I wrote this post today, I am just gonna say "Ï didn't know and better" and then move on. 

Live beautiful!!!!

I am a Work in progress

I have been learning about who I was, who I am and who I am becoming and it has occurred to me that it is not about just one part but many cycles of my life. I have come to understand that no matter who I was yesterday, life keeps taking me through an evolution that changes the definition of who I am.  I see a piece of me in all women and it feels like I have lived many lives. I have come to a point in my life where I realize that I needed every wrong decision, every wrong choice, every tear, every heartbreak and every challenge to become who I am today.  I have learned to break out of the paradigm of who I thought I was so that I don’t place limit on who I am becoming. I know I will get it wrong many a times, I will make mistakes along the way and I will be disappointed but that’s all OK because my greatest lessons in life have birth forth from the moments when I got it all wrong. I have learned that I need not pretend and put a mask to cover up my mistakes because when I am comfortable with my imperfections, I don’t judge and use someone else's mistakes as an opportunity to feel superior or better.  I have reached to a point in my life from where I can look back at all that I have gone through and see beauty in all of that.  I am constantly evolving and constantly changing.  I am not afraid of what’s on the other side of the change. I would never restrict myself to one definition of who I am because I am a work in progress.

I don’t have all the answers and I haven’t figured it all out yet. I will never have all the answers but that’s perfectly OK with me.  I admit that I am a work in progress and I am proud of that because the work is excellent. I don’t need to figure it all out, I am just going to enjoy the process and not worry about the finish product because I am pretty confident the finish product will be beautiful.

keep growing and stay beautiful!

The Best is yet to come

Wow! We are stepping into a new year 2016 and I have so much to be grateful for 2015. 

As we bid farewell to  2015 I am grateful for the beautiful year that has gone by.  It has been a very blessed year and it has taught me very good lessons. I have learned that life is beautiful irrespective of what does or doesn’t happen. I have been blessed with a beautiful life and that is what I am most grateful for. I have had difficult times no doubt but at the end of the day I have had many reasons to be thankful for. Yes I did go through situations where I was tempted to give up being grateful and I did run into people who tempted me to do the same. But I realized that those circumstances and the people were not permanent in my life. So I learned not to let something that is temporary in my life ruin the beauty of my life. One of the most important lessons I learned this past year was that there is nothing such as bad circumstances or bad people; they are just there to test us and help us grow. I have come to a point in my life where I have learned to be grateful for all the difficult circumstances and difficult people in my life because these circumstances and the people are what help us get to a higher level in life.

 I have learned that challenges are what help us grow in life so I am always ready for the challenges.

I know 2016 is going to be another blessed year , I am very confident that many blessings are heading my way with my name written all over and some of these blessings may come disguised as challenges so I am going to prepare myself and be geared up  to receive every blessing that is coming my way be it in any form. I believe that the blessings that i have received in the past would be nothing compared to the blessings that are heading my way. The Best is yet to come and I am very excited. Are you believing the same? If yes, then get excited!

Blessed New Year beautiful people and I hope you are all prepared to welcome the New Year and all the blessings it is bringing along with it.

Be grateful, Stay beautiful, and stay blessed. 

With love,

Deborah

Inner Voice

Have you ever taken some time to listen to yourself?

There are many voices that you will keep hearing. With today’s technology and everything around us it is indeed very difficult to listen to that voice inside of us. In today’s’ world,  we have this obsession of being occupied every second. If it’s not the work it’s the television, the social media, the friends, the family, the food, the drink, the worry etc. We have somehow by default learned to keep our selves occupied with something or the other because we have been told that ‘an empty mind is the devil’s workshop’. Yes that may be true (I have no say on this) if it’s kept empty for a very long time, it may become devil’s workshop but if we do not take time to empty our mind and shut everything around us for a little while every now and then, and listen to our inner voice we might not be living to our full potential.

I do not know about you but there is nothing that scares me more than not living my life to my full potential. For someone like me it’s not very difficult to shut up everything around me for sometime every once in a while because I find great pleasure in doing that. Every time I do that I discover something new about myself and I realize that I am capable of more than I ever realized. Maybe it won’t be easy for many but it will totally be worth.

You do not need to agree with me but if there is a small part of you asking you to listen to your inner voice, once in a while try that out. You can thank me later. 

Love,

Deborah