The Darkness Before Dawn - A Lesson In Pursuing Our Dreams

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I did intend on posting Part Two of my previous post What Is Magic? But something else came up which I thought I would share while it's still fresh on my mind. 

While practicing a more positive lifestyle, one negative little thing came up. It was tiny but it was also distracting. I knew I needed to deal with it but I didn't think too much about it.

A couple of days later, all hell broke loose.

I was out with my youngest daughter and as we got off the bus a man turned to us and said, "I've been told to bless you. Happy new year."

Wow, how nice was that I said to my little girl.

Well, now I can only think this man was either an angel or had a direct line to heaven because of what happened next.

We made our way to the shop we wanted to go to and in the distance a man was shouting. Just as we approached the corner of the street, another man in a car calmly told us not to carry on as there was a man out of his mind with a knife. I looked round and saw him. I didn't think much of it at the time but thankfully he had his back to us. We were the closest people to him. Calmly, I told my daughter we needed to get out of there.

Thank God for the man in the car!

Next, our bus didn't show up....neither did the next. A huge crowd formed and the atmosphere became tense. We were told the next bus wouldn't leave until at least 20 minutes. So I decided to jump on another that stops a good thirty minute walk from home.

But, because it was pitch black and an unfamiliar route we got off two stops early so the walk home in the bitter cold was longer. 

Once home, my new neighbours were once again shouting obscenities at their young children. It was then I broke down at the relentless barrage of stress. I mean I didn't even have a moment to recover from our encounter with the knife wielding man. 

I decided to go to a party I had been invited to to let down my hair. Although it was a good night, I did drink but soon came to regret even that.

The next day I lay in bed thinking what the hell happened these past couple of days? And I believe I got my answer. 

Or answers I should say....

First, I heard in my heard 'It's always darkest before dawn.' As I contemplated those words, it gave me a glimmer of hope to not despair or give up on all the hard work I have put in.

Second, I knew I had some choices to make. Give up the things that were not serving me. Identify areas that drained me. And so on. Things that weren't bad, but were bad for me.

Then Oprah's speech came out. I listened to those words and as soon as she said there's nothing more powerful than speaking 'Our truth', something I talk about and believe, I understood right there and then, that in order to live our truth, we would have to learn hard ones about ourselves.

In order for me to be able to move forward, I would have to change a few things. I had told myself a lie that certain things were okay in my life because I could handle them. Well, the truth is I can't.

That includes the simplest things such as indulging in negative pointless conversations. Recreational drinking. Excessive time on Facebook.

Each one of these is a massive drain on my life and opens doors to a whole lot of crap!

Evidence of the hold that these things have on me is the difficulty of giving them up. 

So, in order to LIVE our truth, we may need to discover some things about ourselves that we didn't know. Things we need to clear out of the way to make room for something better.

And that's the thing. In order to also receive our desires, we have to get rid of things that have a hold on us or drain us. But we won't always see what those things are. They may only be revealed in that darkest hour before the breaking of dawn.

We can mistake hardships as a 'no' to our dreams.

Well, I believe that's not the case. Our hardships are lessons in growth and preparations in making room for better things.

I didn't want to give up, but I didn't want to go on either, until I saw what it all meant. And It will only mean something if I became pro-active about it and apply what I learned. 

So now I have some new intentions. My schedule now changes. My decisions about certain things must change too. And as I do that, finally the light of dawn will shine!