Joy

…is an inside job. Its something I knew I wouldn’t find joy from a job, a man, a new country, or really even with financial gain. I knew joy was an inside job and that it required work.

Work work work work work (cues Rhianna).

But seriously, nothing good comes to us without some work. Sure, there are instances where an opportunity come, but we have to do the work on maintaining a blessing that has seemingly “dropped” in our laps.

So, for the past few…years, really, I’ve been doing work. Work on my self esteem, work on my relationships with God, work with my mindset when it comes to obstacles and entitlement, work with my need to be accepted and acknowledged by men, by my friends, by my family.

The work I have done is leading me into a new freedom. Free from the opinions of others, I am discovering that my Joy simply comes from the Lord. Knowing that I am completely utterly and unconditionally loved and accepted by God NO MATTER WHAT has been the key to my joy and my hope and my freedom. I recognize that He is number one. He is most important and because I am human and I will fail, His grace is the best gift that never stops giving.

I can smile in the midst of defeat. I can laugh in the stead of failure. I can shift when I feel stuck because he gives me joy…that passes beyond all comprehension. Its amazing, its fulfilling, and its free. I didn’t earn it. I don’t deserve it. I can’t repay it. And it will never be taken away from me. Incredible love. Incredible joy.

Love yourself

Name 3 things you love about yourself.

That sounds taboo, right? So often we are focused on the things that we can fix or improve. Let’s take a moment and acknowledge self love. I love myself. Flaws and all- that is where my confidence comes from. If nothing else I have to choose to love me. I mean, I want others to love me. Why would I request or require of them something I fail to give myself? It doesn’t make sense.

So, self love and self care is real. We had a morning meeting and my student asked, “love yourself more than your mom?”. I replied, “well, if you don’t love yourself first it is very hard to love someone else”. We talked about it. I shared that for me, God, self, others is the order of my love.

Receiving and feeling loved by God first then reciprocating that love on me and passing it to those around me has proven difficult and yet so simple. I love because I am loved. You’d be surprised how many kids chose not to share a compliment about themselves to the group. My students are not shy, they are intelligent speakers, and I was really taken a back by the fact that only 50% of them shared what they “love about” themselves. We are going to work on this.

I told them to never lose the ability to encourage and build themselves up- it is a magic power. It is healing and warm. It is necessary and yet stolen so young. We teach children that recognizing their strengths is bragging. No it isn’t. I am a good teacher. That is true. I’m not putting anyone else down. It doesn’t mean I don’t have room to grow. I simply am a good teacher, right now, in this moment. As my students are in PE, I am filling my cup and preparing for the day ahead. I practice what I preach. I tell them to read and write daily and I do. I teach them to be confident and kind- and I am. I want them to solve problems and change the world and that is what I do…one lecture at a time, one lesson at a time, one book at a time, one blog post at a time!

I love myself.

Love yourself.

Queer concepts

I copied and pasted an email from a friend. She sent me a website with videos about intersectionality: race, gender, identity.

The link: https://www.colorlines.com/articles/our-new-video-series-raceand-captures-essence-intersectionality

(I almost didn’t post the link, because I’m not sure where I stand. But, knowledge is power. And exposure takes away excuses…for me…and for you).

“I didn’t watch every video. I watched the first and last and a bit of the second one. I just couldn’t really engage with the LGBT struggle. I definitely want to think more about this. I don’t know how to engage.

I think deeply, identity is being attacked. God created…and then man/the enemy distorted. I also believe culture pushed people to be so outrageous. You can’t be a woman who sees the beauty in another woman. You like women. You’re gay. You can’t be a feminine man who likes fashion. You dress up. You’re a drag queen. It may be small minded but I believe that there is a place for everyone and this agenda is so STRONG it IS overshadowing race and “gender”. And if you can choose your gender, how is gender an issue? I’ll just be a man if I don’t want to be oppressed? Or if I feel more masculine? I don’t get it.

Here are my notes:

misgendering – how can we know what gender someone is now that you can choose? We have to go off appearance and voice…and that can be confusing. No one can confuse my blackness. Ever.

“Race informs the other parts of me.” I agree.

I am a woman who…is also…   I agree.

My thoughts, I’m almost “white” but I’m brown. I mean my education, my social-economic status to some degree, my profession, my dialect, my socializing, my ability to travel, my experiences and opportunities. Sometimes that excludes me from what some paint as “blackness”. I didn’t grow up in the hood, I don’t always understand rap music, I don’t like “rachet” tv (well I do sometimes). A lot of that is also my religion. I’m Christian. And some say “a white man’s” religion. I have to shed all these identities and just be a child of God, knowing that others create boxes for me. And I’ll bust through them MUGS like Mario Kart bustin ice on the track.  Shout out to the 90s/2000s babies.

Intersectionality- heavy stuff.

Race no longer matters. We got all we were going to get during Civil Rights. We can’t fight everything at once, but we must choose and start somewhere.

I’ll always want people saved and to know Jesus Christ.

I will want women empowered.

I want brown and black people treated with dignity and respect.

I want money and education to be equal access, hard work opening more and more doors.

And I want people to love beyond all else.

Even when we don’t understand one another, can we please love?

That, we know, we all need.

#blogpost”

I didn’t proofread. #workflow

#letsengage

I love a guy.

You know the saying about love?

Our first love is young. 

Our second love is hard. 

Our third love we don’t see coming. 

I guess I’m in between love one and two. But I still love a guy. What’s funny is, I’m 99.8% sure that we won’t be together and we may not remain friends. And it has taken a year to come to terms with that, but I think I’m finding comfort in knowing that that is probably healthy and best.

I still write about him. I still think about him. And most days, I’m not sure if I am in love with him. Or I simply possess a deep love FOR him. Our ability to differentiate the two is imperative. Love is unconditional. It keeps no record of wrong. It is humble and selfless and to quite honest it is uncomfortable and unnatural. Most people give conditional though. Though the conditions may be broad, when pushed to the limit, a limit is found.

This idea of unconditional love bothers me. Let me rephrase, its agitates my normal behavior. You make me sad, I love you less. You disrespect me, you get boundaries of my love. I know, there seems to be nothing wrong with that, but if love isn’t free…is it love? Whats the price of love? A ring? A wedding? A child? Can it ever be paid for?

I love a man. And he may not even love me back. And that makes me even more confident about my love for him. He’s made me sad. He’s offended me. Never disrespect, never intentional harm, never unapologetic. And I love him.

Some days I feel like proclaiming this love, because it is evidence that divorce and heartbreak, and failed relationships did not crush me. They didn’t steal my capacity to love and to give without expectation. And that is a miracle. That’s evidence of the God I serve. One who can heal and transform and restore.

Back to love. Family. I love them unconditionally. Friends…my friends. I love them unconditionally and even the healthy boundaries I establish for them are not barriers to my love.

My students. I love them unconditionally. And they need that love. They need to feel and see that love. They need to know that that love is…real love. So as they grow and experience life, they can be prepared to give and receive the love that covers all.

I still love a guy.

 

Cramping so you know it’s real

I said I’d post daily and it’s 1am, so I’ve already failed. Let’s technically call this yesterday’s post.

Monday I felt like a mad woman and I knew “aunt flow” was coming. My emotions, hormones, attitude, and “feelings” were high. Today it was confirmed that I’m not crazy, I’m just a woman.

“Just a woman”. Ha! Oxymoron. This evening I cried. My laptop almost died while I was on an online interview after my laptop mouse failed to work properly and I … I remembered that I’m single and no one could sneak me my charger. I have friends and “people”. I have help and support. Yet, at that moment the reality of my singleness stung. I almost cried into the screen.

I hadn’t planned to be 30, divorced, and single. There was a time when I was 24, married, and hopeful. Then I was 25, married, and alone. That shift happened quickly and tonight I cried. I mourned my marriage. My heart broke again for the loss of a husband, once a friend. I retold and reread my story again. And say with the reality that I was always have “been married”. I’d love to be a big person and say I’m thankful for the lessons marriage taught me but so much of it was hard and sad and draining that  I can only really say, dating was fun and my marriage was supposed to be a good thing.

I don’t assign too much blame. I played a role, he played a role. One of us is a husband, a father…

One of us is single and healing…

Maybe both of us are free.

Podcast: https://anchor.fm/cassandra-bruington/episodes/Division-of-a-marriage-e1h7sn

 

 

 

 

 

Mourning Divorce

I knew this would be a process, but geez! A week ago I had another dream. I have reconciliation dreams. Dreams where he comes back or he stays…or we are together. They are never beautiful. I always wake up with a feeling like “why can’t I stop dreaming this nonsense”. I’ll do a better job of capturing the feeling next time.

Its like an annoying reminder that we could have pushed through, could have made it, but…he wasn’t cut out for the struggle. And honestly, he wasn’t built for me. I’m a fighter, I’m tenacious, I’m a handful of love and energy and adventure…! I have my flaws and they are the same things that make me beautifully fearless and unique and strong.

I just finished a sermon series on relationships and I’m taking away a newfound appreciation for my singleness. (Its great for EVERYONE- single, married, divorced, dating, engaged)

Click and enjoy: https://youtu.be/H7h5BHax06c

For the past several months, I’ve been flirting with the concept of contentment in this stage, but its solid now. I go as I please, I travel solo dolo, I have friends visit, and I really just pursue purpose on my own terms. God is in the driver’s seat and I am learning to trust Him fully. I still mess up and start trusting myself and my own understanding, but I have taken Proverbs 3:5-6 to heart:

Proverbs 3:5 King James Version (KJV)

⁵ Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding.

 

 

Freedom

Chicken in India

Mint a mile high

Colorful cages painted with brown branches, golden skies, blue raindrops, emerald crowns on the tops of trees

Freedom is jumping back into one’s cage of self and never escaping into captivity again

Aware of the grease, the bones, the gristle of a “chicken”

You’re done

Freedom.

I feel like writing

Its funny that I don’t have anything specific in mind. I’m just going to begin typing and see what comes out.

Dance. I joined a contemporary class and its challenging. If I walk into class with heaviness in my heart it shows up in my movements and in my patience with my progress. Last class I was pissed. The instructor was moving too fast and I didn’t remember much as I was expected to run through with a group of two- the other two in my line.

I was irritated. I didn’t remember. I needed more time. I wasn’t ready and I hadn’t mastered these moves, so why on Earth would I want to “run through it with my line”? I struggled through after two suggestions to “feel the movement” and do what I could remember. Still sounds absurd, but I’m trying to apply that to life.

 

1. Feel- be in the moment.
2. Cast off the concern of perfection.

Story.

Of.

My.

Life.

 

One day I’ll get there. I’ll dance like no one is watching. Like the steps are mine to create. Like each movement is perfect without rehearsal. And until then…I’ll check the mirror but look at it less. More feeling, less thinking. More in the moment, less planning. More living, less analyzing my life.

Starting now.

Hair

“You change your hair everyday”. False, but I understand that I do maximize the freedom and creativity my coils provide me with- I can switch thing us quickly. In fact, I’m headed to the states soon and I plan to purchase hair and stuff it in my luggage. Braiding hair, Marley twist hair, a latch hook, widely misrepresented as a “crochet hook”, and few hair ties, curl formers, and bobby pins. Whew! Thats a lot- I might need gel, too. We shall see.

Anyway…this post is a confession. A few days ago I resented and was ashamed of my natural hair:

it shrinks

it requires constant care

it falls out when “protective” styles are taken down- although I hear this is typical, it hurts my soul seeing the collection of coils looking like a lambs wool along my shower, counter, and sink.

I had to take out my last style a little early. I can’t have my fake hair looking nappier than my natural curls. So…I was faced with a decision, wig and switch (cause its hot) or natural hair. I focused on potential reactions and if my wig laying didn’t require braiding, which is time consuming and sometimes hurts AND my wigs weren’t blonde and black/red (hella bold), I probably would have rocked them. Instead, I did a wash and go and today a bomb twist out.

 

But thats only after contemplating:

dreads

weave

braids

cutting

and….wait for it…

RELAXING MY HAIR.

My coils LITERALLY WILL NOT stay straight enough to showcase my length and this makes me look and feel different than I want to. I look more less conventionally beautiful. No big hair to wear as a crown. I feel more naked and exposed, less masked and “protected”. I’m just being honest.

I named my hair some years ago and Shea has to be offended that I’ve spent more time with her clothes than with her. So she’s been free for a few days now and we are relearning one another. Last night twisting wasn’t so bad. And I found out she HAS grown, she’s ACTUALLY REALLY TALL…she just wears flats that hide her long legs. I am falling back in love with my coils one moisturized twist out at a time.

“You change your hair everyday”. No.

You Change. Your hair everyday.

 

Loveless

Love less

Love less

What a way to heal?! You’re saying for sanity sake I should love a little less. Give a little more sparingly. Pour out slowly. Look within and turn ever so gently.

Love less

Love less

God, I pray this doesn’t make me loveless.