Lose Yourself

I will be the first to admit that I don’t usually listen to rap. In fact, I find Eminem’s music misogynistic and inciting violence against women. However, while I was driving to work this morning and trying to find something to listen to on the radio, the song came on. And I listened to the lyrics for the first time. It fits in perfectly with my whole follow your bliss thing.



Look, if you had one shot, or one opportunity

To seize everything you ever wanted-One moment

Would you capture it or just let it slip?



I think I would seize the moment, the day and do everything I could to make my dreams come true. Oh wait, I already did that.

I am the mother to an amazing kiddo. He fills my heart and soul with delight, even when he’s naughty.

I live in my dream house.

I have a job I love, and another job that was the ministry I was born to do.

I had a book published

I am adding on my own business into the mix for 2012.

I will be teaching cooking classes at both the Museum of Visual Materials and the Community School.

I have basically achieved all the goals I have set for myself for my 40’s, and I am only 41.



The only one that is left is to look my best. For years, I have dieted and exercised my way thin and then regained all that I had lost so many times over. I thought that it meant that I had to be thin and sexy and all that. I thought it meant that I had to be model thin, to dress a certain way and look a certain way.

Then I had a photo shoot. If you don’t think an afternoon can change your life, it can.

The last time I felt so beautiful was on my wedding day, and it was more the glow of love than anything else. I wasn’t a size 2 (more like add a zero to it) but I wore the most gorgeous gown and veil, and loved my bouquet. It was the happiest day of my life before I became a mom (now that’s number one).

For my photo shoot for SHE magazine, the photographer, Erin told me I was really naturally beautiful. That made me more excited that than fact I was named woman of the year.



You better lose yourself in the music, the moment,

You own it, you better never let it go,

You only get one shot, do not miss your chance to blow,

This opportunity comes once in a lifetime, yo!





Despite all the accolades and wonderful things happening in my world, for a very long time, I have given a lot mental space to those who really don’t matter in my life. These are the folks that like to limit me and tell me who I am not and what I am not. I have let people who really don’t matter to me in my daily life have control over me. I can’t make you like me, or adore me or be my biggest fan. I can’t convince you that I am a great mom or cook or whatever. I have wasted so much time and energy in trying to make people happy that I forgot about making myself happy. It’s the fact that I have eaten to stuff the feelings of not being “good enough” because I wasn’t pretty in some people’s eyes, or this or that. I ate because I was mad at giving my power away and the only way I could process that anger was by stuffing it. I stuffed my anger by stuffing myself. I stuff myself because I wasn’t who I thought I should be rather than celebrating who I am.



So here I go it's my shot,

Feet fail me not cause maybe the only opportunity that I got!



Who I am got me woman of the year, not by trying to be someone else. Who I am has garnered me professional success. Who I am has given me the gift of wonderful friends who love and support me. Who I am has allowed me to share my talents with the world. Who I am is a wonderful, smart, gifted, funny woman. I may not be thin, or beautiful in a conventional, model sense, but I am beautiful on the inside, and that counts for more than anything else.



You can do anything you set your mind to, man