realationships

Guard your heart…

 

Two Sundays ago, it felt like my pastor had it in for me. I could have sworn he was speaking to me the whole service and I was so convicted. You see, I always say this: I love love. I am very quick to give my heart away, to fall in love or to just believe that each time, it could be love. Every time I do this, and every time I get hurt. I get hurt and it’s all my fault because I had no business giving my heart away like cotton candy. You see even the Bible tells us to guard our hearts, it is our duty to protect our emotions and the issues of the heart. So my pastor went on and on and when he said: God knows how delicate our hearts are, that’s why He put it inside our rib cage. He had to build a whole chest to guard it because He knew it needed to be safe. When my pastor said this, I felt like someone splashed a bucket of ice cold water on my face!

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It was definitely a wake up call for me. It is pointless to always blame other people when you get your heart broken. It is time to start accepting your portion of the blame and realize that not everyone deserves your heart and your devotion. Often times, we are so quick to say stuff like: oh! I am very emotional, or I love with everything I have in me but then nobody gets hurt but you!. It is time to become emotionally intelligent and also to ask God for the spirit of discernment. Too much time is wasted casting our precious pearls to the swine, we literally take ourselves, our emotions and our bodies which are precious pearls and cast them to people who have no business touching them in the first place.

These situationships have to go! Neither here nor there, neither hot nor cold, here today gone tomorrow. If there’s no clear definition of intent what then is the point? This heart is staying inside my rib cage where it’s meant to be, not on my sleeve, not handed away like party favors! Because giving should be reciprocated, if not you’ll give and give and give and one day, you’ll wake up and realize that you gave yourself all away and there might be nothing left.

“Above all else, guard your heart. For everything you do flows from it.” –Proverbs 4:23

 

 

How To Get Over Your Ex!…

Breakups are  never easy, especially when you were really in love and had grand plans for the future, but like death, rain and taxes, breakups are always bound to happen and will literally break you like the name implies and the question now becomes how to rebuild yourself.

I thought about this post long and hard because being vulnerable is not an easy thing for me and especially in this era where everyone has an opinion about things they have no business having opinions about, it’s really hard to be open and honest but for the love of writing and for my readers who are dear to my heart, I decided to share.

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I do a lot of thinking, like I literally sit on my bathroom floor or on the bus or in my closet or anywhere really and just lapse into deep thought, OK not that deep but still I think a lot and even more lately. So another year has come and gone, another new year, vals day, Easter, birthday, summer, fall, and now it’s almost winter and Christmas is around the corner and I am still single, wow. How did that happen? How did a whole year go by without anyone seeing me? Loose some weight, go out more often, do fun stuff, be open minded they said; done, done and done (well, except for the weight) but alas here we are. So I got to thinking, and thinking and thinking. What am I doing wrong? I am not the world’s biggest girl, I’m beautiful and smart, LOL it’s not by degrees right? But seriously what is it? Then a light bulb went off, maybe I wasn’t over my ex…

What??? It’s been a couple of years and I sincerely thought that I was, but it took one sentence from my friend to jolt me into the realization. So my friend and I were chatting the other day and the subject came up and he said to me: You cannot be loved because you won’t let anyone love you. I was floored by this statement and so damn mad, I was just about to lose my cool but the voice of reason kicked in and I allowed him to explain himself and when he was done, boy! The truth is always bitter, nobody likes hearing the truth but I got over myself and really listened to what he had to say and just maybe he was right…maybe I cannot be loved in this state that I’m in mentally, because I am still kind of angry about how it all ended and I have been walking around carrying the weight of the world on my shoulders, unconsciously holding on to the fact that just maybe he would come back to me and we would make it work again, I could go on and on but in my thinking it was clear to me that there is only one way to get over your ex and it is this: get over yourself, and then get over him or her, in that order.

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both pics were taken on the same day(when I still had hair lol), on the right I had just cried my eyes out and wallowed in self pity quite a bit and on the left, I fixed my face, went out with some friends and blossomed in their company and in several glasses of wine soooo, it’s up to you to cheer yourself on, don’t fail yourself!

You made mistakes, so what? You wasted your precious time loving someone and then they broke your hearts and stomped all over it? What’s done is really done. No amount of reminiscing or moping around or listening to love songs will change any of the events that has already transpired, so all you can literally do is get over it!

  • Accept your portion of the blame for whatever it is that might have happened, forgive yourself and look inward to see how you can do better next time.
  • STOP stalking them on social media; not everything they post is about you, they just might have moved on and it’s time to follow suit.
  • Forgive them and let them go, because the longer you hold on to unforgiveness and bitterness and anger, guess who you’re hurting? You!
  • Fall in love with yourself, rediscover just how awesome you are, take care of you and become an even more amazing version of yourself.
  • Disband the pity party, for a night of wallowing, I prescribe three nights of going out! sitting around moping will change nothing!
  • A rebound relationship is the most stupid thing you will ever do. You don’t need to get under someone to get over your ex, I don’t even know why that quote is allowed to be a quote. Rebounds never solve anything, they are just another mistake on top your pile of mistakes.

So its time for me to take a deep breath and let go of all the sentiments, the what ifs and the reminiscing about the fun times and to just get on with my life, open minded and ready to dip my toes into the water again. Will it be easy? No matter of fact it is downright painful and especially in the world we live in today where everyone else seems to be deliriously in love and happy and living in Lala land and you’re just there. But it will be worth in the end, it has to be. How to get over your ex? Get over him or her, that’s how!

Like we always do, let’s talk about this; how have you gotten over break ups? I want to learn a thing or two or more from you guys…

“Sometimes it takes a heartbreak to shake us awake & help us see we are worth so much more than we’re settling for.”― Mandy Hale

The “sis” Zone

This is just a PSA to all the “brothers”, and a heartfelt one at that. Apparently you guys didn’t read or take Dear Mr Indecisive seriously! So my girls and I were hanging out the other day, and we got talking about this whole phenomenon aka “the sis zone”. when you know deep down inside that you have no good intentions, that a meaningful relationship or marriage is not on the horizon for you, why bother? Why confuse us with the meaningless conversations, taking hours of our lives that we can never get back? With the overt name calling: hey honey, sweetie, luv, babe and then to crown it all, hey sis…

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I myself, I don’t need any more brothers. God gave me four, plus numerous cousins so I am good in the brother department! We invest emotions, mental energy, and feelings into these situationships. Never going forward or backward, always in limbo and then one day out of the blue you hit us with the I see you as my sister / best friend speech, sigh…

So Dear Mr. / brother indecisive, the next time you decide to hit a girl up, be sure you’re not doing it just because, and if you find that she isn’t what you are looking for, gracefully decline rather than let it linger for months and hit her with the its not you it’s me speech, or the I love you too much to date you speech, or any of those cliché over flogged speeches in your arsenal. I have four very lengthy names, you can call me by any of them, so no more luv, or babe or honey or sis, use my government name!😐

This is my diary after all so I am allowed to rant right?

*in Chris Brown’s voice* 🎵Please don’t sis me, and I won’t bro you. If you love me, make it official🎵…repeat till fade

All my ladies, if I have spoken for you say Aye!

 

 

I Love You, But I Love Me More…

 

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I have wanted to write this post for a very long time, but somehow I just haven’t found the right words to say the things I really want to say because I didn’t want it to be a self help post, or just another feel good post its something that resonates with me and I wanted it to resonate with you too.

When love ends, it’s downright painful. There’s just not enough words to describe the disappointment,  the hurt, the saying good bye to all the plans and dreams, sometimes it’s a physical pain that just follows you around like a throbbing toothache. If you are lucky, time will dull the ache but once in a while, it will sneak up on you and boy it hurts! If you know my blog, then you know me because I always leave a piece of myself in everything I write so I am just going to go ahead and laugh at myself here shall we?

Once upon a break up, all I could do was cry. I cried and I cried and I listened to all the love songs on my playlists until I knew all the songs by heart, and then I prayed the pain away and then I ate, and then I stopped wearing makeup altogether and I started wearing again and then I would write soapy posts (thank goodness I never posted them!) I was on an emotional roller coaster that I couldn’t seem to get off from, and it became exhausting so one day I put on my big girl pants and I just stopped. I stopped the pity party, the relieving every word and scenario in my head and I looked at my failed relationship for what it really was. I took a good hard look at it without rose tinted glasses, I accepted my portion of the blame and I was determined to move on even if it killed me, because holding on to the what ifs was killing me, stealing my joy and my hands were figuratively bleeding from holding on to all my broken dreams.

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But could I really let go? Its so easy to give yourself a pep talk and make plans to move on but at the end of the day, we’re humans, I am human and of course I didn’t move on immediately. At the back of my mind I clung to thoughts of some day. I am sure you that if you can relate to my story, you know that here’s always that one thing or person that you cannot seem to let go of, even when you know it’s bad for you, even when you know it will end up bringing more pain, and I think it is because there’s something in us that makes us want what we know we can’t have.

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At the end of the day though, when all the words have been said and all the feelings have been felt, one thing is crystal clear, it’s OK to let go! To choose yourself, to love yourself enough to walk away from toxic decisions and situations. Do it for yourself, for your sanity. It is a long hard road, but it’s so worth it when you arrive at that place of peace, of acceptance, open minded and ready to go again. Hey, if at first you don’t succeed, dust yourself and try again till you get it right. I love you, but I love me more…say it till you start to believe it!

“Blessed are the hearts that can bend; they shall never be broken.” – Albert Camus

Love, Even When You Hate…

 

“Love me, even when you hate me.”  The first time I heard this saying was on Greys Anatomy, (you guys know I love my Greys!) Meredith and her fiancé Derek were too busy to find time to plan their wedding, so one day on their lunch break, they snuck into the on call room and said their vows to each other. In her vows, Meredith told Derek to Love her even when he hated her. I remember asking myself what she meant by that and I didn’t really understand her until much later. Love is not nor should it be a fleeting burst of emotion, it’s a decision we make and affirm to ourselves every day.

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 As much as I adore my parents and my siblings, there are days when they upset me and I find myself wondering how on earth to deal with them, but at the end of day it doesn’t mean I love them any less, I hope I am making sense, I promise I have a point. Now, the same goes for romantic love, if you decide to love someone and possibly spend the rest of your life with said person, you have to realize that it will NOT always be rosy, some days will be so hard and you just want to throw in the towel and leave but you stay because like I said, love is not a fleeting feeling, it is a conscious decision to stand by someone and care for them come what may. So basically, you love all the time, even when you’re mad, even when you hate them, you love first because it is the Christian thing to do and also because well, you have to.

The love I really want to talk about is the love between friends. These days it almost seems like friendship is slowly going into extinction. Nobody wants to communicate anymore, and technology has made it even worse because friends these days are most likely to write cryptic quotes on their social media platforms than actually sit down and talk to their friends about issues. There’s so much animosity and bitterness in the world today and it’s causing friendships to end sometimes as quickly they are born. This is happening with so much ease simply because people don’t want to put in the hard work that is required to build a solid friendship: honesty, love, respect, communication, and most importantly, FORGIVENESS. Forgiveness seems to be the missing link in a lot of friendships; people hurt you so much so you just shut them out and act like they don’t exist to you. Friendships are especially hard because unlike family and marriage where you have no option than to love, nothing really binds you to your friends, I guess that’s why it’s so easy to walk away and pitch a new tent elsewhere with new friends.

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Personally, I have lost some friends because we failed to keep in touch or because we let our egos get in the way of reconciliation and I deeply regret that because honestly that’s just plain wrong. I derive joy in praying for my friends and watching them flourish so isn’t it a sin to stop praying for someone just because I’m mad at them? Sigh… I should do better, I will do better and so should you. Life is hard enough as it is, we all need people in our corner to cheer us on, to share our burdens and to laugh with us.

So here’s to salvaging meaningful friendships and to loving others even when they don’t love us back and most importantly even when we hate them, because what would Jesus do?

“Love is not a place to come and go as you please, it’s a house you enter in and then commit to never leave. So lock the door behind you, throw away the keys, we’ll work it out together and let it bring us to our knees…no, love is not a fight but it is something worth fighting for” – Warren Barfield

From One ″Side Chick″ To Another…

Ho ho ho! I am not a side chick oh! But now that I have your attention, let us talk about this phenomenon that seems to be the in thing today. First of all, who is a side chick? A side chick is a woman who may or may not be fully aware of the fact that the man she is in a relationship with, is in a ‘serious’ relationship with another woman. The way I see it, there are three categories of side chicks (this is beginning to sound like I’m writing a paper for my professor )

The type A side chick usually doesn’t mind that she is not the only one, she is less emotionally involved with the man and is satisfied with all the perks that come from being a side chick. Her thinking is that as long as the money, trips, cars and whatever else keeps rolling in then she is just fine where she is.

Now the type B side chick has fallen in love with the man in question, knowing that he is unavailable, but can’t seem to break things off with him. She is not in it for the money or the perks, she is just happy to spend whatever time she can get with him. This is quite sad because the man is almost never there as he is quite involved with his main chick who in this case might be a wife, fiancée or girlfriend. The type B side chick is very aware of this but will still hang on, harboring hopes that one day he will be all hers. Sigh, dreams.

The type C side chick on the other hand, has no idea that she is a side chick. She is the main chick who just happens to be the side chick. Sounds complicated right? A lot of women including yours truly, have found themselves in this category and sometimes it is very well known to everyone else except for them.

 Wouldn’t life be a whole lot easier if people would just use the common sense that God gave to them and stay faithful to their partners? no, they have to mess things up by leading a string of women and men along. Some women have their fair share of side guys as well. Has monogamy completely died? Is it still possible for a couple to commit to each other and just stay committed? I was at the nail shop the other day and I heard this lady saying that it was wishful thinking to assume that your husband would never cheat on you, that men will cheat, so just pick one already and accept your lot in life. That statement tugged at my heart all day, but I refuse to believe it. I might sound naive, but I still believe in monogamy.

In the spirit of the new year, wouldn’t it be nice if side chicks and guys all over the world decide to just stop? To just walk away from this toxic phenomenon that has become so rampant it’s no longer shocking? Decide to leave couples be, and try to find their own? I wish.
In a world that should be black and white, there are so many shades of grey, it’s no wonder we have all become color blind.

Lines Not To Fall For, After He Leaves You…

Now this is just a little Friday humor, but please take somethings I say with more than a pinch of salt, a handful maybe. If he broke up with you and you are trying to nurse your broken heart, the following are lines you should6334362-angry-african-american-couple never fall for.

Line 1: Lets remain friends- This is a huge no no! if he broke your heart, why prolong the agony? I am not saying be enemies, but I don’t see why you need to hang around each other and watch each other move on. So when he says: Lets remain friends, say you will think about it and call him, maybe, in a few years.

Line 2: You’ll always have a piece of my heart- Oh please, let him keep his heart all to himself. If he wont give you all of it, don’t accept pieces of it. True, save the violins, stamp on it and walk away without looking back.(ok not so drastic, but walk away nevertheless)

Line 3: I value our friendship too much to continue dating you– Yeah right. He doesn’t love you, probably never did and if you listen to this, you will find yourself clinging to the hope that maybe someday you guys will make it since he “values” your friendship. Move on, do not let him prevent you from meeting someone else.

Line 4: I will always be there for you if you ever need to talk: Uhhhhm no thank you. let your support system be there for you, your mum and your girls, he doesn’t get to make promises like that anymore. you’re broken up, remember?

Line 5: I am sorry, can we try again?– How many times has he said that before? be honest. Once? you tried, it didn’t work. learn from it, count your losses and go!

Some things are just not meant to be, maybe two of you weren’t meant to be, and that’s OK…you need to learn to accept that maybe it didn’t work out for a reason, What that reason is, you might never know but still, be strong. Someone who appreciates you will come along, so don’t hang around, fanning flames that have died out and killing each others chances of happiness.

“When suffering from a broken heart, be wary of wallowing alone. It is very unhealthy. For every night of wallowing, prescribe three nights out...”- Camilla Morton

Photo credit: Google