Super Parent

The past few weeks I have been in deep thought about a topic that seems to be talked about all the time in such a negative way......................SINGLE PARENTS

I have never quite understood how people can judge someone for being a lone parent, immediately when you hear single parent people assume they live in a very poor community, they live off government money, they have no goals, their children grow up to be trouble makers and they have a lot of self anger. Now this is what I call a false created image of what a single parent is.

Being a parent full stop is very hard, there is so much to consider when bringing up a child, so many sacrifices are made. Your life completely changes. People feel with a mother and father a child lives a better life but the truth is this is not always the case. Parents argue, parents have disagreements and their are some families that go through mental abuse or physical abuse......is this a good life for a child? Not all families with both parents are perfect, but society wants everyone to believe it is and more problem areas are within single parent families.

The difference with having both parents and 1 parent is, to have both parents they have someone to make decisions with, and there is another person responsible for the childs upbringing. With a lone parent they make all the decisions by themselves and have full responsibility of their childs uprbringing..............do you really think this is easy????

When it comes to single parents I feel people need to stop and really look at the title SINGLE, LONE and realise what these parents are doing is truly amazing! as they are doing it aLONE. To raise a child financially, emotionally, physically and mentally by yourself is a major challenge. What people fail to realise is that some of these parents have dreams and goals and some of them really go for it! to do this and support a child by yourself, you deserve so much respect. Yes there are a few that give up but do you not think that is because they find it so hard doing it alone? does that mean we should judge them and make them feel worthless?

Instead of us showing lone parents more support we label them and give them a description which is so wrong! not every lone parent is the same, although they are single parents they have their own personalities, their own views on life so who are we to judge?! and lets not forget most lone parents do not want to be a lone parent, it is because of a situation that they are now lone parents. In most cases its due to a parent not wanting to be apart of the childs life, a break up in the relationship, domestic violence, a parent not really being supportive, a parent being mentally unstable or in prison.

Now I find it very wrong to blame all problems within the community on single parents, just because you are lone parent does not mean you will raise your child to be a bully to society or your child will be uneducated. Yes it is more of a struggle to raise your child financially but there are some wealthy people out there who have notorious children who are involved in drugs and crime. Crime comes from all backgrounds; rich, poor, black, white, asian, single parents, partnered etc. How you raise your child is your choice, we all know how we want our children to be raised or how we want them to live but it doesnt always work this way. people need to be aware that once a child is out of their parents sight they tend to play a different character due to peer pressure, this is not the parents fault. If you want to blame someone blame the government for taking away so many community clubs for children which was helping them focus on something positive instead of being on the streets up to no good. Give a child something enjoyable to do and thats where there focus will be.

I have a few friends who are single parents and are brilliant parents! they work, drive, make time for friends and family and their kids always come first. There are many celebrities who are lone parents and have successful careers for example Elle Macpherson, Jodie Foster, Lisa Raye, Minnie Driver, Sandra Bullock, Cheryl Crow, Ricky Martin. People are so quick to judge without getting to know what it is to really be a single/lone parent. It means exactly what it says a parent doing it alone, a parent playing both roles which is not easy at all.

I personally have so much love, respect and support towards single parents. In my eyes your SUPER PARENT! and I applaud you for your hardwork in supporting your child/ children and yourself by yourself!

x

Body beautiful or body confused?

I recently came across a video of a reality tv star Heidi Montag who not so long ago had 10 or more surgical procedures in 1 day. Her frame of mind has changed from how she first felt about surgery and I feel the need to express my thoughts on this topic. As a woman myself I feel women in general are put under so much pressure to have the image of the ideal woman. But the major question is "what is the ideal woman?"

There was a point in my life where I really wanted breast implants and went crazy searching for the best plastic surgeons in the UK. I thought If I had bigger boobs I would feel more womanly, now I ask myself who gave me the thought that having big boobs makes you more womanly? I continuously watched videos on breast enlargement and the more I watched the more I became concerned about the risks. I eventually researched womens after results and to my surprise there were quite a few negative that really put me off and since then I have permanently ruled out surgery for myself.

When I watched extreme makeovers I would have been 1 of the first to judge women who go through these surgeries, diets etc to enhance their appearance but that is because of a lack of knowledge and ignorance. It is only recently I done some research on the history of the ideal woman and suprisingly it goes back to many many years ago within slavery times. In those years the ideal woman should have had a thin nose, slim body frame, pert bust and silky long natural hair. Women would stuff their bras with tissue, bleach their hair & skin, straighten their hair etc. Now adays that has sligghtly changed. Bleaching is still on a rise, straigthening hair but now we have cosmetic surgery which is hugely expanding.

Some say the ideal woman is a woman with bleach blonde hair, big boobs and thin framed. Some say a woman with a small waist, curvy hips, tanned skin and big boobs, some say a woman who is thin all over........so which one is it?

I personally feel the media are a major influence on women & men! The media tends to show us what they believe is the ideal woman and so many of us are really taken by this to the point we begin to change the way we look to look like what we see on the tv and in magazines. The media tell women this is how you should look and they tell men this is what your girlfriend/wife/partner should look like.

The media are very aware of the strong influence they have on women and are very aware that women spend a lot of money on magazines, watching reality shows to look and feel like these women they see being advertised. For many years the media have promoted diets, exercise regimes, fashion musts and the ideal look a woman should have. What they fail to promote is what some of these things cause..... eating disorders, drug abuse, body strain, stress, debt, intense surgical procedures etc

Women are beginning to lose their own identities as they are trying so hard to be someone else, someone who society sees as beautiful. How many times do we see Kim Kardashian, Rihanna, Cheryl cole in magazines???? to be beautiful do we have to walk around with bright red hair? whitened teeth? full make up on? botox? what is it that we are actually telling ourselves?......................that we are not beautiful the way we are and that these celebs are beautiful?

Yes they are beautiful but we fail to realise that they are in the public eye and are put under so much pressure to look perfect on a daily basis. If they attempt to live a day being natural the media are so malicious and will say things to really break them. How we see them in a magazine or on tv is not how they look naturally there is a lot of hair, make up, styling and editing put in to their looks. I find it quite shocking how magazines will enhance body parts on a woman to make her look perfect, there are a lot of female celebs who notice this themselves and start to feel they need to change certain things on their bodies. celebs are influenced by what others say about them also, if anything they gain more insecurities than the average woman does. It is easier for them to reform their images as they have enough money to do all these surgical procedures and many plastic surgeons will not turn them away!

Plastic surgeons need money and will really make you believe that a little surgery can make you look better. But a little surgery can lead to multiple major surgeries this is what they will not tell you. There have been many incidents of surgeries gone wrong and once it has gone wrong sometimes it can never be fixed, sometimes it ends up in death!

I am not going to judge women who go through these surgeries. Some people say its ignorance, some say they are stupid or vain they simply have an insecurity. We all go through insecurities but we all react differently to our insecurities.
The best thing for us to do is be supportive and show them the pros and cons of changing their appearances. Watching the heidi montag video I felt proud of what she had to say, she does send out a positive and truthful message to women. What she went through must have been very hard, yes it was her choice but you need to consider what made her feel the need to change her looks in such a dramatic way in the first place. The answer is THE MEDIA!

It seems being natural is a disease in the modern world and being surgically enhanced is the way forward. If this is the case how do we know who we really are???

Transitions part 1

This month has been an emotional roller coaster for myself and I have not been able to achieve what I wanted to achieve on the outside which was an appearance makeover, what I have managed to achieve is an inside appearance makeover. To some this may not make sense and so I will explain.

Have you ever sat down and looked in the mirror and thought to yourself who am I? what am I here for? who am I meant to be? then the more you start to think more questions come to mind like who are my friends? what is the meaning of friends? and are these people really my friends? These are some of the questions I have been asking myself as I have hit a point in my life where I am trying to figure out what it is that I am searching for, what it is that I really want in my life.

I have changed so much in the last year, it is unbelievable! A lot of the interests I had many years ago I no longer have. I find myself branching out and trying new things, my problem is I do not have any friends who share these similar interests and so I am doing things alone. Sometimes its nice to experience things or talk to friends about these interests but how can you when they simply have no interest? I find myself outgrowing most of my friends, we hardly communicate with each other, we dont really see each other anymore, we live very different lifestyles now. Really paying attention to this has made me realise as hard as it is I need to let go of these people as they are no longer friends they have either become aquaintances or are now distant strangers.

I have been feeling recently like it is time to make new friends, friends who live a similar life style to me, friends who share the same interests, friends who possibly have the same career dreams and life goals as me. But the tricky part is where and how do I make friends like these? For years I have had visions of how my life would be and the type of friends I would have but in reality at this very moment in time my vision and my reality are very different. I find myself eager to find friends that I click with, people who I know I am meant to be around, people who really inspire me and make me enjoy life more.

Through my life friends have either let me down or hurt me in ways that a friend should never do. Some people take advantage of kindness, some take it to the extreme level and abuse your kindness. To me a friend is like family and family are there to love and support you not hurt and destroy you. I have learnt that I am always willing to help out a friend and be loving towards a friend but what I get in return is either half of that or nothing at all. The past few months I have really learnt who my real friends are and lets just say it is very limited! I can count my real friends on 1 hand. Its just like people say why is it the ones you care about the most are the ones who hurt you the most, well for me I feel because a) They may not share the same feelings as you or b) they know if they hurt you once and you forgive them they can do it again and you will forgive them again or c) its simply because you care about them so much. In my case when it comes to friendships it has always been all 3 a,b and c. Now that has to change! or I will forever be hurting within these type of friendships or I will be chopping and changing friends all the time.

I really need to work on putting my foot down and knowing when to say no! and enough is enough!. I am tired of being used and abused within my friendships, I really want to find real friends. Friends who are loving, supportive, funny, caring, positive minded, hardworking, up for trying new things and are not judgmental towards others.


I feel the next step for me is working on new friendships, trying out new activities, networking and meeting like minded people. As they say out with the old in with the new!

January goodness

Its almost the end of january! It feels like the days have flown by so quickly but I am so proud to say so much has been achieved within this month, more than I actually expected.

Starting off with the decorating of my home, now decorating is a LONG and TIRING task! Just to get all your belongings out of one room can take a full day or 2 especially if you have as much stuff as I do, now a few rooms had to be emptied in 2 days and that felt left my body feeling extremely stressed and tired. I was so glad when the rooms were cleared out for the decoraters to start their work. Well after 2 weeks of decorating and me having to sleep on my sisters floor I am soooooo glad to be home back in my bed! in a lovely new looking room! haha. I appreciate my sister letting me stay at her home especially as she has so much going on in her own life. But I am happy to be back home, Ive really missed my bed and being able to do what I usually do in my own home. The wait was definately worth it my room looks a lot better now. I had my room painted white and electric blue, then I added in white wardrobes to match my white summer bed. I love the way my room looks now and it looks so much bigger. Now the extremely hard task was deciding what to keep and put back in to my room and what to give to charity. I managed to let go of a lot of clothes, childhood stuffed toys and the most upsetting a lot of my books. I am a book worm! reading really relaxes me and I get lost in the book. So letting them go was tough but I have read them many times so its only right that someone else can enjoy them. My room is finally clutter free! January project has been achieved!

My next achievement really made my day as It is something I have always wanted but never ever happened. I have always wanted to be in a hair or beauty magazine but in the past I never met the right people to make this happpen or I would go to a casting full of so many females which usually ended in me not being selected as I did not have the right look. Last year and the year before I did manage to work with a few hairdressers and recieved some beautiful images but the images were not selected to be put in to magazines. But I am happy that finally 1 of my images is in the february/march 2011 issue of black hair & beauty magazine! yaaay me :)

My next achievement is I have really been working on my organisational skills, I have been putting daily tasks in my diary that I need to achieve. I have been very strict on myself and made sure I done the tasks even if they were boring or took forever to do. When completing a task I felt really proud of myself and praised myself which for some reason made me keep pushing myself to do the next task. I managed to organise all my dvds in to a huge case and list each dvd which took me 4 long hours but everything is in order and looks neat. So go me!

Now I am preparing for my february project which is based on health and beauty. I am going to learn to cook healthier meals from different countries and use natural beauty products. So pampering my self very reguarly and seeing what products work best on my skin. I will be taking care of my body inside and out, once I have found a regime that works for me I will use this regime for the rest of the year so I will start researching from now!

x

Welcome 2011

Emerging...........2010 has finally gone and welcome 2011!

Were still in the beginning of january and already good things are beginning to happen in my life and so I am smiling from ear to ear. I dont really celebrate the new years how many do, I stay away from the parties, drinking and dancing. I tend to have the day to myself to reflect on the last year. Well what can I say but in the space of a year I have grown so much and I am very proud of my accomplishments within my own self development. I have learnt so much about myself as a person and have managed to see what next steps I can take in the new year to progress with my development. Looking back at last years vision board I did manage to achieve most of my goals, the ones I did not achieve was simply because they were not realistic.

So this new years I decided to work on a new vision board which is very realistic and I believe to be achievable within the year. I also purchased a new journal to write out my daily thoughts, opinions and realisations within my life so that I have something to always look back on and see my progression. I then wrote out a list of goals and to my amazement I have achieved 2 of those goals already!

This year I have chosen to learn how to be more responsible and independant. I have always had the support of my family which is great but at the same time it hasnt really helped me be mainly responsible for certain tasks or do things on my own. Ive always had someones opinion or advice or somehow ended up doing what others wanted me to do. So I feel now is the time to learn a bit more about being an adult and learning how to manage new life skills on my own. I want to be in the kitchen more learning how to cook new foods, I want to learn how to manage money properly and be able to look after myself and others. I want to be able to make my own decisions on certain things. So this is what I am working on for this year.

Every month I shall dedicate myself to a life project and so Januarys project is redecorating and revamping. This week I have had the decoraters over and they are painting the house and so the house looks like a walk in storage! but once the place is all painted I can start sorting my things properly. I think its about time the house was decluttered and revamped, my room especially! I have let go of my wardrobes, dressing mirror, some clothing and I am changing the whole look of my room which works with my personality. The money that has been dished out for this project is A LOT but I believe the end result makes it worth it and so Im looking forward to the outcome.

My house is not the only thing that needs revamping I DO!, I have decided to change my look as I find I am growing more in to the woman I have always wanted to be and the way I once dressed or had my hair is not really my style anymore. So I am planning on adjusting things in my wardrobe making a few small changes here and there, changing my hair style, changing my style of make up although I dont really wear make up unless I am going out somewhere special. So for me personally this month will be a very interesting and exciting!

I also celebrated my birthday which was very different to what I normally do and the way I celebrated it this year I really enjoyed. I kept it very simple but sweet, I stayed at home with the family having a good chit chat and ordered thai food. The food was lovely and the time spent with my family was really enjoyable. 1 thing I am not really keen on is organising events and so I decided to just do something vesry basic with the family but that something basic ended up being one of the best birthdays I have ever had. The messages and well wishes I recieved from family, friends and aquaintances by phone, social network sites and emails were really appreciated and I feel blessed that people took some time out of their day to think about me. I am so grateful for all the love I recieved and I am going to continue to enjoy this month.

My 2011 affirmation: “I believe and have faith in myself and my God. Everything is going extremely well in my life and my world.” “I can and will achieve my every goal I have set within my life!”

x

Music, the key to the soul

The last week for me has been a turn around, And a turn around for the better!
Every morning this week I have started my day playing old skool classics and every evening playing chillout soul music. Now I must tell you just through this week I feel my life had suddenly changed, I have been smiling non stop, humming and dancing through my daily activities and the best part is I feel full of life.

It is amazing how music can change your frame of mind and feelings, no matter what mood you are in good or bad music has a way of really lifting your spirits. Now my advice to people would be listen to music that you enjoy but music that has positive words in it! If you listen to music about heartbreak, anger and violence it puts you in this negative mood. Every morning listen to music that you really enjoy, music about love, happiness, it doesnt matter how cheesy the song as long as it gets you singing and dancing. When you do this every morning just analyse carefully how your mood changes and your day seems to go by fast with no problems through your day.

The positive words in the song made you feel good and shifted your frame of mind to happiness. Remember your feelings attract certain things in your life. If you feel happy you attract more happiness, if you feel angry you attract more anger etc etc. Now I suggest when you are home in the evening play music that relaxes you and will help you sleep peacefully. Good sleep means waking up feeling refreshed and happy, because your bady was relaxed, it helps you ease in to a good sleep.

Music helps you see yourself in a new light, the words in a song can make you feel beautiful, or bring up a happy memory, or help you visualize where you want to be or how you want to live. Music fills your heart with love and joy which radiates and attracts more love and joy.

I have decided to make this a daily routine for myself as I feel in just a space of a week my life has got so much better, I am no longer looking at my situation as an issue, I am no longer worried or fearful about what happens next. I am enjoying being in the now and I visualise what happens next to be great things, happiness, laughter, love, fun, adventure, travel, food & drink, my family and friendships expanding.

x

Who are our friends???

We are finally in december HOORAY! The new year will be here soon!

Have you started making plans for the new year?, thought about a new years resolution? Written out your 2011 goals? learnt anything from this year?
Well I certainly have! The last month has been a LONG, lonely and stressful month. I have been going through a lot of hurt and I am beginning to rise above it. I am currently in a situation which should be a joyous and happy situation but this has not been the case at all, instead it has been miserable and this is all down to 2 people. Myself and an ex friend.

I have added to this pain because I let this other person hurt me through their actions and verbal abuse instead of speaking up, walking away from it and blocking it out of my life. This person has hurt me to the point I have lost all respect for them, it is so strange how friends can change. Sometimes I am so puzzled on how I once cared about this person so much, respected them and had so much love for them. Only to find that the person deep within them was full of disrespect, hate, rage, bitterness and insecurities. Its almost like some people have split personalities, there is a good side and then there is a BAD side. Once the bad side appears it over powers the good side and almost seems that the good side was never real. This whole month it has made me wonder who really are our friends? and how well do we actually know them? and what is the real meaning of a friend?

Why is it that people say friends come and go? surely friendships should last forever, shouldnt it? who really wants someone that will only be in their life for a year or 2?. Within friendships there should be love, trust, happiness, respect, kindness; how can you have this with someone that is only in your life for a year or 2? and why do these type of friendships start like this and end up the opposite? could it be that this person was never really a friend and was more of an aquaintance?

How and why do friendships end? could our own personal issues be the root of these fallouts?. This month I have had a chance to look at my failed relationships and friendships and have come to realise that my own personal insecurities did affect some of my relationships and my own stubourness did affect some of my friendships. This is something I am learning from and working on so I do not affect future friendships and relationships. I can accept my faults within these situations but I will not take the full blame as all these failed relationships were 50/50 or 60/40 from the other side. My recent broken friendship I would say is 80/20 coming from their side. Although this person has gone to extreme lengths to hurt me I still care about them and have love for them but that does not mean I would ever want a friendship again. Too much damage has already been done and the friendship has hit rock bottom and died. Nobody should let someone hurt them so much to the point they are breaking you down! If you know you do not deserve this why are you accepting and taking it?, this does not mean that you have to do the same back to this person. It clearly means you have to stand strong, express your thoughts and feelings firmly and close that door!

I have learnt and experienced that when the hurt gets too much speak to someone close to you, nobody should have to suffer alone. The support I have had from my family and very close friends has really been amazing and it is because of this love and support that I am feeling stronger within myself. I am no longer going to let this person treat me the way I have been treated and so I have forgiven my ex friend, said a little prayer for them that God will protect them, forgive them and guide them on their journey as I am ready to say goodbye and continue on my own journey. I now feel like I am continuing on the right path and feel happier within myself and my situation. I believe my true friends will reveal themselves, and to the ones that have hurt me, your behavior will not break me and will never stop me from loving others. In fact it has made me love more.

My new years resolution: Learn to speak up for myself, believe in myself and to stop self doubting

My new year goal: To be the best that I can be!

Lessons learnt this year: *within every negative situation there is a positive, look closely and you will find it. Once you do find it carry it with you as this will make you see more positive in everything you do and go through.
*Do not let the loss of others love affect the love you hold, continue to love yourself, radiate love and you will attract love.
*The man that does not love is the man that hurts inside & the man that does not recieve love
*When in doubt quote to yourself: I radiate and attract love, happiness and success

x