This is 34

 

For my 34th birthday, someone told me to think about how far I have come in the past 17 years after they wished me a Happy Birthday.  I have to admit that I didn't give it much thought until yesterday when while talking to my husband I ended up pointing out what I had accomplished in just the last decade.  Then I thought, what had happened the 7 years prior to that? And I decided to make a list only because I feel that there are others out there who might be in similar positions as I was and it might help them keep the fight.  Another reason was that it would be a healthy reminder to myself and others that I should never be underestimated. 

So, how far have I come in the past 17 years?  Here it goes...

When I turned 17, I had already graduated high school and I was living with a man who had brought me to this country years prior with the promise that he would pay for my college studies.  That promise never came.  As a matter of fact, once I graduated high school at the young age of 16 he told me that I had to figure out how to pay for my own health insurance and that the only thing he would give me would be room and board along with $500 for college.  During this time I was still waiting for my residency papers so I couldn't start school but I could work, the problem was that I was a minor and minors were supposed to be insured by their parents.  This was a concept he did not understand, but that is part of him being abusive.

The household I lived in consisted of my biological father and his wife.  Both had previous marriages and both had children from those previous marriages.  Every time they fought, which was often because Mario never liked being late for anything and she was always late for everything, the family was divided by him.  He would call on HIS children and take them with him while calling her children HERS and blaming her for how "bad" they behaved.  This happened every single time something fun was planned, as well as every single holiday. 

There were too many instances when I had to walk in the dark through alleys because he refused to get in the car at 10pm and drive two miles to pick me up from work.  I always felt I was already taking care of myself, the only thing that I was not doing was paying rent because I was even buying myself food outside the house every time I worked.  By the time I turned 18, he forced me to buy a car on his terms.  I was going to pay for it, it would be financed under just my name (which was not a bad thing) but he got to tell me what car I would be allowed to purchase.  It had to be certain years old, had a certain amount of miles, and a certain price.  I agreed because he said that he and his wife would help me with a downpayment, they would give me, I believe $1000 for the downpayment with the notion that I had to save too.  I did, but I remember that something happened that I was forced to use some of that money, and guess what? Suddenly they would not give me any money for a down payment cause I didn't save enough, however, I was still to buy a car under their terms.  

My then-boyfriend offered to help me because he knew what had happened was out of my control and said well, if I lend you the money then they will have to give you the full $1000 right? then you can get a better vehicle.  It turned out that no, they would not do it because it was not the money I had saved.  Mind you that up until this point I was a child who didn't get into trouble and was often focused on my studies.  I mean, I would have to do well in school in order to graduate by the age of 16, right?  I ended up buying the car he wanted me to buy, which broke down just a year later because well... it was a Ford.

After getting the car, my boyfriend and I decided to move in together.  At this time, my biological father's wife was pregnant and made the announcement.  When I told him that I was moving out, all hell broke loose.  Suddenly, I would never meet my baby sibling, I was a selfish person for leaving the house, and my boyfriend would realize how terrible of a person I was and he would abandon me because of it.  After that, he told me how I would then come back crawling for a place to stay and he would say no, then went on to throw me out of his house.  I left his house that day but the day I left to move out of the state as planned, I was told to come to say bye.  When I arrived, he pretended that he had said nothing and was "wishing me well."  There was no apology, no acknowledgement that he had done anything wrong only him gaslighting me by now telling me he wished me well and how he was proud of me.  

During this time, I never knew that all he was doing was actual abuse.  I ended up living with that boyfriend for about a year, I went on to buy a brand new car, have different experiences from not having a place to live (mostly cause I didn't really want to), leaving in a hotel room, being raped by a coworker and then being fired because they didn't want their best employee to get into trouble.  By the time I turned 19, after having another altercation with my biological father because my grandmother, who was visiting the United States wanted to be dropped off at his house that night after I had gotten out of work at 9pm.  It was a 3-hour drive and she threatened to grab a cab to his place which I would not let her do.  She couldn't wait until my day off, so there I went... In the middle of the night, driving her to his place.  I didn't have a key and I had to go back because I had to work the next day, he went ballistic again and told me to never ask him for help again.  I was not welcomed at his house.

A few months later I ended up meeting my second abuser.  He quickly became my first husband and I was easy prey.  I had no support from my biological father, I had trouble at work, and I was ready to just have some stability.  I didn't love him but he looked like he was stable, with his own place and wanting to have a family, which I wanted also so I said: why not? and I married him after I had told him no like 6 times.  A few months into the marriage he was already controlling, he was a slob, and after having my wisdom teeth taken out he decided he would steal my pain killers.  Being raised so sheltered, I had no idea that people could get addicted to those or that they would sell each pill on the streets for $25 to $100 each.  When I found out, he told me that he had sold them because we needed extra money.  I wanted out, but then I find out I am pregnant, so now I had to stay. 

I was very ill during the first few months of pregnancy and lost a lot of weight, therefore I had to quit my job and depend on him solely.  I ended up finding out he was addicted to drugs shortly after because he had taken my car to his work due to his driver's license being suspended and him not having money to get it reinstated.  That day he went off on me because the car wouldn't go over 20 miles an hour, there was an issue with the computer transmission but somehow that was my fault.  According to him, I had gotten under the hood of the car while I was five months pregnant and done something to it so he couldn't use it and now he was late for work.  It was not that he was late for work because he was looking for drugs, it was because his pregnant wife had done something to the car.  His mother had to pick me up to take me to where he had parked the car and asked me what happened.  When I told her, she said that she had given him the money to fix his driver's license... After that, he was forced to tell me he had a drug addiction. 

He was supposedly going to work on that and make sure he did everything the rehab facility told him.  I found another job once I felt better and his mommy gave him a job at an apartment complex she and her then-husband owned.  He ended up stealing from them both, they found out after the baby was born and she threatened to take my child away if I didn't leave her son.  It all went downhill from there, we had already moved three times since I got pregnant and we would end up moving another three times in the first nine months of the baby's life.  I ended up losing my vehicle because he wouldn't pay for it and said I could either make enough to pay for the vehicle (which I knew he would end up taking that money from me, he used to say that he needed me to make $500 a month which was the same amount he would say he spent on drugs each month) or give the vehicle up.  He didn't think I would just give it up, but I know it was the right choice.  I ended up with an eviction on my record because he never told me that the apartment complex we had moved into had started the process and the day we had to go to court, he decided that looking for drugs was more important.

When I finally decided to leave him, I had no money, no job, no phone, no vehicle, we were living in a room that we were renting, he was telling me how much I could eat and would yell if I ate more than that, and he was pawning my computers so I did not have an alternate way of communicating at all.  At this point, the only person who could help me was my abusive biological father.  When you ask why victims do not leave, it is often because the only way they can do so safely is by switching from one abuser to another.  When you ask if he helped? Yes, my biological father did help, he helped because it fed his ego to help, not because of anything else.  I was well aware of that though. 

What would follow? I would end up being gaslighted and emotionally abused for months until the law caught up to my then-husband.  He had committed insurance fraud and they were looking for him.  My biological father had one of his tantrums and ended up hitting me while I was holding my then-18-month-old.  He told me that he would be my worst nightmare while his wife to this day will tell people that I am crazy and threw myself down the stairs.  He didn't know that when I moved in with him, I had already made a plan in case this happened.  A plan that he hated because he couldn't stand that someone else would help me.  During my stay there, I had a job as a nanny and the woman I worked for was the best.  Once I was gone from this other abuser, we found a way to get me to keep working.  Then my mother-in-law offered help.  I didn't know that she was another narcissist and abusive person. 

Ohh the cycle of abuse, the more you are around it, the more you think it is normal and therefore you end up attracting people who behave the same.  My mother-in-law tried to take my child away from me again, this time she decided to call Child Protective Services, she bailed her druggy son out of jail and made a plan to keep my child.  Child Protective Services showed up and saw that it was all a scam.  I ended up having to leave her house in a rush because she threatened to keep me there against my will by using her son and the power of the courts.  More emotional abuse happened from her and him.  Karma is good though because, in her focus on trying to make me the bad guy and trying to hurt me, her son ended up stealing from her and she ended up getting a divorce.  

What happened next? I got another job as a nanny, it lasted a year until I had a disagreement with my boss.  Then I decided that it was time for me to find a way to get myself back on my feet, get a job that would offer me benefits, and would let me work from home.  I found one in less than a week after I had already put that in my head.  I would make enough to rent an apartment for my daughter and I, and eventually would allow me to possibly do other things.  During this time, I had other altercations with Mario (my biological father), but I was still not clear on how abusive that man was.  My grandmother would always tell me he was just a little crazy and she didn't know why he was that way since she never treated him that way.

Oh well... We finally moved into our own place and to a different city.  Shortly after, I decided to completely cut ties with Mario and his family and things became a lot better.  This is when I started to meet some of the best people in my life.  My adoptive moms, adoptive dads, adoptive uncles, sisters, grandmas, etc... The abuse still haunted me but it was not something that was constant.  My first husband was in and out of jail, his mother was trying to get on my good side and I was giving her a second chance only because I felt that most people deserve that after they apologize and change their behavior.  I was wrong to do that... but that's a lesson learned. 

I ended up moving out of the state of Florida a year later with the promise to never go back to live there.  I was making my way out, my goal was to live by the mountains and get a car.  The specific car? A Pathfinder! I didn't want anything different, I had sold me on the idea when I realized that American made vehicles (after having two that had too many issues and one of them was brand new) were just not made to last.  My first husband kept telling me how the Pathfinder was not put together in America and how good the car was.  My daughter and I ended up in NC, not the place I wanted to stay for sure, but the place that for now would work.  Three years later I received an offer to work with the Colorado Crisis Intervention program.  By then, I had been working as an independent contractor for a company that dealt with non-profits.  This was my first experience of building a business.  I was able to go from just taking calls, to doing quality assurance for several clients and training new agents.  With this new project, I would be able to make enough to find a better place to live and eventually get a car.  All I had to do was move to where the time zone worked in a way that I could match the full-time hours that the group was opened. 

My now ex-husband and his mommy couldn't have that and it was not a surprise being that several times she always said she would not stop until I was destitute.  So, after I moved, what did they do? They joined forces again to force me to live near them and take my child from me.  They succeeded, they succeeded because we have a very corrupt justice system that works for those who have money to give to judicial campaigns and that favors abusers over protective mothers.  This guy had never been involved in my daughter's life (yes, she is my daughter, I raised her without his help and when he showed up to taker her from me, he told the judge he was still not ready to be a father). 

After she was taken away, I continued to do what I had set out to do.  I met my now-husband, who is not perfect but I adore him.  This man has the ability to learn from his mistakes and while we don't agree on everything, but when we disagree is done in a respectful way and we come to a happy medium.  I bought my brand-new pathfinder, no my husband did not help me.  You see, I had learned that what I had gone through was domestic abuse and I was still learning to deal with what were my triggers, what were my needs.  One of them was that I needed to accomplish a lot of what I wanted on my own and guess what? I did.  I was living in a place that is 20 min away from the mountains, I had gotten the car I wanted, and I had started my own business separate from what I was doing before... Less work, more pay, and work that I really enjoyed doing.  

A little over a year ago: got the bigger place, a year before that we got a dog (which was part of what I wanted), I started to write my story in the form of a book which will contain more details of what I have written here, and I started the process of forming a non-profit that would tell my story along with the story of other women who have been victims of the family court system in the United States. The non-profit will help empower them by helping them file grievances against judges who ignore evidence and refuse to take abuse into consideration when making custody decisions.  It will also empower them to speak up and help defend themselves from civil rights violations that happen on a daily basis due to these corrupt judges.  That non-profit is still a work in progress but make no mistake, it will be big and well-known... I can already see it. 

And so, here I am at age 34 and I have gone from being an abuse victim who didn't know she was being abused, to learning so much about abuse and mental illness that sometimes even the people who have studied in the field get new information from just speaking to me.  Going from being an abuse victim to helping other people through my work, because that is what I do when I coach others.  Going from being an abuse victim without a place to live, to having a nice house with a yard big enough that we even planted a garden.  Going from having people who would often doubt my abilities, to being surrounded by people who know that as soon as I say I want to do something they know that it might take me a little bit, but that I will surely get it done. Going from having to ask for help to being able to cover all our (I say our because I can cover my husband's expenses too if I want to) expenses with just what I make.  No, I am not money rich yet, but I am rich! I have good people by my side and let me tell you something while there was a time when I would be looked at as someone who everyone would step on, as someone who was not as sure of herself as she should have been, that person does not really exist anymore.  The person that all my troubles helped shaped is the one who now says: DO NOT underestimate me, I might take a little while to get there, but I will get there because I don't go back down the stairs, I just keep going up. 

On pain and suffering...

Woke up today to a message from one of my cousins, she had sent me the link to one of Kirk Cameron's documentaries, in the message she stated that it was a must watch and that she could not have said it better than the way he put it.
I decided to watch the one hour documentary which attempts to answer questions like: why do bad things happen to good people?, why doesn't God stop pain and suffering?, why there is death and sickness when there is supposedly a God that can stop all of it?, why doesn't God cure everyone?, and more questions among those lines.... eventually we get to the selfish question that every human being on this planet asks themselves when things are not going their way which is WHY ME?
Yes, yes I called you all selfish, the reality is that we all are, we are born that way because really when you think about it if we weren't we would not be able to survive, a baby wants food when it wants food and the baby cannot be told I am sorry you must wait because I have things to do, if you do that then the baby will cry bloody murder, why? Because the baby naturally and instinctively knows that it needs to eat in order to survive. However, as the years pass by we learn to not be as selfish, we learn to help others and we learn to love unconditionally, not love because we need something from another person but because it is a good feeling to just love. Now, some will argue that because we get a good feeling from loving then that also puts us in the selfish pile vs the non-selfish one, and yeah you can look at it that way but that is not something I will argue on this post.
So, I am sitting there watching this documentary and listening to Mr. Cameron pretty much recite the Bible, which he, as many Christians do, confuses the words written in them with the word of God. For the purpose of this particular post I am not go into a lot of arguments as to why that is not true but let me just say that:
1. The Bible was written by men, humans, let's say God did spoke to them and this is assuming God does exist (and I am not saying I don't believe God does) humans tend to interpret things and have the ability to change words to fit their own agenda.
2. Let's say that the words of the Bible are the words of God and God really did write this book, well the original one was written in a language that a lot of the people on earth do not understand and therefore it has had to be translated to many languages by many different people. In essence that book is merely a philosophical book which can give some answers to certain questions we as human posit that we have not been able to answer in any other way.

With that said... Let me continue...

Mr. Cameron starts with how the earth was created, how men were created, which as much as I like to go with what the Bible states and how God created this earth, there are just a lot of questions that are raised that the Bible does not explain, questions that each of us must answer on our own because really in the end all we can do is speculate. He tells us how Adam was supposed to protect Eve and how he failed in doing that because all he did was just watch Eve eat from the "forbidden" tree and did nothing to stop her, statements in which he seems to completely take the blame out of Eve and just put it on Adam. So, I guess it's Adam's fault we are all here living in misery right?
Well then he states how God, his God is all loving and forgiving, yet... God still kicks Adam and Eve out of the Garden of Eden and tells them now they will not live forever, on that note... even though God is all just, he also decides that it will not just be Adam and Eve that pay for their "wrong doing" (who would have thought that eating an apple would create such havoc) but every single human being will go ahead and have to pay for what they did.... Now that is like saying someone came to your door and killed someone you loved and then not only do we put away the person that committed the crime but we also condemn everyone else on this earth for the same crime even though they did not committed it. Now he does add that God is still just and caring and loving because he dresses Adam and Eve in animal fur when they become ashamed of being naked, later he adds that maybe it was God that said well you are acting like beasts (since they did not obey him) and now you will be dressed like ones... I understand that  that is Mr. Cameron's view but you can't have it both ways, someone so "perfect" as you seem to believe that God is cannot be both unforgiving and forgiving at the same time, you can be just and unjust, I mean really? Is this what they do when they talk about the Gospel?

He continues on with the story of Noah, and the Tower of Babel, and Abraham and as touching as it was to see him think about all of this because a family that seems to be close to him ended up losing their son to cancer after their child had been battling it for 10 years, he still is unable to really answer the question and instead most of the time he is just babbling about God and all the things he tried to do to make sure that we were taken care of and eventually lift ourselves to the heavens.

Here is the thing, when it comes to these kinds of questions of why does pain and suffering exist, unfortunately as much as we want to try and explain it with a collection of books written centuries ago, we really can't, the book tells stories about pain and suffering, most of which is caused by none other than us. Yes at the end Mr. Cameron states that we all have a purpose, one thing we have to fulfill, that life is a big theater production in which God is the Director, Producer, Screen Writer, etc... And we are mere actors, there is a philosophical text on this particular notion and it made a bit of sense especially since we really are not in control of our lives, everything we do is dependent on someone else, whether that someone else is someone closer to you or not, every decision you make in life, its outcome is not dependent just on you but on someone else because we don't live in this world alone.

So why does pain and suffering exist? We suffer because we want to, we suffer because we get attached to things, to people, suffering is a human emotion, pain is earthly not heavenly, we can say that God is not perfect because he created a world that is imperfect, so how can a perfect God create an imperfect world? A world full of suffering and pain? Change the view of the world you are seeing, the world itself is perfect, each of us was given the ability to choose and the ability to think and act the way we see it best, and each of us was created differently from one another therefore each of us will have different views and different ideas. It is because we are all created so differently that this world is not one bit of boring, we are here to learn and I agree that everything that we go through teaches us all a lesson each situation is different and therefore each lesson is different and yes I could sit here and talk all about what I have learned in the hope that you will learn it too and maybe live a happier life but if you are not willing to learn it by listening to someone else then if it is a lesson you must learn life itself or God will put you in a similar situation in order for you to learn your own lessons, some decide that they will learn others decide that they will not.

And going back to pain and suffering being an earthly thing... Have you ever just stepped back for a moment and really thought about all the other things that were going on in your life that were actually good? Life always sends good things to us, but as humans we are so self-destructive that when we see something good happening we believe we either don't deserve it or that suffering will eventually come from it and eventually it ends up happening because we expect it and then we find a reason to suffer. Whether it is that your job sucks, that you don't have enough money, that you are not healthy enough, that you might find out that you are going to have to battle a deadly disease (and on that note let me remind you all that life is deadly, we all end up in a grave eventually so saying deadly disease is kind of dumb) but we all always find something to complain about, something always sucks and when we focus on everything that sucks for us we tend to drown ourselves in this bubble of negativity which in turn clouds us and stops us from seeing the amazing things we have in life and we become ungrateful and intolerant of others and that in turn creates a lot of chaos in the world. It is not until the day that each of us starts to see life in a different way that pain and suffering will end, every single person on this planet must come to the acceptance that we are not alone and that we have to not just preach tolerance but practice it and I am sorry to tell you but not many people practice tolerance. And back to acceptance, we must accept that this world we live in, is perfect, a world where everyone would agree with everyone else would just be plain boring, a world where everyone was created equal would be extremely boring, a world where there were no "bad" things happening would be a depressing world because then how would we know what the happy and good things were? A world where sickness did not exist would not allow us to appreciate the times when we are healthy, those times that we often take for granted. A world where there was no death would not teach us to appreciate the moments we have now, even though most times we don't appreciate it and it tends to be the times when we completely stop appreciating those beautiful moments we have with close friends, family, nature that we get reminded that life is short and that death can come at any time so you might as well enjoy it.

RIP Robin Williams

As I am sitting here unable to stop crying because of this lost to the world, a lost of a person who made people laugh for a living, he was one of those actors who truly touched people's lives with his gift and yet he was so sad inside.
I keep wondering what he must have felt, how much pain he must have been in, so much pain that he figured it was better to inflict more pain to himself so that it will all end.
A lot of people say that taking your life is a sign of cowardice and at some point in my life I thought so too, but when you really think about it, you realize that no one likes to be in pain and those who have attempted suicide or have actually succeeded at taking their lives must have been in so much pain at the moment that they found the courage to hurt themselves just so that their pain would end. They must have felt like they were being tortured and they just wanted it to end.
Most people will never understand that pain unless they have been through it, most think that you have to endure life and keep fighting, keep going, that you have to be brave and overcome whatever it is that is troubling you because someone somewhere has it worse than you. But to you that does not matter, because maybe those that have it worse than you actually were born with the ability to endure and deal with the things that happened to them in a different way than you and therefore those worse things do not affect them the same way they would affect others.
Today though the most prominent thing that came to my mind as I was reading my news feeds was that at the end of your life, once you are gone, everyone will remember how you made them feel, the smiles you brought to them, the laughter, your kindness. I kept reading posts from people who have met Robin Williams personally and people who, like me, were touched by his art, his gift, and not one of them mentioned anything other than the feeling they had by being around him. We live in a world where we put so much emphasis into obtaining things, into how much money we are going to make, into worrying about how much debt we have to pay, how nice the car we drive has to be, the title on the door of our office, trying to obtain an office and we rush through life giving all of this so much importance when in the end none of that is really relevant.  People today did not count how many cars Robin had, they did not quote how much money he made, they did not point out how many houses he had or how much each one was worth, they all focused on the times that they spent with him, the times they laughed and cried while watching one of his performances. The world we live in has made us to believe that the things that really don't matter should be the ones we focus more on, should be the ones we give more importance to, and in our constant battle to get those things we lose the connections to the people we are around and when we lose those connections we start to believe that we are all alone and when we feel alone and give into loneliness we invite depression to set in. When we invite depression to come into our lives we start to give it power and we let it over take our life and fill our life with more pain than we can handle.
When we allow ourselves to focus on all the wrong things we forget that there are others who need us, we forget that just helping out someone else, even if it is just listening to them for a bit, can give us a bit of hope and can spark a light in us that we can't get from things.
Think about this for one minute, what are you mostly struggling for? What is it that is making you unhappy? and then think about whether that will matter when you are dead. Think about those who bring a smile to your face when you think about them, take a moment and thank them for being there, take a moment to let them know that you are there if they ever need to talk. Take a break from your crappy job and spend time with the ones you love. Make that phone call, send that text. Connect to the world! If we truly want less people to hurt themselves then we need to start getting connected to the world again, not just through a screen, because through a screen your emoji will never be able to show exactly how you feel. Go out there, hear the voice of the ones you love, some might be thinking that they are alone right now and that they've been forgotten and they might be opening the door for depression to come in and with your call you might make them feel better.
How about we don't just start talking about depression and what it is and how we need to talk about at the moment we feel like we can't handle the pain anymore, how about we talk about how we can prevent getting to that point. How about we open up and we talk about how we feel to those we love, how about we also start listening to those we love when they start talking. Let's prevent people from getting so far into a dark cave that they stop seeing the light that shows the way out. Let's not just talk about it, let us take action on it.

Making sense of planning Life

I feel like I have been waking up lately with every random thought I could possibly have and I am feeling like I can't keep up with myself... So here is the one for the day:
Does life makes sense? Do we need to make sense of life in order to live a fuller one?
Truth be told, life rarely makes sense, in fact life never makes sense, but of course it is our human nature and curiosity that is always thriving to make sense of life, make it all fit, figure it all out. Why did I go in that direction when everything seemed to be telling me to go in the other, I did not listen but it just made no sense to go the other way so I went this way instead and now I am late for work...
I've learned that the more we try to make sense of how life works the more time we lose actually living life. I keep saying to leave in the moment, I don't plan, I rarely do make any plans, mostly because life has shown me that plans will change, you can plan your entire week, your entire month, your entire life and in the end when you look back nothing, absolutely nothing went according to plan and that never makes sense to us, we figure we can control everything around and make sure that with hard work and dedication our plans come through and we reach whatever goals we have set for ourselves, then everything falls apart and we get pissed off that life is unfair and we did not get back what we were hoping for.
The reality is that when you are planning things you are only planning based on the things you can and will do, you are not taking into consideration that you are not alone in this world, there are billions of people out there that can affect the course you are on. Then to top the billions of people, there are also billions of living things that can also affect the road you are planning on going into and then to top that you cannot predict any natural disaster that can happen while you are on the road to reaching your goals.
All of it can change your plans in a matter of seconds, why? Because everything that happens to us is a learning experience, we get to that point and we learn something new and when we get this new information we decide whether we need to change things or we end up due to circumstances adapting to a new way of thinking.
Which is why I no longer plan things, unfortunately that has put me in a constant battle with the world because most people like to plan, they want to know what will happen next, it is their way of saying "hey! I am in control of my life" and that makes them feel better, it is a natural thing, we are born with the need to feel that we are in control and no one else is, so when I am asked to plan out something and I don't, people tend to jump at me and then suddenly I make absolutely no sense.
I have had people actually get really angry at me because they want me to go ahead and plan out where I will live, where I will work, what I will do next and I just refuse to do it, none of them understand why and it makes no sense to them, but it does to me. Why? I realized that the only thing I have control over is the decisions I make in life, I have no control over the outcome, I am fully aware that I am not the only living creature in this world and because of that I will encounter things in the road of life that will make absolutely no sense to me but if I stop in the middle of the road and start contemplating and trying to make sense of them I will end up either causing an unnecessary accident or I will end up getting hurt, I just have to try and keep going even when things make no sense. This is something I have learned, life decided to teach me this lesson in the hardest of ways and sometimes I forget because again I am (or at least I still think I am) human, I once had plans, I had my whole life planned out, someone would ask me where do you see yourself in 5 years and I could tell them with absolute certainty where I would be in 5 years time, then 5 years came and I was no where near what I had said 5 years before that. I had worked hard for the things I wanted and in a matter of a week I ended up losing them all, something I had not planned on doing, it just happened and it made no sense, still it doesn't no matter how hard I try to make it make sense, the only thing that I can go back and say I did differently back then was that I had stopped following my "hunches" because they made no sense, they were illogical thinking so why follow them? well then I didn't and as people say: "shit happened", so after years of falling down the same hole and asking myself why I did not go with my hunch because I knew I shouldn't have done that but I did it anyway because logic had to win... I decided to just go for it and try the different approach and went with my hunches and guess what every time I went with my hunches everything turned out fine, it never made sense, it still doesn't make sense, but then again I have been on both sides of the spectrum and Life itself doesn't make sense.
Life will never make sense, life has a way of giving you directions and you have the option to follow those directions (hunches) or not follow them, what happens after your decision is made you have no control over, sometimes I wish we did but we really don't, it is a hard lesson to learn and it is really hard to change the way we are hardwired to think and act, I still battle it myself and find it a lot easier to just ignore other people when they start trying to get me to plan the next thing I am supposed to do according to them and just hide away for a bit to try and avoid the stress it causes me to try and stick to a plan because really I don't know where I will be tomorrow, I really don't even know what will happen in the next minute so how can I possibly plan out one week of my life, a month of it, or even years of it...

Do you trust you?

A few days ago I got a text from a friend asking me to research a company to see if she should go work with them or not.  I asked her what she wanted to do and her answer was that something was telling her to go for it but she was scared that it would turned out bad.

My answer was: "go with what you are being told." She is one of those people that will never go with her "gut feelings", her instinct, that little voice inside telling you to take the leap.  I was like that once, then as time went by and different things happened in my life good and bad I realized that when I follow that little voice inside the one that gives you the crazy idea that fills you up with fear just thinking about it, things always turned up good.

So the question is: what is this voice? I don't know, I could sit here and say it's a higher being, that it is God, that it's angels watching over you and if you don't believe in any of that you will start treating me like a total mental case and completely dismiss me. That voice could also be you, a higher version of you, a you that has the power to know what will happen next without having all the pieces that are needed to put the puzzle together but that can see the full picture, it's the part of you that seems irrational at the moment because all the information is not completely given. 

Yes, I think that exists, you can call it whatever you want, we all have it! There is one voice that guides us to what our deepest heart's desires are, one that is in sync with our soul and that will never take us through a path of destruction. But do you ever trust that voice? Do you ever trust that you? Do you trust it maybe sometimes or when it makes the most sense or do you completely dismiss it?

It's extremely hard to completely trust it, being that extremely logical being I once was I can attest that the hardest things I've done in my life is to begin to trust that voice, and even now there are times when I totally dismiss it, I dismiss it for that "this is what I want to do right now" voice or that "this is what I should do right now" voice, but I've learned, I've gone back to every time I could remember hearing the voice and then remembering what happened after I did or did not do as the voice said and I found that the more I did not listen to it the more trouble I would find myself into. It was like I was taking detours to my final destination and it was taking me way longer to get there and along the way I would become miserable. 

So why not listen to it more closely? For those who pray do you ever think that maybe your prayers are being answered but that you are too busy praying which is like someone talking when they should be listening and therefore you miss out on the directions you need to follow to get to the life your soul has always wanted? That happiness that can't be reached by doing what other human beings tell you to do but only by following the desires of your soul. 

It's never too late to learn to trust that inner you, it's never too late to believe in something a little greater than yourself even if that is part of you. It's never too late to find true happiness and to follow your dreams... So go on, learn to trust that higher you! Those angels, instincts, God, soul... Whatever you want to call it, learn to trust it, I promise that when you do so your life will start to change so drastically and for the better that you will not believe what's happening! 

The idea of God

The idea of God is not about one almighty being that is in complete control of everything, it's about one almighty being that is there to guide us and help us achieve what we want in life.... That was the thought that came to mind today...
After having what I would say was one pretty damn interesting night last night, and once again not being able to sleep but having great philosophical conversations, one with someone who probably did not even grasp what I was saying but was just a perfect stranger there making me feel like I was actually talking to someone when the reality was that I was just talking to myself, and while he did understood certain theories of mine I came to realize that most people are very set in their ways, very few people have the capacity of expanding their minds and actually giving another thought the possibility of it being a reality...
So yeah, we were talking about God, interestingly enough this older gentleman did not throw bible verses at me but instead he spoke about how he actually saw the existence of that almighty being (and this was not a conversation of whether the being exists or does not exists, this was a conversation what the being does if in fact it exists)
And then the words came... he said: "God is in control" and this was the first time I was actually able to explain to someone how terribly wrong that is, and actually able to say part of what I wrote in a previous blog... God is not in control! No one really is... and so I explain why? Because we live in a world where we depend on what other people will do in order for us to get to where we want to get to... and each person was given the power to go ahead and make up their own minds, therefore we have this being that knows exactly whats going to happen if we turn left and everyone else involved in that path does exactly what they are supposed to but that also gave every person involved a choice of either following that guidance, that little voice inside, or not... so then yeah I turn left like I am supposed to but the other person turned right like they were not supposed to and then boom!!! things change.
But do they really change that much? I mean can a small decision impact our lives in a way that it take us ten times longer to get where we want to get to? I think sometimes it does, and other times you just get lucky and everyone follows the pattern that they were supposed to follow and it's all a smooth ride.
So what is this God being that a lot of people believe in? He is a guide or she, depending on the religious dogma you have decided to follow.  He is not the one controlling everything, but rather the one that can see further than we can, because let's face it we can only see so far into our near future, we can make many plans and most if not all might end up falling apart or being changed tremendously before we even get done planning....
Perfect example would be when we were in high school, 12th grade, we were asked where we saw ourselves in 5 years... while there are very fortunate people that got where they wanted to get in 5 years, the majority of us when we look back we realize that we would have never imagined everything that has happened to us in the past 5 years, and how we are no where near where we wanted to be but if we are lucky enough we will find that no matter what happened each day we are just happier than the last... And yes we all have those bad days but each day we have grown and that has taken us one step closer to wherever it is we wanted to be.  And while none of us could have possibly imagined everything that has happened to us, we could not have ever seen any of it coming, I think God did, he knows the outcome of every step we take, but he is not controlling us and making us take it, he gives us choices, because even he knows that a human being is something that cannot be controlled.  But he does see, he sees whats behind the building that you are approaching even though all you are able to see is that building in front of you, he knows when someone will not follow his guidance and will just follow the logic, and in all that chaos that we create, he is still able to guide us to get back on the right path, and he is still able to help us clean up whatever mess we have made.  But not once does ever try to control us.  He is our guide dog in a world full of blind people, and if we listen carefully we can avoid a bad collision.

I've got God in my mind

Dear God, I pray for guidance and patience, I know I am on the right path I know that you have always had a way of making sure I am on track to fulfill my dreams.
I know that my lack of patience sometimes has gotten in the way and has made me turn the wrong way but I know that you have always been there to make sure that I get back to the correct road. I know that the times I have made the wrong turn it has been difficult to get back to the road I must travel and is mostly because those times I decided to ignore the red lights and stop signs and I just kept going. I am now at the place where I know I am supposed to be, I still do not understand many things, I still don't quite grasp the reason for me to be here but I know there is one and I know I must wait for the answer; patience is a virtue that only you can teach.
So I guess for now I ask for the strength that I need to keep going without going crazy while waiting for everything to fit into place, I ask you for the strength needed to not surrender myself to the daily life and to the monotony of the people, I asked for the strength that it takes to quiet down and listen to you so that I can continue making the right turns.
I know that you only speak when you need to and you give direction when the time is right, but I need to hear you now, I need to know now where this road will take me, I want to know your plan and its outcome and at the same time I know that is not time to know it yet, that I must wait and trust that it will all come out right, that you will make sure that I'm ok like you always have, that you will make sure I remain focused and free of distractions so that I can get there without getting lost on the way.
I know all of this but even though I am part of you, I have chosen to live here in the human form, forgetting everything that my soul knows in order to learn new things.
The human part of me will always be curious, will always be impatient, will always have a bit of jealousy, and most of all will always be afraid, so I ask you to renew my faith once more, I give you my human emotions and will let you fill me up with faith and strength to keep going, to not give up, because I know I am very close and I know I am on the right path, I know I have worked hard and the next step is to just trust myself, to not fill my head with doubt, to block those that will use their doubts and try to fill me up with fear, to block those that will try to make me doubt what I know and have learned from you the one that can see it all, those that will try to make me doubt the gifts you have given me. Yes they can still be my friends but I must understand that they will not understand my gifts, mostly because they don't believe, and I can't ask them of expect them to understand of believe, therefore I must continue to trust myself but must learn to block the doubts, I know you are guiding me every day and I know that whatever it is that's you have chosen for me will be the best all I gotta do is keep working towards it.
I also ask you for the strength that it takes to realize that I must rest, because one cannot just work all the time and not rest, I need to rest in order to gain control of my thoughts and for them to not be changed into doubts, I know that you will make sure I rest one way or the other, but I want to learn to rest before I am made to rest, before illness comes my way and you force me to rest.
I also wanted to thank you, to thank you for allowing me to love the way I do, for letting that amazing feeling grow inside me, especially for allowing me to accept and love those close to me without asking for love in return, thank you for letting my heart be free of negative feelings I know you are the one that showed me how and I wanted to thank you for that even though I know you know I'm thankful. :)