Owning Your Truth
No Matter How Ugly It Is

I went bonkers yesterday...yes really bonkers. I am taking some regular meds and missed a few doses and then took something else to make me feel better and it back fired in the worse kind of way. I am a huge advocate of psycho-therapy and medicine. I think everyone needs at least one therapy session in life, whether with a qualified pastor, or some licensed mental health professional. We all have issues and it takes great courage to face them. Most people spend most of their lives running from them.

Anyhow, I wanted to write to say that there is also a great responsibility after seeking treatment to follow your plan as closely as possible. I would rather not take medicine. I don't like it, I never have. There is something very unnatural about it to me. But when told I must, I do. However, I forget to take them a lot....whether it be blood pressure, anxiety(I am a big worrier) or vitamins....I miss doses. I think I avoid them. It means admitting that something is not working right in me and I don't like admitting that.

Well I learned a great lesson yesterday. When you hear about celebrities like Gerald Levert, Anna Nicole and Elvis just to name a few; accidentally overdosing on prescription drugs we are like, yeah right. When you hear of people getting in to trouble doing crazy things and they say it was a side effect from their medicine....again...yeah sure it was.

Well yesterday I was one of those people and I hurt someone I love very much. I stomped on her dreams and mocked her and solicited others to do the same. I am ashamed of that. And so I have been doing some soul searching today.

I realized a few things.

You don't muck around with your medicine. I felt like crap for three days and was not like myself at all. I was doing and saying things and wondering why I was doing and saying them. I was extremely irritable and overwhelmed and angry. I was dizzy and nauseas and had a hard time staying awake. I was moody and surly and I couldn't get it together. Just like a person who is extremely drunk...they know they are drunk, they know they are doing things they should not, they kinda care but not really, and when they try to pull it together, they can't, the alcohol has taken over mind and body. Again, you cannot play around with prescription drugs.

I also realized that I needed to find out where the uglies that I pounded on my loved one came from. I couldn't just blame the medicine. Just like a drunk man speaks a sober heart, the scripture tells us out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks. So I examined what is in my heart.

Too much T.V. junk......The Peoples Court, Divorce Court, Judge Judy, Judge Alex, Judge Joe Brown, Judge Mathis, Judge Christina..... people bickering and fighting and being rude and ugly to each other all day long. Not to mention a plethora of other competitive shows where feuding and plotting against each other are par for the course.

Hurt....Someone else close to me really hurt my feelings last week and I was baffled by it, angry about it, tucked it away, got over it....so I thought. I had been rejected and so I transferred that rejection on to her.

Fear.... There are risks I want to take, Leaps I want to jump, things I want to do...but solicitude's grip is paralyzing......so I think I had a little haterade going on. (thanks Dee for making me own up to this one)

And so with a mucked up mind, it opened the uglies that I pretend are not in my heart. I transferred that hurt I felt from one sister and battered the other with my anger over it, (the source of all anger is hurt), I analyzed and politicized and litigated like a judge...one of the mean ones, and I let my fears turn in to hate. I want to be the best, she looks up to me...what if she does better than me? I'm talking about what I want to do and she's doing what she wants to do. Where does she get off? How dare she!

The scripture says if you have offended a brother or sister, go to that brother or sister and ask for forgiveness.

So Andrea, this is my public apology and plea for forgiveness. You have been nothing but supportive, a great cheerleader in my corner. You tenaciously go after your dreams and if one doesn't pan out you reinvent yourself and go for another. That is admirable, not condemnable.

I told you to charge it to my head and not my heart. Well I was wrong. My head was foggy, but it was my heart that needed repair.

The word of God also tells us the truth shall set you free. By facing my ugly truth I am free today and filling my heart up on better food.

Got a nasty mouth? Examine your heart.

That's melavision. What's yours?

P.S. Special thanks to my daughter Deidre, my cousin Cleo and my niece Jenny for encouraging me to take a deeper look. Love Ya'll!

Graduation

Greetings to all my readers. This Father's Day, my mind is on our recent graduates. Not to diminish the importance all our father's have had in our lives, certainly many of the best of our grads have had the steady hand and firm support of a loving dad. To my own father Donald, I love you and wish the miles did not separate us on this occasion.

I have sat through many graduations and just within the past few weeks was blessed to watch another young life close one door and move slowly forward to her future. Our graduation tears, like those shed at weddings, baptisms and christenings, recitals and all of the other special moments captured in time; for those of us cheering on,are full of conflicting emotions.

We cry not only for the joy of accomplishment, but for the knowing only those of us who have lived long enough to realize, that with each step forward, a loss of innocence and a road of bumps and dangerous curves lie ahead. We see in our graduates a former self, bright, energetic, naive and ready to conquer the world. A tender heart, timid and unsure, but trustfully moving forward, believing if they fall, someone will be there to catch them. A charismatic personality eagerly anticipating freedom and fun filled days ahead.

We cry because we know, with joy comes inevitable sorrow. A dream deferred, some unexpected turn. A challenge we fail. A blossoming and passionate love, lost. We also cry assured in the tenacity we know they will have to prevail, to overcome the challenges. The same tenacity that guided them to this convocation. Some will even transcend their expectations and our own.

A gateway to the unknown is waiting and what we do know for sure, is that it all happens too fast. The time flees like a visit from a bumble bee that stops briefly to pollinate a nearby flower, only to dart away when noticed. It leaves the sweet nectar of life behind while vanishing into the air.

Yet, there is great joy in watching our children grow and aspire to big dreams and ideals. And with the hope of brighter tomorrows we envision them successful, content and changing the world around them. We believe in a wholesomeness deposited in every man to excel and do good for others. We reflect on the tools we gave them that led them to this honorable march, a path they tread alone for a moment, shining in glory, filled with pride and we wait with bated breath until their name is called.

And then we exhale. This part, a job well done.

May all of their tomorrows be filled with the same excitement and sense of accomplishment and may God continue to bless us with His infinite wisdom to help them along the way.

Congratulations to the Graduates of 2007
Stephanie Daniels
Stacia Harris
Rikkita Hooks
Willie Murphy III
Kayla Valentine