Self-full

Written By: Lala G.

CLICK HERE – Mary J Blige Video     

Yes! You have made it to 2012. It’s a new beginning! A time of saying “goodbye” to the old in order to embrace what the new year brings! In order to prepare for the 2012, many of us cleaned our homes, deleted old emails and broken off unhealthy relationships. Sometimes even after all of the work to clear out space for the blessings the new year will bring, our houses end up dirty again, our emails pile up AND we end up with a new person that has the same unhealthy characteristics as the last person we broke up with. How can we being “swept out” houses, break the cycle of attracting unsavory individuals that want to “dwell” in our lives?

“When an impure spirit comes out of a person, it goes through arid places seeking rest and does not find it. Then it says, ‘I will return to the house I left.” Luke 11:24

Recently I visited the New York Times Center and had the opportunity to ask R&B recording artist Mary J. Blige this question. I was surprised by the advice she gave me!

Lala G.: Hello Mary! I spoke with many people in the audience and many mention your evolution. They talk, not so much about a musical evolution, but a personal evolution. Like most women who have been in relationships, some of your public relationships were good and apparently others, not so good. What did you do to overcome the cycle of dating the same men over and over again and finally get married?

Mary J Blige: First, change where and who you hang out with. Marriage will teach you this. Everyone is not around you to make you feel better about yourself. Women date men for confidence not because they need them. Real love and evolution comes from when people do not have to prop you up to make you feel better. Building your inner self through prayer will help with that.

Change your circle…check. Change where you go… check. Forfeit being validated by another human being in order to cultivate a sense of self worth…. This may take some of us the better part of 2012 to overcome. In the meantime, prayer, a new hobby, joining a civic organization, sky diving or feeding the poor are wonderful ways to fill the empty space. Sometimes expanding our social circle and going new places to try new things, may assist us in gaining the self-confidence that we lack. So it is within the development of self that the “swept house” becomes filled. What once dwelled in those spaces can no longer… because you would have EVOLVED.

  “No two objects can occupy the same space at the same time” – Wolfgang Pauli (Pauli Exclusion Principal)

Thirty something Brooklyn, NY native and a Hampton University graduate, I entertain followers on my  own blog “All of the Above” while I explore adventures of being single and saved in New York City.