Peeling away the negatives:Positivism and giving are essential elements for Joy.

By Briana Booker

 Remember you only keep what you give away. If you never give away affection and care, you will never be able to obtain those traits in your lifestyle. And yes, this includes real romance. Also remember how you judge other peoples' characters can give others the ability to rate your character.

When people think or have negative outputs about others around them consistently, it displays his or her own personal unhappiness. It also reveals anti-social disorders.

Peel away all the labels you and others have given you and what is left: pure existence awareness and bliss. Think on it and try it out.

I am sure you will start to see yourself much happier and those around you more welcoming.

Good words from a friend: Let go of negatives.

By Briana Booker

I was looking at my good friend Mariana Morales commentaries and I tumbled upon one that made me laugh and think!

The commentary was as the following:

 Life is like Twitter. You can't control what people say and do. You can just follow or unfollow them.

It's a very honest, truthful, and simplistic statement. When you stop looking for greater meanings and take things as is... I think it makes more positives come into effect in your life experience.

Why keep people in your life that are holding you down? Why respond to immature behaviour? What are these people weighing you down bringing to the table? If you have to think hard on that, it is time to unfollow those people. Cut them out your life. 

Keep your head up high and keep doing you. You allow people to effect your life for positive or negative. People only have control of what you allow them to have control upon.

Some may say it is easier said than done. In response to that I say, you are making it easier said than done. You are allowing that power to exist. Do not let it. Ignore those who are only followers but never positive leaders. Ignore those bringing negatives into your life. Be a leader and be around those that exert positive leadership trait.

A true leader actions speak louder than his or her words in a positive way.

When the going gets tough, you see who are the true leaders. Those that do not past that test, unfollow them. Point Blank.

Believe without seeing.

By Briana Booker

I was watching the movie the Miracle Maker, a film about the miracles of Jesus. I have not seen this movie in a long time and it really hit home for me today. Happy to believe without seeing is a beautiful thing. I am not even talking on a religious sense. I am talking about believing in yourself and believing in your hopes and dreams.

No matter if you believe Jesus as the son of God or not, the story of Jesus and his teachings are amazing. You can not go wrong with the truth of the word and neither should you fear it.

No one is perfect and I believe there is always room for improvement in ones actions and words. Recently, I have come to terms that sometimes the death of a habit does not mean a bad outcome. You have to die to get to where you want to be sometimes. Sometimes, you will not recognize the death of the person you once were, and other times, you will know.

Sometimes, we have to start out as that random mustard seed blowing in the wind that comes upon a foreign settlement to become one of the greatest trees.

To believe gives you more power than you think. Hope can make dreams that seem near impossible become realities. Sometimes you have to go through the storm to see happier days.

What was so refreshing about the Miracle Maker film is that it shows you have to take risk to gain something bigger and greater than your personal wants and needs. Sometimes, life is about a greater will than your own.

Sometimes, we are stronger when we build our house on solid stone versus the easier structure of building on sand. When the storms come, the sand will wash away but the stone will remain.

I was builidng on sand for years and gaining nothing from it but sorrow. However, I have learned some grief is necessary. Sometimes the best days are the ones mixed with laughter and crying in one seating. It makes you a stronger person and prepares you for the greater opportunities set before you...but you have to believe they exist before obtaining these blessings.

I had to touch the marks of my past to stop doubting my future that peace can exist, if i allow it. If you believe, you must forgive yourself for belittling yourself and giving up on yourself. Find a way to open up yourself and be open to what the world around you offers.

I really do believe that all whom are lost can be saved, if we stop wanting to be lost. I wanted to stay lost for awhile because I didn't want to lose what I thought I needed to survive. However, the old wine is not satisfying anymore. I rather have the new wine. I want the new one that makes me live. I want the new one that does not make me afraid to change so that I can be and recieve better in my life and beyond.

Sometimes, we rather take some other way than the challenging way. We would rather run,but it is not our will that we should be serving, we should be serving the higher will of existence...that will called destiny.

Allow yourself the opportunity to push your life boat out to the deep. I am learning to do that more often. I have been so use to having my boat in the shallow waters that I have prevented myself from obtaining the better catch out in the deep.

How can I tell one person I can take the speck of dust out of his or her eyes when I have a log in my eye? It does not make sense.

I am learning now to start with my own soul. I am learning now not to let the past make me silent and afraid to be better. I am learning to live. I am learning to build something new. But this time I am going to build upon a rock and not the sand.

I want to learn to be as humble as a child again. I want to learn to trust. I want to learn to love myself and my neighbor. If that is not a path to happiness, I do not know what could be...but I am going to try.

Please check out the Miracle Maker sometime! It is a great movie for thought for all ages.

How to keep the faith during sadness.

We all have a story to tell. We all feel pain. But what to do when we have lost something dear to us? What to do when we have no control of an outcome?

Often these questions are especially asked when we lose a love one to death. We feel mad at the world and, if believers of God, we ponder why us? Did we do something wrong to deserve this?

I am here to tell you I have been there and done that. I am here to tell you that more than just you and me have been in those shoes. I am also here to tell you...do not lose faith.

I know you are thinking easier said than done, right?

Yes, it is one of the hardest lessons to give your worries and attachments away. It is hard to say that you feel true happiness after feeling a loss close to your heart.

I felt like my world had fallen apart when I lost my brother to illness, almost two years ago. I was mad at the world. I was mad at God.

I literally took hibernation from the external world. I was in much pain,but I do remember church folks telling me to believe.

Eventually, after they stopped telling me that, life went on. People kept moving, while I was still mourning. Sometimes, I would cry at night or look at a picture feeling sad. Then, in the morning, hide my sadness behind a smile.

But then, I realized, I had to stop feeling sorry for myself, my family and my brother. There were people who have suffered as I have in similar experiences. There were people that have been through worse, such as losing an entire family.

And sometimes one has to wonder during a funeral are you crying because you feel sorry the person has passed or are you crying because you were left behind? You felt the person was obligated to still be alive because you could not bear living without he or she?

It is understandable.

But what I have come to grasp is that you have to give your worries away and enjoy those in your life at all times! Maybe it is true that people come into your life for a reason, a season,and a life time.

Maybe what counts is just the present. Maybe you should hope for enough joy to make you kind and appreciative. Maybe we should hope for enough struggle to make us strong and wise. Maybe we should hope for an enough sorrow to make us know we are only human. And above all, maybe we should try to live our lives to the fullest because we are never guaranteed tomorrow.

What does this have to do with comforting you? What does this have to do with making you less angry at the world? None of what I have said eases the pain...only time can do that.


But maybe this will make you smile:

When we were born, we were crying to show we existed, to show we were alive. Everyone around us was smiling, welcoming us to the world. Maybe death is the reverse way. Maybe you or a loved one can be smiling, while everyone around you or your loved one is crying. Smiling on the good times and smiling because you/he/ she are finally at peace and one with God.

Now that is a fairytale I can roll with, thinking only that life was but a dream.

Yoga Fierce! Free Yoga session Thursday!

For those of you who are interested in trying yoga, that have never done it, there is a free Yoga Class tomorrow, Thursday July 9th, in Cleveland Park of Washington DC! It is from 7:00 pm- 8:00pm!

Yoga makes both the mind and body lighter and happier! Try it for free! It is introductory level!

The address and closest metro is below:

Cleveland Park Club
3433 33rd Place*
Metro: Cleveland Park

Knowing when to let down the ego and apologize!

It is human nature to hate feeling in the wrong or apologizing when we believe firmly and passionately about something. We allow our egos to get the best of our hearts! I had one of these moments recently.

The younger version of me would say fuck if [ insert person name] is mad, he or she hurt me! But the woman I am becoming is teaching me to let go of some disputes for those that matter to me and who I know care about me. I enjoy them too much as people to ruin the connections I have with these people. I want to grow a strong connection with those that bring positivity in my life, not a weaker one!

Often in the past I would treat people I knew didn't give a flying fuck about me better than those who did care. Illogical! How foolish!

Why worry about opinions that do not matter? Why appreciate people who do not give two cents about me? It was not sensible.

Loving people in my life deserve to be loved. People I know genuinely care for my well being, I was not treating them for their invaluable worth. Crazy!

The woman I am becoming is learning more and more each day to treat those who respect and treat me well with the same level of gratitude.

I recently wrote apology letters to people I care about in my life. I explained my actions and words were not based on them but negativity from my daily external world. I apologized and meant every word of it.

I can not change the past,but I can live in the present and love in the present. My ego is not that important to me to give up those things worth having- real respect, real appreciation, real kindness and real love.

I feel free being honest about how I felt and how I will change to make things better. Thank God for second chances. Thank God for enlightenment.

Letting go of Fears.

Well, I have not been personally blogging in a long time...maybe more than a year or so! So much has changed, in both good and bad ways! Where there is change, there is always room for growth! Much growth has happened in the past year or so for me!

I am finally not saying, I wish I could do this and that...now I am acting on it! There is so much power when you bring words into reality!

I finally am starting to make progression in creating a website for the people and by the people! I am falling more and more in love with this mission everyday!

If you have not visit my site http://www.fromgirltogirl.com/ , you should definitely check it out! I have been spending quite some time on it and now it is growing into a passion, not just a job for me!

This summer has been amazing to say the least! And I am learning, slowly but surely, that happiness does not always come externally. The greatest amount of happiness comes from within!

For years I use to wonder, what or who could make me happy! How wrong was I to seek happiness from outside sources beyond myself! Although material goods and people outside of myself can enhance my happiness, at the end of the day, I have to learn to be happy with me. I have to learn to love me.

Now, I am not saying I am fully there...but I am learning to truly love myself. Sometimes, the hardest lessons to learn to love ones' self comes from letting go of some of those external sources and attachments.

Recently, I have been letting go of many things and many people. Some things and people I did not want to necessarily let go for fear I could not have better....including the categories of friends, romance, work, and family. But now, I am starting to feel this was the best action for me. Letting go has open so many doors for me! God has made me gain trust in myself more.

I am starting to learn that I will not have worries when I bring my problems to the Lord. Everytime I have been in a bind, some way, some how, a miracle has seen me through it all!

I have been working and living in DC for a little more than two years. I am an intern learning amazing things about politics and policy! So much I did not know! And I am gearing up for my senior year!

I am finally putting my life back in shape in a physical, spiritual and mental sense.

So many decisions to make and so little time! Although stressful, it is, and I hope it continues to be a fabulous adventure.

I am excited to share my journey. I am excited to share my voice!

Until my next blog post, follow me on twitter @Briana_fierce! I post daily here on my life happenings! :-)