The Most Powerful Force in Existence

Everybody wants love, but I wonder if everybody is truly ready to be loved, it sounds easy, but love, is well… love. Love isn’t complicated, but love also isn’t simple, so I decided to come up with my own made up term, complicated simplicity. The great thing about making things up is that you set all the rules, you can decide what is and what isn’t, what was and what will be. Love is the same way, love is whatever you make it, it's not what you saw growing up, its not what you see while walking down the street, and it most definitely isn't what you see on TV or social media. Love is special, and what makes it special is that it’s a creation, a living breathing thing, it's never finished, and every time you look at it, think about it, taste it, touch it, hold it, you admire it for the unfinished masterpiece that it is.

I am not as master or a guru of love, I am a work in progress, as a matter of fact, I am in the midst of trying to understand why in my past I was so afraid to fall in love. It's at times an overwhelming feeling, to be loved by someone, the first people to ever show us love are usually our parents, guardians or whatever title you want to give the beautiful souls that looked after you in your youth. The first person to truly be my shinning example of what unconditional love is, was, and will always be is my mother.

So I can say with the confidence of a titan that I know what love feels like, but I still don’t know love like I should. It took me a long time to come to terms with that, I was ashamed to admit it, because I’m secretly a hopeless romantic. I hopelessly wanted to have someone else to love, for the longest time I was aloof to this fact or maybe I just didn't want to admit it, but I’m grateful that I know now. I so desperately wanted to love another because I wanted to show others what that feels and looks like, I wanted to do this so badly, because I received so much “fake love” during my adolescence, I was bullied, I was different, and I knew it. Beyond any of those things, the most damaging result of all of this, was that it made me afraid to love myself, I felt I didn't deserve that kind of love. We all deserve to be loved, but it starts with loving ourselves.

Loving yourself can be hard, maybe now more than ever, we have so many expectations thrust upon us and so many readily available examples of all the things we are not. There are far too many messages out there that leave us with feelings of wanting, these feeling of incompleteness. Its gotten to the point that we truly believe that if we have this, and do that, and go there, then finally we will be perfect. I’m here to plead to you to not think that way, love, “perfection”, it is all subjective.

Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away. – Antione De Saint-Exupery

So if this message is unclear, then let me be plain, love is the most powerful force in existence. Love is a gift that can be given to oneself as well as given to others. Love has no magical blueprint or map, or guide. Love is complicated simplicity, and it’s the most precious things there is to find in the world. Love yourself, and I mean truly love yourself, not because you want it, but because you deserve it.

If you’re reading this right now and have already found love for yourself, or the love of your life, then I congratulate you. Please pass this message along to someone who is still on their journey. As I said before I'm no guru, and I don’t believe I know love like I should, but I'll be damned if I don’t find out and try my best to help others along the way.

Happiness

While on the other side of the world I was having a conversation with my mother on Facetime, we miss each other dearly. She went into the details of a dream she had about bringing me and my brother some UTZ potatoes chips which we had specifically requested in our care package, but ultimately would never get because to send over even a small box of goods to us would be a extensive and expensive task with no guarantees of us ever getting the package.

My mother is a very emotional being, filled with an abundance of love and passion. She is a maternal titan, and the reason my brother and I are filled with so much love and joy today. As she told me her story she began to cry, she told me that she misses her boys and I could do nothing but be filled with love from seeing this, if I had not forced myself to laugh to try and cheer her up I probably would have cried myself. I think that there is significance to her extreme sensitivity, as we all know growing up black in America is different and growing up a black male almost forces all of the sensitivity out of you.

Our families and our culture have told us to be tough, to be strong, to NOT cry. While at the same time society conditions us to repress our emotions and feelings in fear of being misunderstood, mistaken, or worse, feared by others. But to my mother I will forever be thankful, because of her I was able to become more in touch with my feminine side. Some of you may misunderstand what that means, but the short of it is, that I am a very sensitive male, even if I don't always show it.

So as she sat there on the phone crying to me about how much she missed me and asking me repeatedly if my brother and I wanted her to fly out just to bring us some chips because she missed us so much, I held back the tears that were lying within me and laughed instead. I missed her just as much, because she is my mother, and I will never be ashamed to say how much I love her.

Soon after she calmed down, I reassured several times that we were fine and would be home in no time; she asked if I was happy, and that is why I am writing today. She asked me to write about what it means to be happy and I don't think I have an answer but I do have a perspective.

There are so many people, places, and things that we feel will make us happy, but if I could replace those three words I would substitute them with Gratitude, Grit, and GOD.

I put gratitude at the front because it is the keystone of my mental fortitude, I spent an entire year intentionally focused on the meaning and understanding of this one word because it means that much to me. Gratitude will ground you, but it will also lift you up, it can make the simple seem amazing, and the complex seem mundane.

For a long time I had an image of a young child on my phone who was clearly from an underprivileged upbringing in an underdeveloped area. What made me put that image on my phone was the smile the child had on their face, it was my personal reminder to be grateful. There was not a shred of doubt in my mind that within that child’s heart and mind lied a deep pool of gratitude, and so I sought to develop mine own. Gratitude is the acknowledgment of what is and what isn't, what was and what will be, it is acceptance and determination, it’s something that is free to give and a joy to receive. Gratitude is a gift.

Grit is important to happiness because to be completely honest, nobody is happy all the time, life just isn't set up that way. Grit is courage, grit is strength, fortitude, and its actually defined as a positive in psychology. To have Grit you must have a resolute spirit, one that will see the mountain and claim it as conquered before you even begin the climb. Grit will empower you to overcome the obstacles that will inevitably test your desire for happiness, whatever form you have chosen to imagine it as.

God is last but in truth God is everything, God is gratitude, God is grit, God is God. However you worship and whether you do or not, God is important. God is knowledge, God is truth, God is understanding and with that understanding, gratitude and grit will manifest and allow you to attain the happiness you seek.

So to my mother whom I love with ever fiber of my being, and to anyone else who is reading this, I hope and pray that this will help you, because writing it has truly helped me. These words are not mine alone, they are words that have come from all the experiences I have shared with people all over the world, they are wisdom, and wisdom is not owned by anyone, it is shared with everyone.

I hope you find your happiness, and when you do, I hope you share it with the world.