I ran across this picture last week and have looked at it daily since I found it. It resonates with me because I believe that is me. That’s me writing in my comfy clothes, with my books, candles, and in a perfect world, a live plant. I’m not sure where I am. The buildings look somewhat familiar but I can’t place them. For now, I’m believing it’s the Georgia State Capitol building that has a gold dome. The story of how the gold dome got gold is due to the gold rush, and it was just that a rush in 1829 when gold was discovered in north Georgia, Dahlonega to be exact. Dahlonega is part of the Blue Ridge region, Cherokee country.

If I’m looking at it from a point of symbolism, I believe I’ve struck gold. I have found a gold mine in my life. I have found those with gold hearts, and gold within me. I also believe I am the God’s golden child. I’ve been picked to serve my purpose and help heal others. If you haven’t watched the movie The Golden Child with Eddie Murphy, I encourage you to watch it to make this more meaningful.

I want to believe that is a church or a spiritual temple beside it, to the right. It’s my place of hope, peace, tranquility, and love. It’s my source of being the best version of me. And see the moon? It’s the waning crescent that represents restoring your thoughts and intentions. Looks like the stars are lined up in my favor.

I’m going to continue to meditate and study this picture and see what else speaks to me but for now, I’m believing what I see and what resonates with me. As I have said many many times, pay attention to the signs. They are everywhere.

Lately, I have been feeling the conviction of ego. I feel I need to let my ego go to be more aware of my spiritual awareness and align with my instinct. God did not create us to impress people. If we do impress them, what’s the reward? Their opinion. It is far better to be a thing than to look like a thing.

Before my awakening and during my suffering of pain and grief, I did not put in a request to God that reflected my ego. I did not put in a request that put the focus on me. Why put the focus on me? I was a hot mess, I was in pain and suffering, what is it that I could do that would help someone else? I was holding on by a fiber of a thread. I was in the position of mercy. I said, “I will do whatever!” Whatever meant selflessness! It did not mean as the younger generations say today, “whatever” with an eye roll and talk to the hand. It meant I will be in a servant position. That’s what desperate people say, “I will do whatever” when they need a job. I’ll take whatever car, house, shoes, coat, or whatever is available.” Taking any reward or prize that is available.

Having the mindset of whatever is being open. It is a position in which you are a servant, a helper. Do you think the people that clean out the septic tank or pick up your trash look at it as an ego position? I doubt it. When the focus is on the ego, on the tangible, on look at me, what I did, where I am, where I went, what I bought. What is the point? To impress? Just because it temporarily fills your void does not mean it is impressive to your peers.

We can recognize when something comes from the ego because it never satisfies. Ego and humility cannot simultaneously exist. The ego prevents the apology. The ego prevents saying I made a mistake and correcting the behavior. It prevents the words and actions from matching.

Society keeps telling us that more is better. More tech gadgets, more followers, more “likes”, more cars, more trips. Even more, people that agree with me, believe like me, think like me are a stroke of the ego.

As a man once told Buddha

I want happiness. Buddha replied “First remove ‘I’, that’s ego. Then remove ‘want’ that’s desire. Now all you are left with is ‘happiness’.

I read this quote earlier in the month and wrote it down in my calendar because it spoke to me. I ran across it again and meditated on it. I realized that it is saying the same thing as Dr. Miller in The Awakened Brain. To perceive reality correctly that is fulfilling we have to use both awareness modes we are given.

One is our “achieving awareness” this is also known as our intellect. In Dr. Miller’s words, “Achieving awareness is necessary. It helps us move and chase the ball up and down the field.” It’s what makes logical sense to us. The commitment we need to make goals and how to get the goals. Study for an exam, complete a project, get somewhere on time. It’s our focus drive. “But when overused, or exclusively used, achieving awareness overrides and changes the structure of our brains, carving pathways of depression, anxiety, stress, and craving. When out of balance, achieving awareness is narrowly focused, unguided by the bigger picture, obsessed with the same track or idea, never satisfied, and often lonely and isolated.”

It’s why we need and have the second awareness called “awakened awareness” or instinct. In Dr. Miller’s words, “In awakened awareness, we don’t lose or forsake our goals. But we take off the blinders. We surrender our tight grip on a goal. We understand that life is a dynamic force that we can attune to and interact with. It’s no longer me against the world, or me treading upon the world, but me hearing what life has to say, aware that life is meeting me where I am. I still have wishes and desires and goals, I still experience disappointment and hurt—but I lean into the flow of life, paying attention to where doors open and close.” Now in T.D. Jakes words, “When you’re living by instinct, then you will naturally enhance everything and everyone around you. In other words, success will come naturally! When both your intellect and instincts are aligned, then producing the fruits of your labors brings satisfaction beyond measure.”

Who would have ever thought a preacher from West Virginia and a clinical scientist at Columbia University could be on the same page. I believe it’s because they know the secret to success and living a fulfilling life. If only I had been taught this in school. If only my son and you and your children learned it. It’s been there the whole time. It’s why Noah built the ark. It’s never too late to start all over. Thankful that I learned something new.

Some years ago my shrink recommended a book called, The Four Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz. Talk about a challenging self-help book. The 4 agreements are for us to learn, know and practice to help us not to suffer in vain. All suffering is not necessary.

The first agreement is to be impeccable with your word. I believe that is hard for most of us. Not saying things against ourselves, not just in an audible voice but to ourselves. Beating ourselves up over shame and mistakes shouldn’t have any room in our lives. And when we tell someone something, speak with integrity and follow through with your word. I find a lot of wishy-washy people, especially in business.

The second agreement is not to take anything personally. This one is the biggest challenge for me. I have to repeat the lesson that not everyone thinks like me, believes like me, has a heart like me and what they do has nothing to do with me. If they pick chocolate and I expect them to pick vanilla, that’s on me for having the expectation and taking it personally. Nothing anybody does is because of you. It all has to do with them. I find the childhood wounds and past traumas come up to the mic and speak when we take things personally.

The third agreement is don’t make assumptions. Again if I assume you are going to pick vanilla and you pick chocolate, I assumed it. It may be because that has been your pattern for 20 years. It may be because I didn’t ask you. Asking questions always will get you clarification if the other side tells you the truth. Lack of communication is the foundation of misunderstandings, miscommunication that can lead to drama and lots of mixed emotions.

This last one is my favorite. It’s the one I’m currently embracing and hugging daily. Always do your best. Our best changes daily. Sometimes it changes hour to hour or minute to minute depending on what’s happening in our lives. My best looks like a rollercoaster at Six Flags. Some days I’m doing great with lots of energy and feel like I’m 20. Some days I’m tired, pushing myself, and feeling all of a 1/2 century old. All I know is I’m doing my best both days and it’s not for me to judge or speak against myself or anyone else to judge it or speak against it.

I highly recommend this book. I’ve had to go back to it several times and remind myself that these are the four agreements that will keep me from suffering needlessly.

It’s my last week for my media detox. In the short time I have shut down social media and television, I have found more peace and acceptance than ever before in my life. I am just allowing whatever it is, letting it be and that is how peace comes, being drama free.

I am so focused on me and my journey that I feel like I’m watching a movie when things happen around me. I look at it as if I’m watching it and I don’t have control over it. I don’t have the channel changer. I’m not in charge of this one or that one. I’m only in charge of me. I’m allowing the shift I feel because I know it’s for my greater purpose.

As the posts under my deck shift, become weak and start to fall away, I know the posts that remain are strong and they will hold me up and not allow me to fall. I know that acceptance is the only way to be if I trust the divine plan and the path paved before me. I remembered many are for what I am for or what I am against and only a few are for me. Read Are you Constituents, Comrades and Confidants if you haven’t so you know what I am saying exactly.

My accomplishments, goals and vision board are being fulfilled like never before in my life. I have more checks by my workout, sleep, water, quiet time, writing daily, seeing new contacts and maintaining my calorie intake. I’m rested, I’m not stressed or anxious about anything. I’ve went through boxes of tea, bottles of bubble bath, multiple candles, read 1 book and half way through 2 more. Learned every song on a whole album. Music soothes my soul. Someone asked, “how are you doing?” I replied without hesitation, “I’m happier than I’ve ever been.”

Maybe they are right. Ya know “they” the people that tell us what’s really happening. And what’s really happening is social media is a tool and tools can repair things but they can also destroy things. Hammers can help or hurt depending on the user. I’m going to need to reconfigure my tool box come February 1 when I come back on social media. This life I’m living is just too good.

From May-August of 2021, I cried more than I ever have in my life. I cried daily, I had cries of pain from grief and losses. My heart and soul were suffering. When I went on my healing journey and attended The Potters House church in Dallas Texas, I cried the entire service. If my mask could talk, it held every tear that fell. It was soaking wet. There’s an idea, someone needs to invent a waterproof mask.

I have often questioned why I cried so much that day and during that period in my life. Today, I know that I was transitioning. I was transitioning from my old world of suffering, loss, and grief to my new world of awakening.

The reason we cry is that we are moving into another dimension. A baby cries when he is born. When he is moving from the womb to the world he is moving into a new dimension. If the baby doesn’t cry then everyone gets nervous. The baby suffers passing through the womb, the pulling, the forceps, the mom pushing the newborn out. It’s hard, it’s labor, it’s suffering. But as soon as the baby is out and he is in his new dimension, he cries. The awakening is in the suffering.

Society doesn’t want us to suffer. They want us to extinguish the pain. We are addicted to being pain-free. Let me say it again, we are addicted to being pain-free. We have more substance to kill pain than ever before in my lifetime. When I was a child, we had Joseph’s children’s aspirin, Bayer aspirin, and Goody’s powders. Today we do not have sections of over-the-counter pain medicine, we have aisles. Opioid addiction is the number one killer in this country. It’s more than war and car accidents. Liquor stores have gone from mom-and-pop locally owned stores to megastores. Weed is legal or a misdemeanor in most states. Obesity is a sign that we are eating our feelings. We are losing the war on drugs every single day.

I understand wanting to be pain-free. I extinguished my pain for decades. Extinguishing pain through substance, food, sex, shopping, or whatever your vice is, is not getting you to the next dimension. We cannot awaken when we numb the suffering. We must feel the pain, the grief, and snuggle with our demons to go to the next level in our life. And crying is part of going into the next dimension.

Your destiny is in your tears. Let it go! Stuffing your suffering is only prolonging your next dimension. You may cry for a day, a week, a month, or months but when it’s over, get ready. Get ready for your awakening and get ready for your next dimension. I don’t know who needs to hear this or read this but I pray you to receive it and cry your way to your awakening, to your freedom, and to the next dimension that is waiting for you.

Some years ago, I downloaded the Kindle app on my phone and with good intentions, I bought some books but never opened or finished them. One of those books was Instinct by one of my favorites, Bishop T.D.Jakes. This week, I realized I had on my Kindle but only had read a couple of chapters. I’m not sure it had significant meaning to me when I bought it but it is feeding my soul now. He writes about how to find your path, your purpose through your instinct.

As I read this paragraph in the book, it aligned with what I told an old friend this week. I told my friend that his reaction should not be based on someone else’s action. If he wanted to do ABC then do ABC. Don’t say I’ll do ABC if this person or that person does 123. We should be strictly doing us. Not worried or concerned about who is doing what or who is with us or against us.

We should be so focused on ourselves and what we can change and control that we shouldn’t let anybody or nothing stop us from doing what we need to do for us.

We have to accept that as we ascend higher for our purpose there will be many shifts. Like changing car gears. If you wanna go to 2nd gear you’re gonna have to leave 1st gear. If you wanna go to 3rd gear, you gonna have to leave 2nd gear and so on. Folks will completely fall out of your life as you switch gears and you may never have closure but it’s okay because you don’t need it when you trust it’s all a divine plan. You learn to let go like shifting a gear. Just gotta move on if you wanna keep going.

Learning to gravitate to what feels good is essential for your path and purpose. Embrace what you like, like to do, what inspires you, who motivates you. Relish in the feel good. As much as you embrace the things you gravitate to, you have to remove the negative things too. If someone or something irritates you, you feel their energy is bad or something is not right in your relationship with them, that’s your gut talk.

I recently had someone fall completely out of my life. There was not a reason, an apology, or closure. Now the old me would’ve been upset and lost sleep over the relationship. The new me, not so much. I just said they were removed because their season is over in my life. They no longer have a reason to be in my life. I’m going to assume they had bad intentions, they were talking behind my back or something I cannot comprehend but God removed them and I accept it. Period!

It’s a professional athlete mindset. Professional athletes don’t get emotionally attached because they can’t if they want to move forward in their careers. Quarterbacks can’t take their best or favorite running backs with them. Lineman can’t take their other lineman with them. Even though those people were part of their team, their tribe and helped them to achieve their goals. They accept that the season is over and it’s time to move on to the team, city, state to achieve another accomplishment.

Don’t expect and don’t depend because you will get your heart hurt if you try to take folks with you. Keep shifting gears, keep it fluently moving, and don’t look back or beside you to see where everyone else is because their path is different than yours. Don’t let your reaction be based on their action. Believe in yourself with your eyes wide open as you ascend higher and higher.

I’ve set a new record. I finished a book in 2 weeks. First, let me say I’m not a reader. I’ve always had trouble focusing and reading comprehension has never been my cup of tea. I’m a hands-on learner so handing me a book for instruction is never a good idea. So maybe I set more than one record with reading The Awakened Brain. I highly recommend it for understanding spiritual awareness. Here are some highlights from the book.

• If patients could understand their anger or childhood wounds, the theory went, they could release them and no longer be controlled by them. The way out of suffering was to face suffering and gain insight.
• I was always thinking about numbers. And soon they began to light up in jaw-dropping patterns, like constellations emerging from a dark sky. The effect of maternal depression on childhood depression: a twofold increased risk. The effect of poverty on depression: a 40 percent increase associated with the variable “a problem paying bills.” The effect of parenting style on depression: when a parent, father or mother, is affectionate but not overly controlling, a child’s risk for depression is cut by 18 to 30 percent.
• I discovered something striking: when the mother and child were both high in spirituality, spirituality, the child was 80 percent protected against depression, compared with mothers and children who were not concordant for spirituality, or mothers and children who were not high in spirituality. In other words, a child was five times less likely to be depressed when spiritual life was shared with a mother.
• Personal devotion—a sense of personal relationship with a higher power—was the active ingredient that carried the protective benefit, with or without personal conservatism. Third, he found that personal devotion decreased the lifetime risk for alcoholism and nicotine dependence. Spiritual people are less likely to be addicted. The findings showed correlation, not causation, but it was a start in revealing the effects of spirituality on our mental health.
• Remarkably, I found that in the nationally representative sample of teens, adolescents with a strong personal spirituality were 35 to 75 percent less likely to experience clinical depression.
• And after so much time worrying about what we’re supposed to think, we don’t know what we think.” She pointed to the irony of becoming more and more educated while becoming less and less able to trust ourselves as knowers.
• Synchronicity—when two apparently disparate events are joined at the level of meaning or consciousness—seemed like an accessible way to illuminate and validate those sparks of inner knowing, those flashes of meaning or insight that seem to arrive out of the blue.
• Cho also found that this enhanced perception of synchronicity goes hand in hand with increased spiritual awareness—and with better mental health. The more we practice engaging with open awareness, the more we are able to perceive synchronicity. And as we see synchronicity, we become more spiritually oriented—more aware of guidance, connection, and unity in our lives.
• Spiritual awareness is a stance, not a transaction. There’s never a guarantee that we’re going to get what we want, or what we thought we wanted. When we become spiritually aware—through synchronicity, for example—it’s a sign that despite the uncertainty, we are aligned with the force of life.
• women are twice as likely as men to experience depression, she had discovered that women tend to rely more on a cognitive process called rumination—mental mental spinning or overthinking—to cope with negative moods. While men generally engage in activities that distract them from their bad moods, women tend to dwell on the causes and consequences of their moods, asking, Why am I feeling this way? Why can’t I handle things better? What’s wrong with me? This tendency to ruminate—to go down a rabbit hole of unrelenting thoughts and questions—only worsens a depressed mood, in part because the negative content of the thoughts reinforces the negative mood, but also because the process of rumination is passive and repetitive. Although people generally engage in rumination because they want to achieve new insights about themselves or their situation, Susan found that the effects of rumination are rarely positive for people who are already depressed—it impairs problem solving, deters social support, and fuels a brooding sense of low self-worth.
• Susan found that depression reinforces rumination; and rumination reinforces depression.
• And our times of doubt, struggle, and depression often serve as portals to our awakened life.
• We experience loss, trauma, suffering. We get the things we’re most terrified of, the things we least want. Even when we’re bent on protecting the castle, we can’t prevent the tides. And when we cling too tightly to our desire for control, anything can break us—we’re so brittle, fragile, ready to collapse and fall that any risk feels too severe, any block insurmountable. We are so consumed by our need to do things right, that we lose sight of the larger meaning for what we do and are blind to the regeneration that loss makes possible.

That’s only about 1/2 of what I highlighted. If you read something that resonates, I encourage you to buy it and discover more.

Remember the Christmas movie that is a favorite by many, A Wonderful Life? If you’ve seen it then you know that Clarence, the guardian angel takes George down memory lane to show his life in flashback. I don’t know who my Clarence is but I’ve been having flashbacks of my life and I’ve been shocked and what I didn’t see. When I say I had an awakening, I cannot say it enough.

I’ve read that the more you practice discernment the better you get at it. I think it’s like a bird or any animal in the wild. When they are first born they are not aware of sounds or smells that endanger them. But it’s not long before they know the sounds of gunfire, the smell of a human, the animals and prey that endanger them. We are all created with the ability to sense or judge when there is something wrong. I think God gave us that so we could protect ourselves. I think it’s strange that animals practice it daily but humans can’t seem to grasp it.

Animals know when they are in danger. They spot their enemy miles away and make preparations to avoid getting hurt or killed. Humans most of the time know their enemies too but for some reason cannot make preparations to avoid getting hurt. We continue to expose ourselves to hurtful and toxic people. Knowing their capabilities. If you want to predict the pattern of someone, look at their history.

As I look back at the flashbacks of my life I see where I put myself in danger and exposed myself to toxic relationships. I see the danger of falling prey to manipulation and so many other toxic traits. But now, I can hear conversations in stores, restaurants, and public places and think this person is toxic. This person is lying, manipulating, gaslighting. It’s like I have a built-in radar going off continuously.

I know I have spent the majority of my years putting myself in danger and not using my God-given abilities to discern toxic traits in people. I am so thankful that I am now awake and I see things clearly. I know I could still be spending another year or decade in danger and not utilizing my radar.

Shoutout to my Clarence for showing me flashbacks and giving me so much hope for my wonderful life.