I'm Not Perfect Either!

Cameron says that perfectionism has nothing to do with getting it right, nothing to do with fixing things and nothing to do with standards. It’s a loop that causes us to get stuck in the details. I used to have the case of perfectionism really badly. I wanted my hair to be prefect from the time I took my scarf off until the time I got back in the house at night. I wanted perfect grades, I wanted a perfect life. But there were a few small things that prevented these things from happening. I realized that having perfect grades didn’t come easy, especially in college. Courses are a lot tougher than they were in high school and accuracy, organization, and a lot of effort are needed to obtain even the highest B. I could no longer skim my notes before a test and expect to earn the grade of an A. I had to plan to earn an A, prepare for it and then put forth a ton of effort to achieve my goal. I also had to learn to that there were something’s that I just weren’t going to understand in my subjects but that was okay because it’s not the end of the world. I used to want the perfect life, or I should say the perfect family. After 17 birthdays passed by and I realized that my biological father was not coming back I had to embrace and accept that. Maybe I didn’t have a mother and father who were together but at least I had a grandmother, grandfather, uncle, and mother/sister. It was then I realized that perfection doesn’t entitle someone to happiness. My friends with both parents in their lives were far from perfect. Their fathers were the cause of a lot of their pain emotionally and physically. I had to accept what I had and learn to be happy. If I didn't have to do it perfectly, I would try to do enough to please myself and not everybody else. A common cause of perfectionism is trying to please everyone else and not realizing when you are content with yourself. I say this because there was a time when I lived to hear a compliment from others to feel good about myself, I need someone’s seal of approval. Beyonce-Listen

What Helps Me To Get My Day Started?

My music taste varies. Some Taylor Swift, Yo Gotti, Sara Bareilles, and Bishop Paul Morton. There is this one song by Bishop Paul Morton that brings tears to my eyes sometimes because when I listen to I think. I think back to a close friend of mine who passed away and at his funeral my best friend sang "Open the Flood Gates of Heaven"...I don't listen to the song everyday but I listen to some of the artists above. In the mornings, I wake up, stretch for a few minutes, and turn on some music. On some days, when I'm too lazy to turn on some music I catch the morning news. Here is Sara Barailles cover of Sittin' at the Dock of the Bay. It's a really nice song to to listen to start your day.

Enjoy!Sittin' on the Dock of the Bay-Sara Barailles

Organization is key!

So you have how many binders for school? How do you keep them organized and cute at the same time? How do you preserve them so you're not spending money on binders every semester? Are you obsessed with monograms? Take a look at the picture and I hope it helps you. I simply went on maybooks.com and created a monogram, right click, and save the image. Use Microsoft Word to stretch it out to fit a regular sized sheet of paper. I also make them with Lilly prints sometimes but they take a bit longer to make. I love being organized but no the boring organization. I like to keep it cute by girlyfying everything :) When I am organized I can get so much done because I can focus on the task at hand. Once I started practicing mindfulness, I became much more organized in my personal life and in school. I am able to sit and complete one task and my mind is focused on what I am doing not the millions of other things I need to do later. An organized mind is a great mind. An organized life is a great life. When your mind and life are in order not even a bull in a China shop can disturb it.

PAY ATTENTION!

“Pay attention!” Teachers, professors, parents, and even friends scream it at us from the time we are age two or three. We are never taught exactly how to pay attention however it is something we are supposed to automatically “know” how to do. When our parents are telling us a list of chores or errands to be done, teachers teaching a hard math lesson, professor giving a long and boring lecture, and our friends telling us the repeated story of what happened on her date, what are we paying attention to? Are we noticing how the errands might need to be done to get you out the house for a surprise birthday party when you return? Are we seeing x, y, z, and large numbers on the board wondering how will they apply to us in five years? When our professor is giving us a boring lecture, are we aware of the easiness of the subject matter? When our friend is telling you about her date for the umpteenth time are you noticing the way her voice changes or her eyes glisten when she talks about him? We can notice these things if we pay attention. We pay attention by learning to connect and thrive.  If we can enjoy the moment and focus on the present we can get through these and other boring lectures with much ease. When we pay attention by connecting and thriving we are improving our quality of life. Cameron states, "The quality of life is in proportion, always, to the capacity for delight. The capacity for delight is the gift of paying attention." From my interpretation, Cameron means that life is a gift. But how are we to enjoy this gift if we are too busy being upset about the way it was packaged? Or we complain about it and fail to realize that maybe it was homemade and someone put hours of time into it to create it especially for us? The gift of life is given to us by Him and often times we fail to thank Him for it by not paying attention or being grateful for it. (Sorry to get so personal y'all.) I was used to being treated a certain way by young, stupid guys who I would talk to for a few months and then never hear from again. Maybe one or two dates, a few text messages, and things would fizzle very fast. Then I met this one guy who wasn't as tall as the others, he wasn't as flashy as the others, and he didn't approach me like they did either. I realized these things but it was still something that drove me to him, that made me reply back to his “Good morning beautiful” text messages every single time, it was something that made me agree to meet him at my favorite restaurant for our first date. After we left the restaurant we went walking through the park and talked for hours. I forgot all sense of time or that I needed to be home for church in the morning. I was too busy paying attention to the way he was so intrigued by the things I had to say, I was distracted by his beautiful smile, but I paid attention to the way he adored his mother. That showed me that he was capable of being in the presence of my daddy’s princess because he had been raised by a Queen himself. By paying attention to what he said and what he did I was able to see a great, respectful and ambitious guy. I didn't focus on his height, the fact that he did not have on the latest Jordan sneakers, or the type of car he drove. I chose to focus on the guy in front of me in return I was brought a happiness that hadn’t been sparked in years. I then realized that paying attention is more than listening and looking, it’s seeing within the fine lines. It's amazing the things we see and hear when we actually pay attention to the things we have always seen but in a more contemplative way. Since this post was first written, I have become more observant of my surroundings and notice the beauty in everything. 

Exploring Contemplative Practices Outside of Class

This week we explored practicing mindfulness outside of the classroom by beginning to write morning pages. In the book "The Artist's Way", the author Julia Cameron introduces 'morning pages'. Morning pages are three pages of handwritten thoughts, done in the morning before one gets to accomplishing anything else. They are written in a way that is neither right or wrong. They are meant to be the primary tool of creative recovery. By this Cameron means that by writing these morning pages, we block out what is known as The Censor. The Censor is our internal critic that resides in the left brain. By getting out of bed in the morning and writing morning pages you are evading the sharp opinion of your Censor. It is our hardest critic, it evaluates everything we write, we create, and we think while disguising its remarks as the truth. To prevent The Censor from gaining power over you and your creativity, we must belittle it to something like a bad character from our favorite book or movie. Writing morning pages helps us overcome The Censor, to put aside and get over the constant fear and negativity that it evokes. 
As a young girl growing up without brothers or sisters, I sometimes kept a journal. A black and white composition notebook with "Janetha's Journal" written on it. It was my confidant, it became my brother, sister, and father. I wrote in it daily to replace those who I did not have in my life. As I entered high school, I found less and less time for journaling because I had become to busy hanging out with friends or some other school activity. When I entered college, I had begun to experience a growth away from the people who at the time had mattered the most. A year later when I read through the pages in my journal, I was amazed at how much growth I had experienced. I did complete the task of writing morning pages daily for a few weeks but I was not able to keep up with them as the semester became more hectic. 

Here is a link to another blog on the benefits of journaling: Why Should You Keep a Journal?

Hope you enjoyed this insight!