7 Oct 2015

Own it!

Hello Beautiful Beings!!

So today I want to talk about healing. 



We have all been hurt in one way or another, being it emotionally or physically. Sometimes some wounds deeper than others, some cases more traumatic than others. Whatever the case, I just want to take a moment to honor the process of healing. Talking from the lessons I recently learned, there is no way the healing process can begin if I don't honor and respect my pain. It may sound outrageous and for some no such things has ever been heard. 

By honoring and respecting your pain, it's no pity party being thrown or a sad mellow session; it's much more about acknowledging that you are hurt and being honest to yourself about it.It also isn't an opportunity to shift the blame, but much more about opening our eyes to our own role in the messes we personally put ourselves through. Feeling all things so deeply is really the first treatment to the pain(in fact growing up I remember to confide in whoever was there at the moment that I wished I was made out of steel or a tree because I wouldn't have to feel all things so deeply). In any case, avoiding the pain is simply adding to the infection and the day the volcano will erupt, not only will you have gotten the load heavier, you'd have consciously adhered to silent and slow mutilation of the precious being that you are. You and your pain deserve to be honored. 

Recovery is not about how fast you will get up or avoiding the matter. It is all about how well and truly you recover. I realized how important it was to take a step back, give myself a lil time to acknowledge that yes I was hurting, whether the pain was self inflicted or whether the offence came from an outside source. Identify how you feel, ad why you feel how you feel and where it came from and say yes, this sucks, I am hurt (because..) and then own it, own it, make it yours. While you make it your own and should you have a part in it. Own your mistakes and be gentle with yourself, forgive yourself from letting down yourself. 


Additionally, I learned that owning and honoring my pain did not mean that I have to give into desperation or giving up on myself. I stress not giving up on the self strongly, because the self is all that cannot be stolen or taken away from you when all else does. You can give up on a job, a relationship and anything else that harms you or does not allow you to grow in anyway, what gots to go gots to go honey, pronto! There is no way you, I can heal if we make no space for it, if we hoard the negative energy whether its from an outside source or ourselves. If it is not helping us to grow or to go through the process of healing, it has to go. This leads to the next point I want to talk about.


It is important to take ownership of our pain, whatever wound it is, you ave to embrace the fullness of it: name and make it yours. It is important to realize that as much as we may need a trusted person to walk with us through the process, ultimately we are the one to heal and to fight for ourselves. It's not anyone's duty to learn the lesson you have to learn or make it through for you. The fixing is in your hands. God can change things for you, someone can help you get to some realizations, but the healing is yours to do. To do! 

It's an active step  not a passive one. Just like most women and girls (including myself), we often made/make the mistake to do the healing  or the fixing in someone else's life, yet it is never our responsibility to fix or heal anyone. Yes it is in our nature and it is good to love someone and nurture, however it is not our duty or responsibility to do the healing for someone else. It's crucial to not get addicted to being needed or survive on faint edification that wear us down. My point is, if you have not created a human being, how can you fix it without confusing it. If you are not the creator, you are not the fixer.  You can just be a companion, hold someone's hand but it's their duty to reach within themselves and resolve it themselves. 


Lastly, even when we think we have healed and survived, we get to a moment where we feel stuck and sometimes we do not know why. This pretty much is how I felt for the past weeks until I had to do some serious work on the self. I realized that I made it through the fire, burnt but not destroyed, I was in the deepest water but I did not drown. Okay, so why do I still feel overwhelmed? I realized that I felt overwhelmed because of fear and worry, because I kept on dragging the hurt and the wounded self with me, the bad memories and defined myself by it, a victim forgetting that I am mostly a survivor. 

Scared to death that history may repeat itself, I made sure to engrave all the symptoms and signs etc. of how it all begins,  where it may come from, not realizing that my safety net and cautious strategy was simply a trap. A trap that ca start by fear, grow as bitterness and end up to a hopeless case. Telling myself that yes I deserve a better future, yet believing the opposite. There was no way things could get better, if in my mind all things ended up badly anyway.  This trap that held me so tight, had me trying to figure out how to gauge the risk from each corner but most importantly, I gave into the foolishness of believing that I may have such powers. 

I am no super woman and in fact it's not my job to gauge all risks. It's God's job, not mine.
 I may fix boundaries and try to limit the damage or entertain anything that is not good for my soul. But I cannot save myself from everything and everyone at all times. I can only work on my healing and therefore my reaction to what life will throw at me. I can work on understanding that the whole world is not out there to harm me, that I may get dissapointed and it's okay, I can get hurt again too by something different. 

What matters is that I will survive it too, like I survived the other things before. Like Sarah Jakes Roberts says it " you have to let go of the teacher, in order to learn the lesson and grow". So dust your crown little lady, feel it, weep for yourself, nurse your own brokenness. Then get up and feed your faith, and keep going towards your better future, even if you don't see the light; the future will show up for you, if you show up for yourself. 



Side note: Yes, I love the new movement of wearing button down shirts backwards. When my model accepted to adhere to my madness, my heart skipped a bit. I believe in the renaissance of all things. It's about time classic items get to be spiced up a lil bit and be worn and viewed from a different perspective!

Anywho more strength, courage and healing to you all!

Shirt: Banana Republic
Pants: Woolworths





3 Oct 2015

A million complexities


Hello beautiful beings!!

This October, EverydayAella is graced by the beauty that is my soul sister. I felt like her style fits so well with spring, because in my eyes she is all things warm, pure and simple,...So I asked her to write something, but she said that I could pen her down, speak from the heart and introduce her through my eyes. So there goes a million complexities.







A million complexities

We are at the extreme polarities
I am all things bold and loud, you are sophisticated in all simplicity
But as much as I think I could describe you, you never cease to enhance my curiosity
You cannot be defined, even if we had all infinity
We see all our difference and complexities like no infirmity
But celebrated unity in all respect of individuality
Rebuked conformity
I appreciate the fact that we strive to conserve and base"us"on friendship and love labeled with purity and dignity

You are beauty in it's natural form
What's beautiful about you is that you exude it in all silence
No need to shout from the roof top or over do it, you are magnificence 
You are the mirror to the sun child that I am
Moon child, you soothe all the burning fire in me coming like a storm
You whisper "breathe" when I can't take it anymore and say hey we are in this together, here I am

I love that you do not entertain my insecurities
Instead your love, strong stares and nods take out some of those self-inflicted impurities
I am glad that you are an island, a destination I got the chance to reach
A refuge where I found myself, and with wisdom I got enriched

God must have known that my mother wouldn't bear no other daughter
So He gave me you
I am glad a have a safe place, I am glad I have you
You help me grow, you help me heal, you help me be me
your lil light beams on me
Soul sister, never stop being you, for in you I see me








#Jumpsuit: YDE
#Gladiators: Steve Madden 

28 Sept 2015

Searching for clues







Searching for clues
Heart painted blue
Mind filled with a list of dues
Nothing goes unseen
Nothing will not be hidden
Nothing will go unspoken
All of it, even the broken
The adorned was no longer a token

I thought, well that means nothing will be unpunished
The tarnished, the blemished
Eye for an eye, well deserved
Perfection has to be preserved
Who cares if progress is happening, control over all things has to be observed
All has to be paid for, maybe this redemption must be earned
Darkness judged
My sentence and time has to be purged
So I suffocated, mostly exhausted, to despair I turned

Till I touched grace
It changed my fate
First time touching forgiveness
It felt foreign to my face
I had to stop relying on my ignorance
Oh how much reasoning and self confidence
Rationality and logic, I gave it all the importance
But how could I be so confident yet my plans couldn't take me the whole distance
Out of breathe, impossible was the race
Sustained perfection and strength, it's all pretense
I am not that strong, I don't even have it all under control
Too frail to hold water or anything more 
I needed to get to a place of surrender for the survivor in me, only in your embrace
At the door I glared at the self and all over her these scary traces
I pleaded grace

Then for a minute I touched heaven
In a second I tasted your love
That was a change for a life time
Free, I had to pay no price, do no time
Suddenly my bags weighed less
Surrendering made me stress less
Not that I became brainless
Coz it's not about what I do, is it?
It has more to do with my intentions, isn't it?
What I feed my soul, what I produce from the inside, therefore it's actually about who I am?

Less precautions
Since my limitations were no caution
I couldn't escape the truth nor settle with my incarceration
I just rebuked deception
Now there came sweet redemption
Medicated by life, you healed me with love on prescription
Put me on a ride to promotion
No, actually benediction
I accepted my humanity and wore humility, so where you lead me shall be my destination
The way you see me, my description
No need for an audition or universally correct perception
What matters is that I eventually reach my full potential, completion









Thank you for reading and for following up the September series of my attempt at poetry :)

Cape Blazer: On the line (Superbalist)
Jeans: Cotton On
Scarf: From my sister's closet (you are meeting her soon, in the next posts)
Jersey Tee: Woolworth (actually a gift)
Heels: Fashion Express
Clutch: YDE

Inhale and exhale, even if you don't have it all figured out..it's going to be okay



23 Sept 2015

Dear me, dare me!




Dear me
Dear me, not so little anymore but still a lil girl on the inside
You don't ever have to pretend
Thinking that you are defended
Defended by the silence imposed to your emotions, feelings inhibited
Even if they don't understand your mind, be on your own side
Feelings shattered, voiced shut, you are not meant to be following every coming wind

Have a grip little girl
Have a grip to stand still
Stand on the side if it's needed, but remain still even when you are ripped apart
You don't have to dim your light to be in the part
Part of the preexisting evolution of confusion
All the anger, all the abuse and resentment, let it not be called love seen in an illusion
Or some will say it's a love and stability kind of fusion
But hurting yourself is no redemption

Little girl, you do not have warm up everyone else for the sake of saving yourself
Selflessness is not thinking less of the self
Nor is it selfish to retract from anything that doesn't build you up
Help you grow up
You don't have to get to a point where you blow up
Little girl brighten up
Shine to your lil light
Keep on walking light

Let go
Let it go
Let it all go
Slowly but let it all go still
You do not have to be a pillar to redeem your frailness
Nothing can feel up that emptiness
It takes crucifixion to deny the past self to reach fullness
Ease into your self little girl
Phase off the bitterness
Most like regrets and mea culpas, being stuck in the past is useless
Be brave for yourself, not for the sake of those who turned you into a case
Let it all go, decide what will form you and lead yourself to where your heart is
Your own light and fresh breeze
Don't hold on to the tease
You are more, you need more, you are created for more







Top: YDE
Skirt: Mr Price
Socks: Woolworths
Heels: Utopia
Necklace: La Belle

18 Sept 2015

Metamorphosis

Metamorphosis





Thank you for not letting me settle for iniquity
You see my past made me believe that I represented iniquity
My present filled with frailty
Impersonating fear and emptiness I gave away to mediocrity
Swayed by false humility
Decisions made on meager scrutiny
I barely survived on spiritual and emotional poverty
Ridicule sanity
The darkness is maybe not too bad a place, I saw change as the ultimate adversary 

But no, you had to see the real me and remind me that I am a lioness meant to roar
An eagle to soar
My fears told me, nah you can't make it, your legs are way too short for the distance
Have I forgotten your omnipotence?
I am too small for the greatness of these heights
Am I  too numbed by pain to see your importance?
Holding onto pain, I told you I am not fit for this God
I am not ready for the outpouring of your embrace
I am barely getting out of bed, I can't even face my own face


Love so relentless
You refused to feed my anxieties, because you never intended for me to abide in inferiority
You led me to dig unto me the treasure of the your divinity
You didn't give up on me or forsake me
Even when I gave up on me
You said give it all up to me, the ugly and the beautiful, just be true to me
Waiting on me to pick the right reaction and make the sound decision
You waited patiently, because real love is allowing me to have a free will
Holding me still
Even if it opposes my nature, your relentless and never ending endurance, you remain rooted in your truth for me 

Still I remained lost, hurting but shoving all those feelings into oblivion
Well because maybe my brain was to small for all that terrible dominion
Logic and reason is supreme, isn't it, my head works where my heart always gave up anyway
Little did I even know what a heart was or less of what it is to be used for, so faithless
You found me in a pit and you lightened me up, set me free to be on my way
Your light, so bright, so strong, my darkness got lit
Yes you done did it
Layer by layer, got rid of it
Just because I lived life, walked a crooked path and got beaten by imperfection
You did not love me any less
Instead you saw me as blameless
So forward I will press
Forward child, forward you go to your greatness
But all the glory is yours, you turned the empty into wholeness







May love water your soul, garden your heart, empower you to be alive and smile!



Shirt: gift
Skirt: Mr Price
Leather tights: Mr Price
Shoes: Superbalist
Bag: gift (Aldo)
Handmade Jewelry: Inzuki
Sunglasses: YDE


14 Sept 2015

Mother Supreme


In homage and reverence to the force of nature that is my mother!!!









Mother Supreme

You are the earth that grounds me
The sky that elevates me to transcend to the higher me
Your love lights into me, and into me I can therefore see
Your words are the beauty of flowers
Like a rose, they remind me that the harshness of this world should not harm my softness
Just because I have scars of thorns, there is still beauty and gentleness within me
And such beauty I shall honor, for I am a flower worth watering in the midst of weeds of racing thoughts
Your love is healing, a wonderful scent that my mind should enclose, 
Just like to your heart you hold me close

You are the sun that keeps me warm
the moon that holds me down
Your river of inexhaustible warmth and life supplies endless energy from the core within me
You are the spring of my life
Renaissance in its own essence
Your being holds the sense of me
You help me make sense of my boldness
You take away all doubts and feed my fearlessness

You keep me going
You keep me rising 
You are light
You are love embodied in a mystical paradigm of a myriad complexities
I am glad to be engulfed in you
To be birthed by you
To be known by you
To be loved by you
You are supreme!





1 Sept 2015

From a human doing to a human being

Hello beautiful lil lights in each of you !!!!



So today I want to approach a thing I often struggled with and I am sure some of  you probably struggled with it too or have seen people around you do....The "thing" is the concept of self-perception whereby instead of seeing myself as a soul, a person, a living creature or a person, I insisted on seeing myself as a human doing and often identified with what I am to be professionally or what I am currently doing....Then I had an aha moment in the midst of the madness, which made me realize that I wasn't only putting a lot of pressure on myself, trying to control everything, wanting everything perfect (as if I can control and gauge the unpredictable things in life), I was also limiting the light in me, I am much more than a career, a profession, a position, etc..

As much as it is important to pride yourself in being a hard worker, have a sense of effort and purpose and simply not being lazy all day er'day, we are first and foremost human being not human doings...There is so much more to offer than what you skillfully provide to the world, from what you have learned in school or the practical skills you learned at work, there is a soul inside of you, there is a spirit that has so much to offer to the world. What the soul and spirit in you has to offer counts much more than the skills you have, in the sense that whatever you do, if you are not kind to others, if you are not loving towards other, if you do your job reluctantly or overly allow it to define who you are, you can easily lose the treasures you have inside, you can lose yourself and totally be dehumanized..




One impediment that comes with identifying ourselves as a profession is that it can take over ourselves to the point where we lose ourselves. I tend to imagine what would be left if I was stripped of any title, award, job, career, opportunity, what would be left of me? Your job/your career can totally take over your life to the point where you get off balance, to the point where you lose your relationships, become lonely and alone, intentionally secluded and unhealthy. The sad part is that if you die tomorrow, the company can always find a replacement. 

The second problem that comes with identifying ourselves as human doings is that you can easily be trapped in comparisons birthing unhealthy competition, yet there will always be someone brighter, stronger, more creative and more successful than you. Besides for a long time and most times you might not even get any sort of recognition, reward, acceptance, or be included in a certain "group" you hoped to be part of by choosing a certain career or by doing certain things to get there; reason being that those relationships formed would not come from a  genuine and sincere place and people can sense it. Moreover anything requires time to mature and be excellent, everything requires to go through a process.

 Thirdly, you can easily grow weary and tired when you see yourself as a human doing, for the simple reason that you are prone to taking everything so personal, be afraid of failure and no one is ever perfect or does everything perfectly at all times, we need to remember to be humble, to be eager to learn and to grow and transform each and every time; and that sometimes requires one to slow down, accept the fall and dust yourself off , learn something new and keep it moving. 

Lastly, being a human doing brings a false sense of security, you may think that you will hold a certain position forever, you may think that for sure you worked hard enough compared to so and so and yet not get your promotion and soon enough you might be bitter and angry when yet there is more for you outside (every rejection is actually a form of protection). You might even be laid off any time, you might even be depressed if a certain project does not get as much success. So let us free ourselves from all these boxes, titles and things we try to bind our souls with, let us not limit ourselves to one thing or idea of ourselves, there is a myriad of things in us we need to explore be we can't find all these treasures when we don't go beyond the shallow waters of the surface of our being...




As a recovered control freak, ex perfectionist yet a firm believer of excellence, this is not a call to slack at work or school because you are trying to be a being more than doing your work, this is a call to unburden your soul, be grateful for every opportunity you are given and appreciate it, strive for more...However be conscious enough to not allow your work to take away your soul, your spirit and who you are....As Erykah Badu said it "Bag Lady, pack light".


Shawl/vest: Cotton On
Polo Neck: random shop
Pants: Woolworth
Shoes: Fashion Express

Remember to smile, remember to be yourself, remember to treasure your joy...