Down and Out

When I was growing up I was always taught to go to God when I hurt. Lately I feel like all I'm doing is going to Him to complain about everything that's going so wrong in my life. I'm having financial issues, and it's not like I wanna be rich (though that would be wonderful)I just wanna be secure. I want to be able to pay my bills off and be able to get the things that I need and some of the things I want. It's only human nature to want more than what you have...I feel like all that I'm doing is sitting around waiting for the next thing to go wrong.
Last night I talked to my best friend and I was just talking about how things always, ALWAYS get so much worse before they get any better...I started remembering how God takes you through levels of bad to show you how strong you are. God has taken me through so much within the last month I just feel faint at every step but He has also been my strength and my courage and my joy through this last month and a half and I just can't imagine getting through everything without Him. Without my faith.
Hope in times of struggle is all that we could ever hold on to...in the middle of hope is the idea of love. When you are hopeful you believe that you are loved by a Higher being so much that He will never give you more than you can bear...and maybe sometimes it may seem that you are given too much to bear but you aren't really...YOU are still BREATHING.
In hindsight of all my trials and struggles I look back and welcome them because they have made me such a strong person, you live through it to fight another battle and become EVEN stronger. I can only think of the strength I am receiving as I struggle to get to the top of this Mountain. I can only think of the power given to me by God as I whirl in this storm to get to my calm. I can only think of the miracles I am about to receive...my eyes are on the prize...NOT the struggle.
As black sisters and brothers we are all too often confronted with crisis (ie murders, theft, fires, financial problems, family arguments,everything)We also learned through a strong institution of faith and belief that the Lord works in a very mysterious way. Even if you don't go to church or don't have a community religious go to place, someone you know, is praying for you...Maybe you yourself know to pray. God is very present in our lives. He is always there even in times when we don't have an urgent need for him. He is there protecting us. Making us stronger...keeping us safe, keeping us blessed. He is our Father which art in Heaven, yet his love and joy and spirits walk the earth to protect us every second of the day and night. His Love is all we ever need
So, even when you're feeling down and out...feeling like the universe is against you...nobody can help...nobody can understand...you don't really understand yourself. Just realize that God knows you can...because He is the strength behind your will and the power behind your faith. God KNOWS YOU BEST...just keep the faith and You will prevail.

Find Peace and Be Blessed.
Kitty

My Own Aesthetic

I have come to realize that I don't think the way that everyone else I know does. I think that when I finally realized I was different it was because of the way my mind worked. I'm a strange being, I can sit in the sun and literally feel like God is touching me. I can wake up with a smile on my face and believe truly that God has instilled Joy on my heart for the day. I can see the leaves turn orange and yellow and pink and brown during autumns months and have such peace within my spirit. Nature makes me feel grounded. It makes me feel so close to God. There are times when I want to cry and all I have to do is step outside and I'm reminded of what God is giving to me. This is my own Aesthetic, and maybe it doesn't sound too different from somebody like Thoreau or Ralph Waldo Emerson but when I think of how much the natural beauty of things has impacted my life and changed me from sad to JOYOUS, I realize how nature, created by God, is where my spirit goes to escape. It makes me high. It is my anecdote and at the same time it's my drug. It is a beautiful feeling, and emotion to feel so connected to God. It happens more so in the Autumn than any other season. I love this season it is just such a spiritually grounding season for me. I feel beautiful, I know I glow, and I have such peace. Get like me and let the cool air, take you somewhere you rarely see.

Find Peace and Be Blessed
Kitty

True Beauty

People need to understand that loving yourself comes before loving anyone else. If you can't love yourself, you don't know what love is. currently someone that I'm very close to is going through something that has caused me to call into question whether or not this person loves their own self. It's okay to let compliments boost your self esteem, but it's not okay to allow yourself to depend on compliments to boost you up. One thing that should never be downplayed is the fact that you can look in the mirror and see yourself and smile and be pleased with yourself with no one around. Feel beautiful when you're alone and when you don't have make up on, and when your hair is a mess. True beauty, comes from within...it truly does. You can be beautiful physically and have the nastiest personality and be so ugly...you can be physically limited to some peoples eye and have a beautiful spirit and that beauty radiates from within. DO NOT depend on a person to boost your ego, nor looks to be what makes you feel beautiful. A large chunk of people prefer beautiful spirits over beautiful faces. Step out of that traditional way of looking at beauty and focus on what truly is beautiful about you. God created something beautiful about you, you were created in His likeness, thus you are beautiful, and once you see that beauty for yourself you'll start to see your Joy and find your PEACE.

Let Go and Let God

I've seen so many seemingly ill fated events unravel in my life. I've seen so much that I just thought I wouldn't recover from. It's crazy how blessed my family has been, it's amazing how God's grace has pulled us through time and time again. Some people don't believe that God favors. I truly do believe it...my family has been in so many situations where we could have easily lost our minds and just as easily given up. We have come dependent on His love. He's an amazing peace giver in rough times and I wouldn't say it if I weren't a witness to it. I understand why many people cry their hearts out in hard times, I still do, yet if you understand that God never gives you more than you can bear, your tears become less abundant. I'm so much stronger from the many things that I've encountered in my life, so much wiser. I will never say that I've made it on my own, because I know that without Grace from God I'd be just another lowly person on the streets, wishing I had something to pull me through. I'm a witness, my entire family is testimony to the fact that when you let go, and let God, Everything, EVERYTHING will be alright.
I won't dwell on the negative, but I'll faithfully stand on the Peace that God has given me every morning when I wake. I will stretch that peace into the night when I fall asleep. I will take the joy that He gives to me in the new day, and happily share it with people throughout my day.
I guess what I'm trying to get at now, is that when you feel like you're blessed from head to toe and all your surrounding air is blessed as well, WHEN YOU'RE FAVORED, and you KNOW it, share that blessing with someone else. Make someone else's day and let them Know that they need only to call upon His name and He will answer.

If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land. Chronicles 2 7:14

Woke Me Up this Morning

There is nothing I remember more vividly from my childhood than the times I played with neighborhood friends in our big vast yard off to the side of our large home. I remember it so well because it was when I was happiest. I often take a trip down memory lane in my mind and find myself laying in the grass with the sun beaming straight down on me and me soaking in the rays. It's my good place. It's were my mind takes me when I need to escape. It is where I wish I could spend eternity. In that state of mind, that physical condition, that absolute joy and peace. I never had a worry or a care then, and nowadays, it seems as if all I have are worries and cares. Just wish sometimes I could go back to those days...
I was awaken today from what I assume was my peaceful slumber, I turned over to find my baby staring at me. Bucked eyes, staring straight into mine. It scared me, then it made me laugh. This peaceful place of mine, must have overcome my entire state of being. She must have been confused, because usually my mind isn't in a state of peace, it usually is in utter chaos. Not that my life is chaotic, my mind simply makes my world chaotic, because I'm realizing how naive I've been about just about everything that I ever believed in. This world is not a safe, perfect place. Life happens to everybody and we have to find ways to cope. We have to find a way to escape what life dishes out. I escape mine in my sleep and through prayer and through writing. I escape all of it. I leave the world behind and enter a realm of life that won't hurt me or anyone else. A world where there is peace.
That peaceful look upon my face isn't what my daughter is used to. It's not what any of my family is used to. It isn't something that is common for me. She must have been curious. And as I laid in bed and thought about it more and more, I realized that she needs to be around that version of me more often because I don't want her to grow up and have to be as concerned about EVERYTHING as I am. I want her to ponder on her thoughts of course but I don't want her to dwell on things as much as I do. It truly drives me crazy when I do. It makes my heart race and my brain ache to think the way I do. But I don't know how to stop being a worrier. It's a part of how I function. It's a part of why I care so much about the world, about actions, behaviors, respect, love...
I laid there and I told God, "Thank you for waking me up this morning."
It's how I wish to start all my days, this is the first thing I want to state everyday and next I said, "Today will be a good day." It is a declaration of the peace I so desire to have. He did wake me up this morning after having such a peaceful slumber and He will give me a beautiful day. I feel it. I know it. I claim it.

Find Peace and Be Blessed,
Kitty

R.E.S.P.E.C.T.!!!

Assuming that everyone wasn't raised by a mother that taught them the "Golden Rule" I will give some people the benefit of the doubt. I'll excuse a couple of people for their ridiculous, outlandish, inhumane behavior. Some people are just not capable of respecting others and sometimes I understand. Sometimes you run across something that is altogether too unreal and too disgusting to even attempt to RESPECT. Notice though that I did say "thing." I would personally never disrespect a fellow human being (at least not on purpose) It's that beautiful Golden Rule that has held me back from the organized chaos that is so many other peoples lives. Respect on the road, respect in the church, respect in the class, respect in the home...No matter where I am, I'll respect you as long as you give me the same courtesy.
I wasn't raised in a world where you could walk on somebodies heels and not even notice that you were invading personal space. Nor was I raised in a world where cursing somebody out became daily routine. I was however raised in a hood where people were disrespected all the time. But to me and my perfect little Utopian world, RESPECT had a natural presence. I don't know, maybe it's because I had this perfect view of the world and human nature. Lately I've been so let down by some of the pigheaded things one human could do and say to another. My perfect little naturally respectful world is crumbling into pieces.
Today I had a conversation with someone very close to me about the gay community and while I won't go into detail about the conversation I will say that I'm a straight person and I felt deeply disrespected by the conversation. It hurt some of the things that were said. I guess that it hurt so bad because it made me realize how stupid and evil some people think. How blatantly disrespectful a person can be.
Why though?
What are you trying to achieve?
Why hurt someone like that?
For personal gain? What gain could possibly be worth that put down?
The saying that sticks and stones can break your bones but words will never hurt is just not true at all.

Words hurt, they pierce the skin, they pierce the mind, they break the heart of many people everyday. You can't tell me that Heartbreak isn't painful because I know that it is. I've experienced it...and til this day I'm not over it...it's long lasting pain.

I guess what I'm trying to say is Respect is a necessary in today's world. Some people don't realize the impact that their words make on other. But words no matter how small or big, make impressions on people whether we know it or not. So the smartest thing to do to insure maximum RESPECT is to watch what we say, know what we say, and mean what we say.

Find Peace and Be Blessed,
Kitty

On Being a Mother

Life has been so great now that little Mckenzie is here. She has turned me into the woman I was destined to be. I'm so protectant of her and though I didn't know that I had it in me to be a mother, I've suprised myself at all the natural motherly instincts that have come out of me so far. Mckenzie is six months old and was premature so she is a month late in her development, meaning she's six months but her developement physically and mentally are as if she were just turning five months. I couldn't be any more proud of her and my little family. I feel like my life is finally started to take turns that I want it to take. God is starting to shine His light on us. It's always been shining I guess, but now I can see it. I don't ever want this feeling of love and joy in my soul and heart to end. My little family will be successful. I claim it in God's name. That spirit of fear and the spirit of worry are not of God, I will ever more put all my faith into His Holy name, and claim the spirit of Success for me and my little baby and future Husband.

Find Peace and Be Blessed,
Kitty