Music Mondays

I think we all have a natural need to feel accepted and valued by our environment and that need is to be met in a healthy way by the encouragement and approval of important people around us. When I chose to really go after my dreams and go against the stream, I only had a handful of people around me who didn't think I had lost my mind. It can be very painful when someone close doesn't accept your choices and isn't able to see the sincere heart behind them, but living under fear of men (by men I mean mankind, women and men) is only another prison holding you down. 

It's something I battled with for a long time and it still tries to creep back sometimes, if I'm not paying attention. The cause for my constant need of approval from anyone and everyone around me was rooted in my childhood. My father grew up in a very praise deprived environment and didn't really know how to give from an empty bag, so the curse was passed on again to us. The only times I got some of that need filled, was when I accomplished anything excellent like getting straight A's in school and I could feel how proud my father was of me. This inevitably made me very performance driven and my identity ended up being rooted in what I did and what other's thought of it. I was yearning to be accepted and recognised and it became one of the mane motives for all that I was doing.

But as we all know, living for the approval of others doesn't lead to a very fulfilled life. Fear of men will always rob you off of your true destiny and it wasn't until I learned to let go of it and have those needs met in a healthy way, that I was able to jump into the life I was meant to live. I needed to forgive my father for his shortcomings to be able to break that curse, which freed me to overcome it.

"And every time I try to be what someone else thought of me, so caught up I wasn't able to achieve.
 But deep in my heart, the answer it was in me and I made up my mind to define my own destiny.

Now I know his strength is within me."



xxx