Gracies Blog

Regrets? We've all had a few. Whether its things you did and wished you didn't, or things you never did and wished you had, the sting of regret bites hard. ` Whenever one door closes, another one always opens´.  “It’s not that you don’t regret things in life, but you at least try to learn from them.” We should all keep something flawed or misspelled close by to remind us that this is the nature of life. If we get hung up on imperfections, we will live in a state of perpetual regret. Its what’s on the inside that matters, and the inside is where we handle disappointment without lapsing into bitterness or regret.  If you keep in the back of your mind that one day you will be looking back on choices you make today, you can make choices now that you will be proud of for years to come. (or not, because none of us is perfect , but this is a later step and I don’t want to regret getting ahead of myself here).  But as far as is humanly possible, make c...

  I ain't worthy, but I still believe. I ain't perfect, but I still try. I ain't smart, but I still read. I ain't beautiful, but I still love. I ain't anything near what you got, but I ain't hating. I may not be what you want, need, or fantasize, but I'm still me. Take me as I am, or leave me the way I'll be. I have no idea where this strength is coming from. To get up when I was hurt, to care when no one has cared for me, to walk alone in the dark without anyone's hand to touch. And I guess it came from me, the knowledge that this is the person I am meant to be.

We ALL want rock solid self confidence, but what is it and where does it come from? Here are some of my current thoughts on confidence. I don’t see myself as confident. Most of my life, I've attempted things I didn't feel equipped for, but I tend to put my head down and go for it anyway. Some might call me naive! Persistent? YES, that’s my middle name! In any case, realizing that I’m not particularly confident but I AM persistent and I am generally optimistic. Confidence is generally your belief in your own ability (based on past experience) while optimism is a big picture perspective. In other words, I don’t know if I can do this, but I will do my best and trust that it will all work out as it needs to.  Confidence depends on me. Optimism depends on me + forces beyond me. Optimism operates despite confidence, but true confidence needs the guiding hand of optimism to make sure ego doesn't spin out of control. And then when my sense of purpose gives me confidence that I...

It's time for us as a people to start makin' some changes. Let's change the way we eat, let's change the way we live and let's change the way we treat each other. You see the old way wasn't working so it's on us to do what we gotta do, to survive. And still I see no changes. Can't a brother get a little peace? There's war on the streets and the war in the Middle East. Instead of war on poverty, they got a war on drugs so the police can bother me. And I ain't never did a crime I ain't have to do. But now I'm back with the facts givin' 'em back to you. Don't let 'em jack you up, back you up, crack you up and pimp smack you up. You gotta learn to hold ya own. They get jealous when they see ya with ya mobile phone. But tell the cops they can't touch this. I don't trust this, when they try to rush I bust this. That's the sound of my tool. You say it ain't cool, but mama didn't raise no fool. And as long as I...

    Over the years, I have come to realize that the greatest trap in our life is not success, popularity, or power, but self-rejection. Success, popularity, and power can indeed present a great temptation, but their seductive quality often comes from the way they are part of the much larger temptation to self-rejection. When we have come to believe in the voices that call us worthless and unlovable, then success, popularity, and power are easily perceived as attractive solutions. The real trap, however, is self-rejection. As soon as someone accuses me or criticizes me, as soon as I am rejected, left alone, or abandoned, I find myself thinking, "Well, that proves once again that I am a nobody." ... [My dark side says,] I am no good... I deserve to be pushed aside, forgotten, rejected, and abandoned. Self-rejection is the greatest enemy of the spiritual life because it contradicts the sacred voice that calls us the "Beloved." Being the Beloved constitutes the co...

It’s natural to protect yourself from the elements, but you don't need an umbrella under blue skies. The same is true in life and love. When you've been hurt, you naturally protect yourself from intimacy. You don't want to go through it again. There comes a point though, when you let your guard down enough to see that the only thing raining down on you is love. You never know if it stops raining if you don't peak out from under your umbrella to check the sky. Take a peak. When you feel strong enough, put away the umbrella, open your heart and receive the love on offer. It’s elemental to who you are to trust love. You just have to remove the protective layers to receive it. Shakespeare wrote, True love cannot be found where it truly does not exist, nor can it be hidden where it truly does. You can only guard yourself from love for so long, before you end up tangled in your own web of denial. Its time to get untangled. S...

For everything in this journey of life we are on, there is a right wing and a left wing:  for the wing of love there is anger;  for the wing of destiny there is fear;  for the wing of pain there is healing;  for the wing of hurt there is forgiveness;  for the wing of pride there is humility;  for the wing of giving there is taking; for the wing of tears there is joy; for the wing of rejection there is acceptance;  for the wing of judgment there is grace;  for the wing of honor there is shame; for the wing of letting go there is the wing of keeping.   We can only fly with two wings and two wings can only stay in the air if there is a balance. Two beautiful wings is perfection. There is a generation of people who idealize perfection as the existence of only one of these wings every time. But I see that a bird with one wing is imperfect. An angel with one wing is imperfect. A butterfly with one wing is dead.  So this generati...