The depth of my gratitude.

Lately I've been constantly hearing "I am going to hold on cause what I believe is so strong." It's from a Shania Twain song whose true meaning I can't relate to since I wasn't pregnant as a teenager but that one sentence always seems to comfort me when I am making my way through the unknown. A place I journey through often since no matter how many plans I make and how much effort I put into making those plans a reality the road there usually requires me to grow through never before walked on territory and expand my horizons to arrive at a destination exceeding my expectations. This time around the road to my current destination has had more detours and taken longer than I could have ever anticipated but just like the line suggest I am holding on for dear life because what I believe is so strong and as the song continues to say "no matter how long no one can tell I am wrong, I AIN'T GOIN DOWN!" This feeling is a knowing from my gut and where I connect to God for answers not a stubborn I want to be right and not fail feeling. Those are two different feelings and if we listen to ourselves we know which one we are receiving as one comes from ego and one comes from an inexplicable place that aligns in this place with signs and well maybe that is something only I can comprehend. It's worth typing in case you do too. ;-)

I heard a friend recently say nothing lights a fire under your butt like death. I could so relate to that. I walked in this week turned on the TV and found Oprah telling Shania that death is a wake up call at the precise moment I turned it on. The thing about that wake up call is that only those close to the person who passed have their world rocked in a way few can comprehend. I make mistakes and I choose to look at them as lessons I need to grow through. I am no longer a person who likes to reprimand myself for being human and sometimes learning the hard way. I let go of the idea that perfection exists and I wish with all my heart that people realize perfection is not something we should long for or I believe we'd stop being human and growing when perfection was achieved. My humble opinion. Now I simply realize when I make a mistake, take it's lesson and move on because I now more than ever know it's just a mistake not a life altering situation with no solution like death. In my mistakes I learn the depth of my gratitude for life and everything about it.

I can genuinely say that after emotions surface and I face them and deal with them I arrive at a place of gratitude. This week coming from a place of naivete I sent a picture to people that I thought would make them happy only to be told the opposite. I was told in a way that made me angry and enough explicit words came out of my mouth in one morning to last me a lifetime, I hardly ever use them, ;-) and when I was done saying those aloud to my four walls I took a walk with a friend and her baby. In that walk I realized how grateful I am for learning the power of forgiveness. Some of us walk this world with heavy dark shadows looming over us reminding us of how we were wronged at one point or another either in adulthood or childhood. I have lived through things I do not wish upon anyone and yet I have found gratitude for even the darkest harshest of things because being able to face them and forgive them led me to be grateful for choosing to be the opposite of them as having been on the receiving end allowed me a perspective that showed me what I don't want to give or receive. For me seeking vengeance of any sort on any scale is simply not an option. My road and my journey have taught me that FORGIVENESS as hard as it may be to give it in some situations holds far more beautiful power and light than holding on to the negative energy of an unjust situation. I can guarantee you I am beyond grateful I forgave my father which allowed me to speak to him for the first time in twenty-four years. I am grateful I can write that sentence and not the alternative which would have been he left when I was seven and I never saw him or spoke to him again. Trust me forgiveness has more closure than anger ever could.

Why we live certain unjust things may be a question to be pondered with no answer in sight but if like me you are able to see that it lead you to the road you are currently on allowing you to eventually live your way into that answer than perhaps also like me gratitude for everything and everyone becomes your way of life. I am grateful beyond measure because all I have lived and all I see the world growing through teaches me to be. It doesn't take much in this media driven existence to find out that on a daily basis people are suffering and that the human race needs eachother. I am living through somethings these days that I believe are preparing me for something extraordinary something only God and the universe know the outcome of and something only they can make my reality.

I know in my business or in a lot of businesses for that matter egos can sometimes make people believe they hold power over someone and that without them they are nothing. Wait that goes for relationships too. I've crossed paths with people like that in both my personal and professional life and while the heavy energy of their belief may have knocked me down for a little bit when I rose again I rose with gratitude for having learned exactly what I don't want to be to others and how I don't want to be remembered. I also walked away with the very valuable lesson that no one is as powerful as my understanding of God and that no one gets to define me. Trust me on this one because I've seen what God can do when I put all my faith in God even as some people cross my path to remind me that I will fail. I know they are saying they have failed when they took a huge risk and therefore perceive any huge risk as failure. It's not about me. It never is and for learning that I am beyond grateful too. No one has power over me, no one can destroy me and I know this because no matter how challenging the road gets or has been I have always been comforted by my constant companion. One I know can take the weight of my worries and shoulder them like no human being can, God.

Not that friends aren't great listeners because they are. I believe the quality of friends we attract not only says a lot about where we are in life and the lessons we are growing through but if you are as blessed as I am it's definitely God saying God has got your back. I wish I could tell the world my in depth story and that you could see that who you came from and what you learned does not define you. You define you and the ability to break patterns is something I feel necessary in some cases in order to live a life of gratitude. However it can not be done alone. I have read countless books, attended therapy sessions for four years straight something I returned to with the passing of my friend Neil and my birth father, continue to attend Al Anon meetings, and attend a brunch with like minded INDIVIDUALS. I don't shy away from what it takes to lead a life of forgiveness, compassion, love and gratitude but the kind of work you do to live this life in my humble opinion comes organically. At least it does for me because it's the kind of life I want to create for those in my life and those precious angels God has chosen to come through me someday and be of this world and of course their father.

Not having that yet like I had planned has taught me gratitude for when it all comes together on God's time I will be extremely grateful for many reasons but most of all for not giving up my belief that magic can arrive at any moment of any day and that no statistic can stop it from doing so when it's part of God's plan. So my life has become not only about having the faith to trust God's will for me and the ability to carry it out but with that faith allowing my life to teach me about a depth of gratitude no words can describe. A knowing only I can comprehend that this transition I am in will sooner than later come to pass and I will move beyond it. So savoring even what seems like too much to grow through somedays is what I am working on doing these days.

I am grateful I have learned to be grateful for what seems like the simplest things as I continue to risk all I know for a shot at living things only God can dream of for me. A bigger dream than the one I have. After all that is precisely what I believe I am being prepared for right now which is why I have learned to be grateful for how my body knows to function on its own, how my fingers based on memory can type away finding the right letters to compose a word which composes a sentence which eventually becomes this blog! Gratitude for being able to put food on my table with what I love to do even if it's not always one hundred percent the kind I would like to feed my body it is food and this understanding allows me to think of all the people who are struggling or can't food on their table and send them all the love in the world that their faith carries them like it has me. I can't fix the world's problems but I can be of service in many ways locally, which I choose to do. I believe that small things done by a lot of people lead to great accomplishments. Look around with your heart open and using it as your eyes and you will not only find reasons to be grateful but hopefully also reasons to be of service.

To those who have "wronged" me and been part of my unjust destination I thank you for the person I am today I would not be without you reminding me of who I don't want to be. For those who have loved me and left and allowed me to continue a pattern in that moment I thank you for you have walked a road with me whose experiences taught me I needed to find my way to another road where I learned what a friend has so beautifully written that "I am worth the adoration" and I couldn't have done it without knowing the opposite. To everyone who chooses to not believe in me I thank you because you taught me the amazing value those who do hold. To my angels on the other side I thank you for you taught me how precious life and EACH breath is, how precious each angel on this side is and how much I should treasure them. Thank you for sending them my way.

Lastly in the spirit of Mother's day I say to you mama Mercedes Cortazar Ferguson thank you for your beautiful example. You were a single mother of seven and with your example you taught me that with faith anything is possible. I never went without a thing and it is only as an adult that I can comprehend the depth of your bravery, faith, and most of all SACRIFICES for all of us. You worry about me often but I hope someday you can see that I am doing the same thing you did, following your example. The only difference is that the risk I am taking and sacrifices I am making are in regards to the music my heart sings for a dream I am being guided to bring to life in my career not with seven children so like you "I AM GOING TO HOLD ON CAUSE WHAT I BELIEVE IS SO STRONG. NO MATTER HOW LONG NO ONE CAN TELL ME I'M WRONG! I AIN'T GOIN' DOWN!" Like mother like daughter. ;-) Thank you for teaching me by example to trust a God of my understanding. We all have our own individual destiny to fulfill so thank you for allowing all seven of us to be yours. Happy Mother's Day!!

To anyone facing a tough time I send you all the love in the world and may your road lead you to a place where the depth of your gratitude allows compassion, faith, and forgiveness to become your constant companions. May love reign in your heart and triumph over anything that makes you feel anything other than what you are, a BEAUTIFUL child of God.