Whose Voice is that?

Good Morning Everyone. Another day, another blog. I hope you are all enjoying these blogs everyday. Remember to let me know what you think and if there is anything you would like me to focus on one day.

How many of you realize that everything we do and everything we say and how we carry out our lives and days is very closely related to our childhoods? On the flip side, many of us do the opposite of anything that remotely resembles childhood.

It's a very difficult thing to shake off the dust of our pasts.
We all have that little piece of our personalities that we try to avoid. Mine is my tough exterior. Growing up in the Bronx, NY, I learned at an early age to be tough. I refused to let anyone get to me. If I cried, I was angry. I never allowed myself to feel. Crying was for the weak and I was tough and strong and........very lonely!

That was the end result of all my efforts to be someone nobody would mess with. As I got older, I started to realize that all of these facades I had put into place in my life were not helping me. Oh no, they were preventing me from becoming the beautiful women that I could become. Holding on to my old ways created a sort of shield from people getting close to me. I had to change.

Isn't it true for many of us that when we are hurt emotionally, that we sort of regress into a child. Whether it be hiding in your room or turning off the offender? When my children would be naughty, I would innately handle them the way I would have handled a bully as a child. I would try to scare them into submitting to my demands. This didn't last because no matter how hard I tried to be the old me, my children loved me still. That unconditional love that only a child can give a mother. It softened me. It made me see what I was doing. And guess what? It was the best thing that could have ever happened to me.

That voice in my head, little Kerri, hiding in her room, was forced to come out and be mom. I was forced to realize that I am mommy now. The hiding doesn't work anymore. The tough act doesn't work anymore. The loving and caring and nurturing Kerri absolutely works. Now don't get me wrong, I am in no way a pushover, but I am a little easier to nudge.

I am talking about this today because I want you all to take a good look at yourselves and see how you react to situations. When someone hurts you, do you retreat, or do you embrace? Do you embrace the situation as a learning lesson. Do you take the opportunity to say to yourself, "why is this so painful?" "Why am I so effected by this?" What part of your personality is still so fragile? When you find the answer to this question, embrace it. Find the root and yank it out of the ground.

We all have skeletons in our closets. Some we can see and some are buried way in the back. Unfortunately, we don't decide when they will emerge. All I know is that when they do, and they do, I am going and have been ready to face them. Will you? This is where your Circle of Sisterhood, Journaling, and Meditation, etc will make the difference. All of these principle outlined in my book are what is going to make the difference. When we clear out the garbage that we've been holding on to for so long, we are able to plant new trees. We are able to watch them grow and know that our children will nurture them and take care of them. Because at the very end, isn't it our children who are most important. Because, remember, they will become us. Do you want your daughters to become who you are now, or become the empowered women that you have the ability to become.

You have the "Power Within" to be the women you want your daughters to be. Come join the journey with me and together we will never look back.Have a great day and remember, you are not alone.