Shauna's Sisters

I was just blessed with 6 glorious days on the beach, it was one of the most relaxing vacations I have ever had! I was feeling so good and on the last morning at 4:15 a.m. I woke up stressing, and worrying, and fearful over some things. What a way to end an amazing 6 days! For 3 hours I laid there fretting over things that haven’t even happened and wondering about the future! How dumb!! I need to get through one day at a time, not fret about something days, months or even years down the road!! How do I make a difference and chase my dreams with fear in my heart? I was just blessed with 6 glorious days, peaceful days, in paradise where I just let myself relax, think about the future and dream, and then on the last day, this happens!

I want to talk about fear for a minute. Fear can absolutely paralyze you, and stop you from taking chances, chasing your dreams, and making a difference! I was reading Rachel Hollis’ book Girl Stop Apologizing on my flight home, and while reading her chapter on fear and people’s opinions, it hit a real nerve! Let me tell you a secret about me, and I will probably lose some of you right here, but I am on my third marriage! Pick your jaw up, you read right. I am not going to spend one second saying one bad thing about anyone or trying to justify myself,  I don’t have to, but that fact has paralyzed me multiple times, and stopped me from writing or feeling like I could help one single person. You know what, that’s what people expect me to do! To shut up and not help anyone else! People expect me to sit back, live a quiet life and not go chase my dreams, or do any good in the world! That’s not me though and I refuse to give in to the critics! I refuse to not refuel, refocus and go be all God meant for me to be! I refuse to sit back quietly and not help other people! I was not created for mediocrity and neither were you!

I was told before I went on my trip to let the waves roll in,  and roll back out and while that was happening for me to release those things that were holding me back. To release my fears. Release the judgment of others. Release my past and all the mistakes I have made, and I did just that. Before this trip, I was seriously running on empty! I had nothing left to give to anyone else, let alone myself! Nothing! I have been feeling like a failure lately. I have been feeling like life is never going to change, that this fog I have been in is going to continue and I will never be able to go where my heart wants to go!

Maybe you feel like life is never to change, that life is never going to be better but stop thinking that way and dig your way out NOW!! I have had one of the most emotionally difficult years of my adult life! I know where you are coming from, but I’m getting through it! I am personally doing what I am asking you to do, I’m digging out! I have wondered throughout this entire journey of blogging if there was a remote chance I was making any kind of difference and then I received the following text last week on my birthday! “Happy Birthday! I admire your tenacity and will to never quit. You have never allowed life to keep you down in the pit for long. You regroup, get back up and continue to give it your all. I see you, I like you and I love you. You should be proud of yourself, Shaun! I hope this is the best year you’ve ever had.” So, the answer is yes! Even me with all my mistakes and failures, I am still making a difference! You and I can make a difference even in the tough times! Somebody is watching you to see how you’re going to react to those tough times and if you’re going to make it out! Use your test for your testimony! Don’t be afraid to fail, don’t be afraid to fall down! Just make sure you get back up! Just make sure you take the time to recharge from time to time!

If you’re a young person reading this, don’t be afraid to make mistakes, just don’t be lazy and watch life pass you by! Get out there and do what makes your soul sing! Don’t let anyone talk you out of it! If your example is parents who are complacent and settling in life, who don’t work hard, or make life amazing, break that cycle!! Determine you want more in life and go get it with fire in your soul!! You can do it!

My prayer today is that if you’re feeling down, stressed, not at peace and not feeling like you can make a difference, take some time and start today to do something to find your fire again! Do something today to fill your tank to full and get out there! You have something inside of you, a dream you want to chase, people you want to help, things you want in life and running on an empty tank won’t get you there! Find your JOY today! Find your FIRE today! You will be unstoppable I know!

With love for you all,

Shauna

It did not even dawn on me until this morning that I am one year into my blogging. It seems so crazy to me that 365 days later, I am 50 blogs in. I started this blog in a time when in my life things were so indecisive and crazy and uncertain. I hoped that just maybe I would gain some clarity, and, just maybe help somebody else along the way. I never set out to be a weekly blogger, and told myself that I would only blog when the inspiration hit, I never set expectations on myself. I believe I have been true to that. I have only posted when I truly knew in the pit of my stomach that I had something to say.

I want to take this moment to say thank you to so many people. To my friends, family and my brother for pushing me to do this, and for faithfully reading every single thing I post. To all the people on social media who read each blog,  and to all the people who have gone a step forward and actually subscribed, thank you! Without all of you, there would be no voice to Shauna’s Sisters! Your support means the world to me. I wish I could say thank you to each one of you in person, but obviously, some of you I have never met in person.

I wish I could tell you that a year later life is in a much different place, but I’m not there yet. I will be at that right time, I am learning to trust the process and trust the timing! As I wrote not very long ago, life happens. People come and go from our lives, lessons are learned, mountains are climbed and life becomes what it is supposed to be! I trust God’s plan and I trust I am on the right road, it may just take me longer to get there, but I am headed forward!

I hope you stay on my journey with me, and I hope in the process that you gain something along the way. I hope something I post lights a fire! I hope something I post inspires somebody to keep going! I hope something I posts makes you stop and re-evaluate and know you can be and do anything you want! Stay with me! More to come and I am so excited to see where I end up one year from today!

With love for you all!

Shauna

I have horrible eye site, my prescription is -4.50 and -4.00.  I can’t see an alarm clock or see a face without my glasses! I am near-sighted and far-sited and have an astigmatism in both eyes.

Last night, I got out of the shower, no contacts in, no glasses on. I am standing before the mirror and I see sculpted shoulders, a tiny waist, the thigh gap, perfect hour glass figure. Okay for all you haters out there, take a deep breath, I started out by telling you how poor my eye site is, and that I had no glasses or contacts in! But in my blurry vision that’s what I saw. I put my glasses on, walk out of the bathroom naked, look down and all I can see is fat rolls, a stomach sticking out and thunder thighs! I mean it’s like the movie Shallow Hal!

These are just a few things I have had guys tell me over the years:

1. My legs are huge.
2. My nose is big.
3. My eyes are sunk back in my head so therefore I must never wear contacts, glasses hide that.
4. I look awful with straight hair, which might come to a shock to many people, is actually natural for me.
5. I’m stupid and must never open my mouth.

Those are just a sampling of the things I have been told.

Do you know the guy who called me stupid couldn’t pass the real estate exam…I passed the first try!

The guy who called me fat is overweight!

The guy who didn’t like me bigger than a size 4 with straight hair, his wife isn’t a 4 and wears her hair straight.

I don’t think I need to go on, you get the point.

Why is it that our self worth and self image is based upon other people’s opinions of us? Why do we let those voices in our head? What other people think of us is just their opinion, and most of the time, I believe it’s actually their feelings about themselves down deep! It actually has nothing to do with us at all! That person who picks on you, is actually very insecure down deep!

I know I am not stupid! I know all of those things that were said about me aren’t true, but for years they have been the voices in my head! For years they have been the way I see myself! For years they have driven me to feel like I have something I have to prove! For years I have felt like I didn’t measure up! For years I have tried every yo-yo diet and exercise plan known to man! I am exhausted just talking about it!

We need to get to a place where we love ourselves so much that hearing those things has no effect on us, and we realize it’s laughable, and not care what the haters say! We are perfectly made! If you’re not as healthy as you would like then change that, but do it because YOU love yourself enough to want to be around longer! Not because someone else thinks you’re fat or ugly! You won’t have the results or the satisfaction or stick with a healthy lifestyle if you’re only doing it for other people! Trust me! Been there!! I have been known to work out crazy amounts in the gym, then sneak an entire box of donuts in the car! Stop letting celebrities and models dictate your views too! First of all those images are often photoshopped and secondly those people get paid to look like that! They are paid to have trainers and chefs. We could all look like that if we’re getting paid and had all day to work out! Plus, they’re always under a microscope! That would get old!

We don’t have to be the prettiest person in the room to be amazing! We don’t have to be the smartest person in the room to make a difference and change people’s lives! We all have gifts! We all have a life to live that is lived with a purpose! Let’s stop feeling like we don’t measure up, and get out there and be all we’re called to be! Let’s start lifting each other up instead of sizing each other up! You have something I need! I have something you need and this world needs us all! On a side note, stop chasing your self worth with other people too, and getting into relationships that are unhealthy because we’re so insecure and crave attention. We all matter! Realize yourself how great you are, and then the right relationship where you both lift each other up, will come along!

I am going to the beach in a few weeks and I am going to rock a bathing suit, thunder thighs, surgery scars and all! I feel healthy right now, although I haven’t had much time in the gym lately, I am eating healthy and I feel good! Let’s get out there and rock it!! Have I challenged you?! I hope I have! Can you start exchanging the negative voices in your head with positive ones? I dare you to start trying and see how your life and those around you start changing! LOVE yourself!!! It has to start with loving ourselves!

With love for you all,
Shauna

 

As I thought about this subject this morning over my coffee, I just kept thinking of that saying that has floated around social media for some time that says “Everything happens for a reason. But sometimes the reason is that you’re stupid and you make bad decisions.” That made me laugh thinking about it. Yes, everything happens for a reason, and I have most certainly been the one making bad decisions, and that being the reason something happened. I’m pretty sure we can all admit to being stupid and making bad decisions throughout our life. For me, I think it’s when I try to control things and make things happen versus trusting the process. I have done that too many times to count and even at my age, I still do it. I might have a slight tendency to control things. Okay, I have more than a slight, let’s be honest here, but I need to slow down more and just let life happen for me and not get in such a hurry!

You might disagree with me that life just has a way of happening but think about this with me. Can you control the seasons changing? No! They just happen. Can you control what family you were born into? Nope, again, just happens. Trust me, if I could control that, I would have been born on an estate in Napa Valley, California growing grapes and making wine, but I was born in Bloomington, Indiana to a middle class family. If you want to be honest, my family was low income at the time of my birth. Life just happens! The seasons change, the weather changes, you were born to the parents you were, it just happens!

I know you’re thinking there is so much that we do control and it’s not just life. You’re right about that. You can change where you live, you can change your career, you can change your health, sometimes, you can’t always change your health, but you can make changes to improve it, you can change your friends, you can change any relationship you’re in! We were all given free will, and yes, that does effect our lives, but there are so many things that we cannot control and instead of realizing that, and going with the flow and trusting the process, we try to fight against it and too often, we mess up our lives terribly! That’s where I am going with this! I have found myself losing hope lately, not trusting the process, and believing that life isn’t going to work itself out and be everything I want or deserve. What naturally comes after a good hard rain? A rainbow. Rainbows are a sign of hope. You survived the storm, now here’s this beautiful thing to behold that says you weathered the storm. It just happens!

I had a change in my job last year, and I fought it, kicked and screamed and cried, ask why this was happening to me, etc. You get the picture. I had settled into this life that had been created quite nicely and I wasn’t ready for that to change. I was able to work from home, work out 2 hours every day, travel to CA 2-3 times each year. What was there not to like? But then, life happened. It’s caused me to totally re-evaluate my life and where I am at and where I am going. I don’t have the answers yet, but I am trying to trust that something is coming and things are being worked out the way they are supposed to! I was totally handed a job that I didn’t search out, which in turn has allowed me to gain a new set of skills and meet so many amazing people. I don’t think that was a coincidence. I actually don’t believe in coincidences! I have met some people who have changed my life and who will forever be a part of my life. I never would have met them without my job changing.

Let me talk about people for a minute. I think every single person that crosses our path was for a reason! They may have been brought into our life to teach us love, to point out our strengths, to point out our weaknesses, to teach us a skill, to show us who we can be, to show us who we don’t want to be. Maybe they needed me or you for a time and only we could give them what they needed. I honestly don’t know why people were brought into our lives to abuse us, other than to make us stronger and give us a voice to help others. Think about this for a minute, we are all given free will, and sometimes the people that come into our lives are not meant for the purpose that we bring them in for and that causes us pain. We have red flags with people but we choose to ignore them and have a relationship with them when that was never meant to be their purpose in our life. We can bring hurt and pain on ourselves that shouldn’t have been there. That’s not life dumping on us, that’s us making the wrong choice.

I say all of that to say take a look at your life and the people in your life. Your life is what it is for right now, but that’s not the forever picture of how it’s going to be. If you find yourself lost right now, start searching for what you want, start educating yourself, read, meditate, pray, find out what the lesson is and trust that something beautiful is about to happen. So often we give up just before the breakthrough comes. Just don’t lose hope! Yes life happens, but we also have to do our part. If you’re not fulfilled in any area of your life, and you find a stirring in the pit of our stomach, start making the necessary changes right now. If you don’t, then the life that is going to happen is you sitting around, no hope, bitter, unfulfilled, broke, unhealthy and alone. You still have to do your part. We all do! So today, let yourself dream! Let yourself have joy and hope and trust and believe that good things in life can and will happen to you!

With love for you all,

Shauna

 

Have you ever found yourself going through life and it just feels completely hopeless? Like everything is falling apart. Everything you touch and every direction you take is the wrong direction? Everything you try, you feel like you’re hitting a brick wall. Every now and again life tricks you and gives you a hint of hope, just a glimmer, and you think this is it! Things are going to change! Things are shifting, only to be knocked right back down, and you feel tricked, almost like you’re being made fun of for believing in something changing and life getting better! Have you ever been there? I feel like I have been for over a year now!

Loss of a job, loss of relationships, loss of life as you knew it, loss of stability, loss of what your life was supposed to look like. It’s so easy to feel defeated and like life has dumped on you, over and over and over again. You may have a few years of good and then comes that season that is not so much fun rearing it’s ugly head! It’s so easy in these times to let life totally defeat you, to feel like this is my life, it’s never going to be any better. I’m never going to have that baby, I’m never going to have that dream job, I’m never going to have that relationship I crave with my best friend, I’m never going to feel love like I crave, I’m never….never…never! We get so consumed with never. We settle, we begin to think we don’t deserve all those wonderful things and for some reason, this is all we believe we deserve. When we let our mind go there and feel like this is all we deserve, we start to settle and almost admit defeat. In those moments we make bad decisions that could literally alter the course of our lives forever.

We have to change our thinking because we do have hope. There really is light at the end of the tunnel if we just simply choose to believe to see it. Even if we don’t see it right now, make believe we see it until we actually do see it. It’s there, I promise you. How bad do we want it though? How bad do we want that amazing job? How bad do we want to find our best friend who becomes our soul mate? How bad do we want that family? How bad do we want peace and stability? If we don’t want it bad enough, we will never ever have it. Trust me, I understand how easy it is to fall into that trap of depression and that trap of defeat and to feel like there are days this life would just be better without me in it. I have been there trust me! I have had many days where life didn’t feel like it was worth living any longer, but life is worth living and I know there are so many people who would be hurt without me in their life. There are so many people who would hurt if you weren’t in their life.

So listen to me today! I promise you, I promise me, that there is a light at the end of the tunnel and it could be closer than we even know! Strive to see it! Strive to find it. Strive to go discover what life is calling you for and how far you can go! Life is a gift! We were given a gift! So what shall we do with that gift? You can have anything you want! I can have anything I want! We just have to believe that, have hope, and go get it!

With love for you all,

Shauna

I heard this today and it pretty much yelled at me. Think about it. Some days never come. Some people didn’t wake up today. Some people won’t wake up tomorrow. Some days just never come. Have you ever been one to say I will do that tomorrow? I will do that next week, next month or next year? What if those days don’t come for us? Eventually that time is going to come for all of us at some point. Can you say you’ve lived? Can you say you lived life or that life lived you? Think about that for a minute.

I had a very dear friend have a heart to heart with me yesterday. They asked me point blank, Shauna, what are you doing?! Really, what are you doing!? Are you settling? I had to honestly answer that most of my life has been settling because it was comfortable and it was safe and I did what everybody expected of me always.  They looked me right in the eyes and told me I was meant for so much more and I could have whatever it was that I wanted. They said it with such love and conviction that it shook me to the core of my being. Side note here, if you don’t have somebody like that in your life who loves you, and believes in you, and wants you to be everything almost more than you want it for yourself, then you need to surround yourself with different people!

Back to my original thought, the fact of the matter is that some days never come. Period. Let me ask you this, if tomorrow doesn’t come for you, can you say that you had a full life with everything you wanted?

If some days never come, would you let yourself fall in love?

If some days never come, would you take a chance on relationships when the right people are literally dropped in your life?

If some days never come, would you chase that dream, whatever it is for you?

If some days never come, would you care less about what other people think and care more about what you think?

If some days never come, would you become all you were meant to be?

If some days never come, would you take more chances and risks?

If some days never come, would you be happier and less stressed.

If some days never come, would you treat people different?

If some days never come, would you travel more? Enjoy life more? Spend more time sitting around talking to people you care about, and whose conversations mean the world to you more?

What do you want? Honestly, I know some things I want, but can’t totally put into words what I want. What I do know is that I must stop waiting for the right time or I will never get what I want. What I know is that my friend yesterday stirred something up inside of me that I think was so deeply pushed down that it has almost paralyzed me.

Are you going after what you want? Are you going after what you deserve? If not, I hope you start before your tomorrow never comes and it’s too late!

With love for you all,

Shauna

Have you ever gone through life feeling less than or feeling like you have been everything to everybody else, but never what you really need in life? Have you been the perfect friend, perfect mother, perfect wife, perfect employee but life still leaves you yearning for more and you wonder why when you give so much, why does it seem life gives you so little? Maybe like me, you have been living for everybody else, living the life everybody else wants you to live, but not truly living your life! What do you want?? You are allowed to ask that! Who do you really want in your life? Why does it always seem everybody else always gets what they want and it’s a struggle for you?

What do you want in life? Where do you want to go life? It’s okay to ask that. It’s okay not to know but to be searching! It’s okay to wonder why certain people only come in your life for a reason or a season, no matter how bad it hurts when they leave. I truly believe some day we will understand this, no matter how bad we want them to stay, not everybody is meant to stay in our life. This is tough for somebody like me who cares so deeply and wants everybody in their life and believes the good in every situation.  That is not always the case though, and no matter how bad you want a situation to be different, sometimes it can’t be. This could be a parent, a spouse, child, somebody you’re in a relationship with or even a close friend.

One thing I have learned in my life is that people are always brought into our lives for reason. For a test, for a season only, to teach us something, to love us when we most need to be loved, to be an ear, to be a shoulder, to have our heart, but then when their season is over, it’s time for them to move on and boy does it hurt! But we have to trust the season we are in and where these people belong in our lives, and when they are to leave.

People can tell me I am special all day long, but why did I need them to validate that I am special in the first place? We need to get to a place in our lives where we know what we bring, where we know what have to offer to anybody lucky enough to be in our lives and we don’t need validation from anyone else. Know your worth and it doesn’t belong in another person! Know that some people don’t belong in your life forever!

My wish for everybody is that all your dreams come true! That you know how special you truly are! That you don’t need validation from anyone else to know that and when life is ready, that it truly becomes all that you want it to be, and some day all the right people are aligned in your life! I am one who wants to run, but that’s not always the best answer. Maybe stand still for a second and see where the road is leading you. Maybe stop and see that some people shouldn’t be in your life for you to be great! Maybe you are heading somewhere different, maybe it’s to stay where you are, but you get to decide, YOU get to decide! Nobody else gets to decide that for you!

Make the decision that makes your heart sing and happy!

With love for you all,

Shauna

I pose this question to me because I have been posing it to myself all morning long. Where have you been living? Have you been living with fear, pain from the past, buried in debt, hurt over past relationships, hurt over your childhood, broken? Or, have you been living with peace, joy, with grace and mercy for yourself and full of life? I can tell you the answer to that questions would not be the ladder for me. I realize I have been living the majority of my adult life grieving and making excuses. If you’re in a great place in your life and you have dealt with these issues I applaud you, and hope you keep doing what you’re doing!!

I myself have been living, if you want to call it living, with pain from my childhood, pain from abusive relationships, pain of being divorced twice, pain of never being able to have my own child, pain of no self love, pain of criticism and judgment. Many of the choices I have made in my life have been to fill voids. Void of not having a present father, who abused my mother and was there for other people’s kids but not us. Void of having a male figure form the type of men I would choose and who loved me unconditionally. Void of no kids. A void of judgment. A void of being told I was stupid and fat. A void of listening to those things and judging myself, not loving myself. Sound familiar?

I am learning today that I need to let go of all of that trauma and all of those excuses. I have to hit the reset button and in doing so I need to forgive. Starting with forgiving myself. Myself!? I have so much forgiving and letting go that I need to do. So much hurt and guilt I have been carrying around for years that I need to let go of! I must forgive, not be filled with hate and be set free. How can I show compassion for other people and not myself, but I don’t show compassion for myself. I show no mercy for myself.

I am so tired of always just picking up the pieces of my life. I am going no where and quick! I don’t have to figure it all out! I must just take one day at a time. One foot in front of the other and enjoy the process. I want freedom! I want to do what I was meant to do on this earth! I must stop being dictated by my ego. I heard a statement from Dani Johnson that said this “Ego cares about pleasing other people and keeping you stuck.” My ego has defended and justified until I’m blue in the face! I  must choose to no longer live there!

So I ask you the same question today that I am asking myself. Where are you living? Where are you going? Do you know? If not, take some time, hit reset and figure it out. That’s exactly what I am planning to do and I’m excited to see where I end up! Life is too short to live anywhere other than full of peace and joy and happiness! That’s the legacy I hope to leave someday when I leave this earth.

With love for you all!

Shauna

If you follow my blogs at all, you know I was never able to have biological children. This has been a struggle for me my entire adult life. I finally made peace with it and moved on. Many times I thought about getting a puppy to care for, but I am a little OCD about my house and lets be honest, a little selfish about my time and ability to just go whenever I want to, so I would always look at cute pictures or other peoples puppies, and think they’re cute, not for me. My brothers have been telling me for a year how much I needed a puppy in my life. About a month ago, as I am sitting at my desk, I receive a picture of the cutie in the picture above. She had arrived at my house unannounced, but the second I got home and saw her, I was in love. The week she arrived had been one of the most trying weeks of my life. I had been dealing with some family issues, and new duties at my job and was just stressed. I literally would come home and hold that precious thing and as she looked up at me, I experienced love like I would imagine mothers do holding their babies. I felt like God had sent that puppy to me at a time when I needed some unconditional love and something to just need me and have no expectations except to just hold her and love her.

As the month has progressed, she’s grown, she’s getting teeth, she needs taken out all the time, she needs regular baths from rolling around in her poop, she’s chewing on everything and life has continued to be stressful. As I work long hours, she’s not getting the attention she needs and I’m too tired to deal with it. Bring on the guilt, bring on the added stress and bring on the feeling like a failure. I literally said to a friend, I can’t even be a doggie mommy, I suck!

For some reason, my entire life, I’ve always put perfection on myself. The best wife, best cook, best friend, best employee, best daughter, best sister, my house had to be perfect, I had to perfect a garden and then learn to can. I have never allowed myself the grace to fail. That wasn’t an option because then it meant I was less than, then it meant people wouldn’t love me, then it meant people might see me as a failure. Bring in my little Coco and I should be rocking this doggie mommy thing, but honestly, right now, I can’t handle it. Yep! A failure!

As I set in counseling yesterday crying telling my counselor how I was feeling, I read her a letter that I wrote to myself recently. As I read it, she says to me where is Shauna in the mix? Where is your love for yourself? Where is your self-care because right now, you’re getting none! You’re worried about taking care of everybody else, but who is taking care of you? Um…nobody. I just keep piling it on and piling it on and piling it on. Is that okay? NO! Where did we come up with this idea that we had to be perfect and that we didn’t have to take care of ourselves first. Where did this notion come from? Society? Social Media? Friends? Family?

So I made the decision to find Coco another home and I have to say, it couldn’t have been any more perfectly orchestrated. As I set and held her and cried, I knew it was okay. What I gave her over the past month and what she gave me, will forever be in my heart. The timing just wasn’t right for me, or was it? I choose to believe that Coco and I met when we needed each other the most, and now she’s moved on and I must too. I am not a failure because I couldn’t handle this right now.

So let yourself fail! Give yourself the grace to fail! Then pick yourself back up, love yourself and move on! It’s okay to fail! It’s okay to admit that you can’t handle something!   You don’t have to be perfect all the time! So today, I refuse to say I failed at being a doggie mommy to Coco. I didn’t fail her! I loved her and gave her a safe place! That’s how I will remember her! That’s the grace I will show to myself! So at times when you fail at something, I hope you show yourself a little more grace and love!

With love for you all,

Shauna

What does the word victim mean to you? Webster describes a victim as one that is injured, destroyed, or sacrificed under any of various conditions (2): one that is subjected to oppression, hardship, or mistreatment, a frequent victim of political attacks b: one that is tricked or duped. That’s some real stuff right there! That’s some sad stuff! A true victim to something makes me very sad and makes me feel sorry for people, but notice I said REAL victim! There’s real victims and there are people who make themselves the victim! Big difference in the two! BIG!

Have you ever felt like the victim in a situation? I have and I have made myself the victim a few times in my life! A victim from a bad relationship, a victim because I was physically abused, a victim because I couldn’t have biological children, a victim because circumstances changed in my job and I had to work outside of the house…victim from a divorce, victim because I have some debt. I mean are you getting the picture here!? A few of those situations, I was a true victim. I never chose to have a man burn my arm and hold me by my throat up against a wall and threaten to throw me down a flight of stairs. I never chose to have endometriosis to the point of never baring children. Yes, I was a “victim” in those situations, but did I really have to choose to be the victim!? The answer is no. Yes, I was a victim, but did that need define me? No! No! No!

I find myself so tired lately of the victim mentality! Do you know the kind of speak of? People who make decisions, hurt people, make bad decisions that effect several people, but try to make themselves out to be the victim in the situation and then there you are,  left trying to make sense of it all, emotional, tired, literally drained and just wishing they would stop! That is the kind of victim I refuse to be! Have I ever made mistakes? Yes! Have I ever hurt people? Yes! I didn’t always mean to, but I did, and I have always tried to take responsibility for my actions instead of trying to destroy people that do not deserve to be destroyed! I try to see my role in the situation and change myself. Not sit around trying to point the finger and act innocent like most people do!

Do you know that you can literally effect your children, at times almost destroy them, by putting things on them about the other parent that is unfair? Do you know that you can literally destroy your relationship with them by not taking responsibility for your actions, saying you’re sorry and trying to be different? Do you even care, or is it always about you? You might want to stop for a minute and let that one sink in! Take a deep hard look inside and see if you’re guilty of this. Your kids don’t deserve this! They don’t deserve to be burdened with you trying to justify things you did to make yourself feel better!

Do you try to destroy your ex just to prove you’re right or that you’re not a bad person? Who cares! See your role in the situation, try to be better and move on! Nobody is going to care in a few years anyway!

Do you try to blame everybody else for your debt? But did somebody hold a gun to your head and make you spend? That one might have just made you mad! It’s true though! Until you see your role in the debt, you’re not getting out!

Do you blame everybody else for every single bad thing in your life? Many people do because it’s easier than taking a long hard look internally and dealing with our shortcomings!

Let me ask you this though, does blaming everybody else for everything bad in your life do anything to make you better, to heal you and take you further in life? I’m going to guess the answer is no because it’s been no in my life!

You know what I am choosing from here on out!?!? I am NOT a victim to anything that has happened in my life! I am a warrior and I choose to fight my way out and make life everything it can be, and be the fighter that I know I am. Who is with me!? Why let anybody but YOU dictate what your life is! You and only you are in control of your life so shake off the urge to be the victim and go be different! Go make life what you want it! I’m not at all saying you’re not fairly the victim, but you don’t have to let that define you the rest of your life!

Go fight!!!

With love for you all!

Shauna