After speaking to a friend, I was reminded just how
much fear was impacting my progress in life.
You see years of pulling myself down had taken its toll on
how I interacted with people and what I thought or felt I could say or do. It
also made me build a self-limiting wall, guarding me against anything that
might want to shake me out of the comfort of not speaking out.
Here’s an example:
I can be very opinionated within my quarters (my safety
place among people that I know and are comfortable with). However, take me out
of that scenario and I become an observer. Even if I want to contribute to a
discussion, voice my opinion or thoughts on a particular topic, or speak out
regarding something I may not agree with, I still find myself shrivelling back
in fear.
There have been a number of times I have wanted to tweet
something and then at the last minute just as I’m about to hit tweet, I delete
it and forget about it for fear of rubbing people up the wrong way.
I then justify my actions by saying “I probably wouldn’t have made that much of an
impact anyway”. What difference can a drop make in an ocean, right?
Yet, there lies the problem, the fact that I keep feeling
that my ‘little’ can’t make that much of a difference, or my voice shouldn’t be
heard. On top of that, I really don’t want to have to feel the pain of
rejection (rejection of not being accepted or understood).
Nevertheless the truth, which my friend reiterated is that I
would never truly be free until I stopped worrying about insignificant nothings.
I need to constantly remind myself of why I’m doing this and
not lose focus and be distracted by the cripples of fear.
I need to forget about how I will be perceived or whether or
not people will understand me, because no matter how small, I have a platform
to impact people’s lives for the better.
So what is it that you're afraid of?”
Pause. Think about it, and when you’ve got the answer, then
‘Just do it’.
Do the very thing that makes you quake in your boots, because
no matter how scared you may feel at the time, that action will very likely make
a much bigger impact than you can imagine; leaving you wondering why you didn’t
make moves a lot sooner.
God has not given me a
spirit of fear, but of power, love & a sound mind (2 Tim 1:7), so I WILL
speak out when & where necessary.
Please watch the video
below where I VOICE my opinion on a particular issue that i’m passionate about, and
let me know what you think.
The woman
who is constantly bombarded with questions from outsiders such as “still no
children?” or “how long do you want to wait…don’t you know time is against
you?’’
The woman
who does everything to hide the pain and frustration she feels from the endless
insensitivity of people.
The woman
who has no choice but to press on and act like everything is OK, when deep down
she knows it isn’t.
The woman
who has spent many nights crying out in prayer, wondering ‘why her’ and if she
will ever get to experience motherhood.
The woman
who knows she would make a great mother and wonders why so many women who
couldn’t care less about their children were bestowed with the precious gift
she eagerly yearns.
The woman
who now lacks confidence, because she’s been made to feel inadequate.
The woman
who has started to question her faith.
The woman
who all she is asking for, is to feel the joy of holding her own child one day.
To that
woman, this is #JustForYou
I am dedicating this blog post/ vlog to
one of my dearest friends.
I remember how nervous I felt when it
came to sharing my great news with you.
I felt a sense of awkwardness, because I
knew that you wanted to experience the same thing; to be able to
pick up the phone and tell me that you were pregnant too.
I found myself toning down my joy and
excitement, just so that I didn’t come across as insensitive to your feelings.
Well just want you to know that:
I may not be able to feel your pain, but
I certainly empathise with you.
I may not be in your position, but I
know the heartache that comes with wanting something so bad, it hurts.
I may not fully understand, but I know
God does and He actually cares.
It’s easier to trust what we can see rather
than what His word says.
Let the accompanying vlog serve as an
encouragement; that regardless of what people say or how you may currently
feel, there is still hope and that hope will birth forth your deepest desire.
I want you to see this period of your
life as being in ‘Active Labour’.
It’s often when things get the toughest, and
the pain almost unbearable that you are on the brink of receiving something
beautiful, something worth all the pain.
PLEASE VIEW THE ACCOMPANYING VLOG BY CLICKING ON THE LINK BELOW:
I wanted to celebrate this pregnancy and what it stood for me in
a different way and one of the things I did was to visually document the
whole journey, as it was something I longed to do in my previous pregnancy, but couldn't.
As promised in my previous video (last week's post), here are just a few
snapshots/ highlights of this pregnancy. Something I hope will either inspire,
encourage you or just put a smile on your face; as this is #JustForYou.
Happy Viewing! [Disclaimer: I am not a professional photographer | Piictures are better viewed in a browser]
When I found out I was pregnant, I had to quickly think
on the spot as to how I wanted to tell my husband and at the time the nearest
thing to me was my iPad.
So what started off as a simple notification tool soon became the
theme throughout the pregnancy.
I also wanted my son fully involved in the whole
process, so when we decided to tell our immediate family, I made
sure that he was the one to announce it.
When it came to finding out the sex of the baby,
we thought we would get our family to guess. Different
people got different riddles etc. Here's one of the images we sent them.
Then we finally revealed the sex of our baby with
these pics below:
One of his favourite spots:
Just one of my weekly update pics:
Here are a few baby bump shots, where I embrace
both my beautiful African culture and the Asian culture that I love so much: