"Embrace Your Journey "– you've probably heard this phrase -or- something similar, especially in our generation's eagerness to grab hold of New Age philosophies and make them religion. But what does this even mean? Is it just taking the bad along with the good, surrendering to fate, and not actually doing anything to empower yourself or affect change in your world? Isn't it just a lame excuse for not working at things – not taking control over your life? An acceptable way to be lazy and call it a day? As a recovering "Type A, Take the Bull by the Horns, Never Accept No" personality, it has been life-altering for me to actualize "Embrace the Journey." My life journey is complicated, with tremendous ups and downs from the start until now, age 47.
So complicated that when thinking about writing this blog, I figured I'd share my story of overcoming childhood poverty and family mental illness to lead a productive life. I figured readers might want to hear about my personal sexual assault story or the abuse stories of my family – patterns that repeated despite my social work education. Or I could pick "luck" as a topic. Lay out how I've encountered lots of luck along my road -- winning the Little Miss Sunbeam contest, winning Ms. Louisiana Homecoming Queen, winning on Wheel of Fortune, and then talk about how you can make your own luck if you want something badly enough.
Maybe I'd discuss the plethora of natural and human disasters I've witnessed and how friends beg me not to live near them for fear of being affected, too. Or take you on my personal mental and physical illness journey to try to educate women on post-partum depression and some "rare" diseases, which are really not that rare at all (you might have it!) Write about my parenting journey, how it's never gone as planned, and I still think I'm royally screwing up my girls at year 16.
But what I think is key to all of these is how they relate, how they all are stories of resilience, how they all shaped who I am. This is when I realized – my contribution is not all these individual stories but how they all come together to form my journey in life. So that's my theme … and my message. "Embrace the Journey," and you may be surprised what a gift this can be. Accept the bad, along with the good. It isn't permanent—neither the bad nor the good. Surrender to fate when you've tried, tried, tried again to empower yourself and affect change, and it just doesn't work. Be lazy – call it a day sometimes. It can make the difference between your mental health and your not-so-healthy mental state.
In a series of short blogs, I want to share my stories with you. Share how every step has taught me something and keep me going today. My most significant gifts along the journey weren't the good things, by the way. They are the lessons that I have spent hours trying to decipher that came out of all those bad things. I hope you'll join me and look for ways to Embrace Your Journey, too!
Til then ~ Bonnie
Bonnie Horne Sims is a wife, mom to teens- dogs-mini pigs, vocal advocate for the oppressed, passionate story teller and locally known 'weird' one. She now lives in The Woodlands, TX with Shon and daughters but hails from small town Louisiana, misses her beloved NYC, mourns for NOLA, and dreams of living on St John one day. A social worker by education, Bonnie has worked in the neuroscience clinical research pharmaceutical and biotechnology industry since her early 20s. She's an overthinker and recovering Type A who enjoys finding patterns in nature/behavior/family stories, gardening and snorkeling, especially swimming alongside turtles. This is her 1st blog and she's still unsure about all this.
Bonnie and Family
Will you consider supporting Bonnie's passions by giving to the following charities?
https://rainn.org/ (National Sexual Assault Hotline)
https://www.weareplannedparenthood.org/onlineactions/2U7UN1iNhESWUfDs4gDPNg2?sourceid=1000063&_ga=2.172093989.725132737.1632319749-1224811101.1632319749 (Planned Parenthood giving page)
https://support.savethechildren.org/site/Donation2?df_id=1620&1620.donation=form1 (Save the Children)
https://donate.nami.org/give/197406/#!/donation/checkoututm_source=globalNav&utm_medium=website&utm_campaign=DonationTracking&c_src=WEBDG (NAMI--National Alliance on Mental Illness)
https://supportpbsfoundation.pbs.org/site/Donation2;jsessionid=00000000.app20102adf_id=1520&1520.donation=form1&mfc_pref=T&NONCE_TOKEN=F342509D54EAB09BAEF4F204DD12BB6E (The PBS Foundation)
And as always, If you are interested in becoming one of our featured guest writers, we'd love for you to join our community of bloggers! Reach out to Becca Canny at becca.vented@gmail.com.
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