Looking Real Familiar
To be honest,
“Return to the root and you will find the meaning.”
I don’t even recall what the meeting was about. I don’t remember what my administrator spoke of as I noticed a face that I hadn’t seen in months on that same zoom call with me. Her hair was pulled back showcasing all of her face. Her skin was dark, yet radiated a familiar glow. Her eyes did not look like there was something behind them as they usually had looked. I became so inundated with the look of this familiar face that I forgot my purpose here ...in this meeting. What are we even talking about?!
As I continued to stare, I could not help but to think of how disgusted I had been with that face… for months. I hated to spend time looking in the mirror at the reflection of this woman staring back because I did not know her. Her body had changed. It seemed as though her face had aged and the thoughts that pranced around in her head weren’t at all positive. Her entire aura simply was not the person she had spent her twenties developing and loving on. Who is that? There was truly some liberty that came in recognizing that woman. That led me to take a moment to truly sit with my thoughts and reflect on all that has contributed to the revival of self.
Shut down social media.
I did not originally do it with the best intentions but the intention shifted and so did my mindset while I no longer had that as a means of distraction.
“Stop talking so damn much!”
This was paramount to getting back to me. While people may have had my best interest and have told me things to affirm me, I had to question “where has it left you?” It left me an affirmed mess. I needed to abruptly eliminate the outside voices and opinions about my journey. Momentary contentment does/did not contribute to my overall wellness.
On the contrary, I decided to Take it to God. ...no seriously.
I had to stop talking about and around God and make the decision to sit with and talk TO God. I had to get anchored in the only one who could sustain me through anything. I had to be transparent with him and take the mask off. Once He began to peel back my layers and I began to truly relinquish control, that’s when the real healing began.
Speak to your thoughts. I speak to my thoughts in the form of prayer and simply saying internally or out loud “nope!” I just won’t allow my thoughts to take me certain places. When I feel the drift, I journal it or pull someone in for conversation; not necessarily about my thought process but about anything that I feel will uplift me and keep me going.
Talk to my therapist. To be completely real, I do not feel as though my therapist has been as instrumental as I’d like, however, she has deposited some nuggets that have kept me going. One of the most significant things she has done for me has been introducing me to Attachment Theory .That text is literally life changing. “Things” and ideologies can only work if we work, however, so as I sunk my teeth deeper into this text and vigorously flipped through the pages, it dictated to me who I am at my core. I had several moments where I had to pause, take deep breaths and look around to see if someone was playing a trick on me. Talk about being read! Yeah that book read me. But what good is a book of such magnitude if I did not do the follow up work? While I’ve been done with that book for a couple of months now, I’m still working; still plowing through the parts of me that I never quite understood until now. It’s crazy to think that I had done my own self assessments in the past and I really thought I had me figured out...NOPE!
Once she said her goodbyes to her colleagues on the other side of the screen and powered off her laptop, a smirk slowly appeared on her face. Click clacking down the hallway in her heels that always alerted the kids, gave an extra pep to her step. She was at peace with the re-emergence of herself. She was content with the familiarity.
...so allow me to re-introduce myself! My name is Cadacia--Nas’ (AKA Baby Elliott’s) Mommy!
