It has taken mi over 60 years to realize that there is something about not playing small in a world that makes you feel that way.
I find myself constantly seeking answers and examining my motives, intentions, actions, and reactions. I continually contemplate, “What am I going to do these next 20 or 30 years on this planet? Cry about getting older? Dwell on all the life I overlooked and the opportunities I missed?”
But eventually I realized I don’t need to please everyone, be accepted, or even be twenty-five again, and I examined some of the rough patches in my life. I could accept my treacherous and traumatic childhood and recognize the extensive blur of my twenties and excruciating thirties. I came to accept the painful transitions of my forties and appreciate my extremely eye-opening fifties.
So, really? Who wants to return to any of that?
I genuinely have no regrets about the life I’ve lived, but I don’t need to go back to who I was when I was younger: thinner, cuter, more energetic. I need to be who I am now for such a time as this. I have finally come to accept my mom bod, flabby arms, gray hair, and scars. I get to decide what is age-appropriate and right for mi.
In fact, I recently told my hairdresser that just because I’m in my 60’s doesn’t mean I need a ‘golden girl’s haircut. So what if I like my hairstyle from the 70’s? What does it matter if I wear bright, bold colors and flowers in my hair?
It has taken years, a lifetime, actually, but I realize now that I carry all the power. The power to live there or live now. Today.
I shall take the layers that have made mi and decide which will remain part of the masterpiece I am creating, and which will be painted over to produce who I shall become and, ultimately, leave behind.
I get to make the rules for mi and my life and understand that no one controls my happiness but mi; I have the power to change anything about myself or my life that I want to be changed. It is when I accept the power that lies within mi that I am most powerful. But beyond that, I now know that I’ve also got the power to make a positive difference in others’ lives, to use it in any situation for the greater good of others.
Every day that I am blessed to wake up, I CHOOSE to start my day with a positive mindset, to ask, “What do others get out of a relationship with mi?”
I am filling each new day with appreciated abundance, more laughter, acceptance, peace, and joy. I am cherishing the things I once overlooked, and finally, I am embracing my unique purpose. Every. Single. Day.
As I get more comfortable revealing who I am, I am confident through encouraging others personally and professionally, that I can help them stop fearing and concealing the magic within themselves, and together, we will discover our ability to stand on our own two feet amid a universe that emanates a million ways to crush us. And we shall do it with smiles on our faces.
That’s power, and although it’s taken mi this long to figure it out, I hope you will be encouraged not to play small today. That you would find the power that lights you up and that your spark will also lighten your corner of the world as well.
© c. michelle bryant griffin
Photo by Yaroslav Shuraev: Pexels.com
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