"You have to speak what you seek until you see what you said."

I am free.
I am free.  
I am free.
I am free.
I am free.
I am free.
I am free.

      Have you ever had to repeat something over and over again to yourself as if you were trying to convince yourself that what your saying is real and true? You may sound like a broken record but you know that what you are saying is a mandatory to do and necessarily vital to your everything. I have. This morning the words "I am Free" were on constant repeat out of my mouth. For some reason, I woke up with a sense that something was trying to take hold of me and keep me bound. It was my mind. In my mind, the past kept replaying. My past hurts. My past pains. My past failures. My past let downs. My past put downs. Things from my past that I thought I had buried to never resurface again. But guess what, they did.
      On yesterday in morning worship, the youth sung Free Worshiper by Todd Dulaney during Praise and Worship and it has stuck with me ever since. I am a firm believer that EVERYTHING happens for a reason. For me that phrase, even from some babes in Christ, was for such a time as this. There is a part in the song where we sung "Lord I'm Free" over and over again. This morning when all these memories and feelings started to arise, I had to sing just that part of the song to remind myself that I am no longer bound to my past. To what I did and what was done to me. I fought so hard to get where I am now and I am definitely refusing to go back.
      I say all of that to say to you this morning that you are free. What happened back then shouldn't and doesn't define who you are right now. At times the memories of what happened to you and what you did will try to rear it's ugly head to try to stop you from walking in the greatness and goodness that is you, but you have the power to stand flat footed against it and say "I am free." For some of you maybe it's not memories. Maybe it is present day people and situations that hold you in condemnation. Know that even in the midst of, you have the power to free yourself. You have the power to speak those things be not as though they were. That is if you are tired of being bound and desire to be free. Then and only then you will open your mouth and speak "I am free" like a broken record that not even the forces of nature can stop until you feel every shackle release you from the grips that hinders you from moving forward and being all that you were destined to be. I don't know about you, but I am willing to do this as often and as necessary as I need to do it. Not just for me, but for my babies as well. They model what they see. Not just for you, but for your babies as well. They will model what they see.
      Start right now. Right where you currently are. At your desk. In your cubicle. In the bathroom. In the break room. In your classroom, wherever. The shackles and chains that bound you are no respector of where you are or whose around you so why not. Just begin to say it out of your mouth. Pull it from your toes and declare right now, today that "I AM FREE!" 💜💜💜

      Have you ever been riding in heavy traffic and it seemed like all the other lanes were moving so much faster than yours? You get frustrated then eventually you force your way into the faster moving lane. Then it seems like that new lane that you just switched to all of a sudden slows down and the one you abandoned is now moving at a much faster pace and you get frustrated even more now your road rage has kicked in...... Happens to all of us at some point. I bring that scenario up to because it is very real and I want to say this. In life we are all in our own individual lane. Though our lane may not be moving as fast as we think it should be, we have to practice (and here comes that word that most of us dread) patience. What we cannot do is we can not look into other lanes, get frustrated and then try to be lane hoppers thinking that we will move just as fast as them or faster. One thing that I know is that everything is not always what it appears to be. We must learn how to be patient with the lane that we were designed to be in and the speed that we were designed to go and stick with it until we get where we are needing, trying, wanting and supposed to be.
      There are sooooo many times when I have looked at the people around me and those on social media and I have either begin to do things outside of my ordinary, or I have gotten myself into some crazy head spaces. Head spaces where I thought I was going to need to be committed to a mental institution. In those spaces I have questioned me, doubted my abilities, downed me and even quit just because it seemed like everyone else was moving so much faster than me. I know I stated earlier that things are not always what they seem, but I want to add to that idea that we also don't know what those people sacrificed to move at that faster pace. And when I say sacrifice, I mean both good and bad things. I can sacrifice my time to pray and give, but I refuse to sacrifice my family, my morals, my values, my integrity or my character just to get there quicker. I don't know about you, but that stuff is super important to me. So in that case, I think we should all stay in our little lane and move at our own individual pace no matter what speed it is. We'll definitely get there as long as we are heading in the right direction.
      Plus, I don't know about you, but I don't want to get there too early because that might cause me to have to just and to sit and wait anyway. You ever rushed to get somewhere and they weren't open yet? No fun whatsoever. I want to get where I am needing, trying, wanting and supposed to be right on time. Don't you? Just hold on and be patient because you don't want to start doing things outside of your ordinary. Or things that will have you compromising your everything. We'll get there. Right on schedule. 
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      Happy Monday you guys! So, I don't know if you all have seen the video of Snoop Dogg making his speech when he got his Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. But it stuck out to me because he did something that 95% of us either forget to do or refuse to do because we don't want people to think that we are so full of ourselves. But what he did in his speech was.......... he thanked himself. Yes he did! He thanked himself for putting in all the work that he did. He thanked himself for believing in himself. He thanked himself for having no days off. For not quitting, for being a giver, for giving more than he received, for trying to do more right than wrong and for being him at all times. That was absolutely HUGE!
      A great deal of the time we give so much energy to giving everybody else all the praise for the even the tiniest part that they play in our success and we give ourselves nothing. Now I am not saying to not recognize the people that help us along the way, but we can't forget to thank ourselves when we were the ones that put in the bulk of the work to get us where we needed and wanted to be. Truth be told, if we didn't put in the work that we did, none of what we do would be possible and those thank you's would be null and void. On our road to success, we don't get paid for a great deal of what we do, yet we'll recognize ourselves the least. Then when we feel overworked and under recognized, we get mad!
      In the South, thank you is second nature. But we always say it to any and everyone else that does anything nice for us. So I want to challenge you to be the biggest gratitude giver of yourself. I'm not saying to be pompous or arrogant now. But when you get where you are trying to go, thank yourself. On the road to getting where you are trying to go, thank yourself. Everytime you have a victory, thank yourself. This will help you to motivate you to keep going also. Stop leaving you out of your own gratitude on your journey to success. You deserve your thank you's too just like the people that you decide to thank that helped you to get there. We criticize ourselves when we mess up. Why not thank ourselves when we blow and blow up? ....... Ijs. 
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