Akosua Dardaine Edwards's Blog, page 70

The world is going to start over again

The world is going to start over again and we have the opportunity to make it a more humane place. We need a more balanced, humane system. We need a more honorable government. We need people to come first. We don’t get to that place without a crushing transformation.We need to know how to awaken that power in ourselves. Carolyn Myss


Today our Prime Minister outlined the measures to reopen the economy on a phased basis. I felt anxious as he outlined the measures to go back out into the world. A type of sadness came over me and I had to ask myself why. There are so many people who must depend on a daily wage and so  I know that this is a positive move for their sake. I realised that I was happy for that part of it but what made me anxious are the decisions I know I must now make as we reopen. I simply cannot go back to do some of the things and actions that I grew used to. I must honour this growth. I must honour this time where I have been learning about myself, learning about how to engage better in my community.
The anxiety is coming because I am afraid to make decisions and they backfire.
The decisions must be made, I will and must learn from the process rather than running away, denying or avoiding it.
Decisions on how I live, how I spend my money, where I go to recreate. All of these decisions before were born out of habit, now there must be a conscious decision on my part on how I continuusly show up in this world, in my world

Peace

 Have you read any of Akosua's work?
What Did I Learn Today? Lessons on the Journey to Unconditional Self Love

Nyabo (Madam) - Why Are You Here?Daily Lessons on the Journey - A Journal
Follow Akosua onTwitterInstagramFacebook

Worry is a Parasite

Worry is Fear Laced with Control - Iyanla Vanzant 

What do you worry most about?

Have you ever asked yourself that question?
Before this experience of being at home for over 5 weeks, I never asked myself this very simple uestion
Confessions on the journey I never consciously believed that I was a worrier. I internalised the situations by either denying, ignoring or dismissing it hoping that it would go away.
Having asked myself the question, it was pretty eye opening and humbling.
One has to be ready to accept and embrace so many parts of themselves when conducting honest self enquiry.

Worry promotes making up stories in our heads that are usually false and negative, it sucks the life out of us and makes us ill and wrecks the nervous system.
When we worry we tend to want to be in control, we want things to line up as we envision and only that, we act from a space of fear not of love and believe me when I say worry does not change anything.

So here is me right here releasing the worry:

Now, I release worry aboout my bank balance
Now I release worry about this nagging back pain that I have had for months
Now I release worry about self doubt
Now I choose to release worry about not having a releationship which is happy healthy harmonious and abundant
Now I choose to release worry about not being able to travel in the near future 

What are you choosing to release worry about?

 Have you read any of Akosua's work?
What Did I Learn Today? Lessons on the Journey to Unconditional Self Love

Nyabo (Madam) - Why Are You Here?Daily Lessons on the Journey - A Journal
Follow Akosua onTwitterInstagramFacebook

Get Ready For the Harvest

I find it immensely helpful to relate to this as a time of autumn unfolding. Things are dying and falling away, wind and leaves and mulch are kicked up. For many it’s a time of incredible stillness, a winter where time washes one day into the next, a deep pause. Others are busier than ever, each day new seedlings are being planted, new technologies and ways of working, schooling, and relating are budding. Is it chaos or possibility?   Chela Davidson

There is no formula to follow to navigate this season. Whatever feels best for me and brings me peace is what I do. 
Did I feel pressured to do and keep doing? To remain relevant in a time where we are at home? I did for a while. I wanted to make choices from a place of love, from connection, from divine guidance. I thought about it and like Chela says, nature is the teacher. It never rains everyday, nor does the sun shine all the time. There is a season for everything. Sometimes we prune the trees and they shoot up even more, there are more flowers and buds. 
So, I have chosen to view this season like nature as one where the harvest is being readied. the sun will come out and we will start again.
What do I do in the meantime?
Get ready for the harvest.

Peace

Have you read any of Akosua's work?What Did I Learn Today? Lessons on the Journey to Unconditional Self Love

Nyabo (Madam) - Why Are You Here?Daily Lessons on the Journey - A Journal
Follow Akosua onTwitterInstagramFacebook

Clarity

Clarity - A sense of peace, a well being in the midst of chaos and confusion. The ability to discern the truth within one's own being Ernest Holmes 

Clarity has been a word that I have had some challenges with in the past.
So many of my teachers, mentors, healers have stressed to me the importance of being clear, of having a level of clarity that is unshakeable.
Many times I had very little idea what they meant and felt  funny to keep asking. I believed that clarity meant being without doubt and fear, and trust me, there was always a level of both lurking around in the recesses of my mind. I wondered, how do I remove these feelings and "get clear"?

What I have learnt now is Clarity is a mindset. It is a choice I make that within whatever is going on I know who I am, I find a peace inside of me to stand on and to stand in.
I have learnt that clarity is making the choice after guidance from my intuition to separate the truth from the illusion and act on that. Standing Firm
Within all levels of clarity there comes peace even if the fear and doubt is lurking in the background.

Peace

Have you read any of Akosua's work?What Did I Learn Today? Lessons on the Journey to Unconditional Self Love

Nyabo (Madam) - Why Are You Here?Daily Lessons on the Journey - A Journal
Follow Akosua onTwitterInstagramFacebook

Letting Go is not erasing a memory or ignoring the past

Letting Go is not erasing a memory or ignoring the past. Letting go is no longer reacting to things that used to make you feel tense. It is releasing the energy attached to certain thoughts. Young Pueblo

"Let it go" has been a mantra of mine. 
I say it especially when the thoughts are doing sommersaults in my mind, rehashing a situation and adding in unplayed scenarios simply forgeting that the situation has passed and there is no going back.
I say let it go meaning to move on, just leave it, whatever it is, and move on.
Young Pueblo's interpretation of Letting Go resonated with me this morning as I was having a "flashback" of a situation that had me up in my feels. 
What if I stop reacting to something that has already happened in the past that I cannot go back and change?
What if I feel the feelings and recognise that the situation can be used in the future as a lesson?
What if I release that energy in a different way?
What if I accept what is?
What if doing all of this is the formula for letting go?

This morning I released the feelings and thoughts using a journal to write out the thoughts that were swirling around in my head. I let go of the feelings after feeling them.

From that exercise the revelations included:

1. The past cannot be changed
2. The scenarious being thought about were also not real nor likely to happen in the future as the exact situation may never materialise
3. Feeling the feelings allow them to pass through, rather than them remaining stuck in my body and end up as a pain- literally.
4. Letting go frees up energy to do something positive
5. All things are lessons 

Peace


Have you read any of Akosua's work?What Did I Learn Today? Lessons on the Journey to Unconditional Self Love

Nyabo (Madam) - Why Are You Here?Daily Lessons on the Journey - A Journal
Follow Akosua onTwitterInstagramFacebook

Listen to Your Body

on some days, you will feel more fragile than you do on others. allow yourself to break. allow yourself to sink. allow yourself to retreat. you are allowed days like these; days to feel, days to recluse, days to process. tomorrow will taste much sweeter. Billy Chapata

Yesterday I was ready to stay in bed all day. I willed myself to wake up to move my body and exercise. I felt a small surge of energy after that movement. That feeling lasted until I took a shower . I just wanted to go back under my covers and stay there all day.
Now, this is a new feeling for me.
Not wanting to do anything. Just to be in my bed doing absolutely nothing.
I really started fighting the feeling and was losing the fight. I surrendered and went back under the covers and spent the day there. I asked myself why the guilt? Why do you feel bad about spending the day listening to what your body asked of you?
And the answer was because I was taught that being in bed all day one must either be ill or lazy. I was neither. Beliefs demand loyalty and going against those beliefs result in guilt.
When we question the beliefs it shifts us away from our comfort zone.
Question the beliefs that no longer serve you.
I stayed in bed almost all day and trust me when I say it made a difference to both my mood and energy. No guilt, no sickness and no lazy me. Listen to your body, she knows!
priveledge Peace


Have you read any of Akosua's work?What Did I Learn Today? Lessons on the Journey to Unconditional Self Love

Nyabo (Madam) - Why Are You Here?Daily Lessons on the Journey - A Journal
Follow Akosua onTwitterInstagramFacebook

Triggers and I

Triggers are unhealed places within us which are stimulated by what's going on in our life - Iyanla Vanzant

I have been learning about triggers over the past few days, what are some of the unhealed places within me that when exposed by an event or a person or an activity.
The reason I felt it necessary to learn about these this is during to the time I have been spending with myself I have noticed that  more than ever I feel angry or annoyed even by the slightest thing, be it a word or something on social media. 
I wanted to get to the root of this behaviour. 

Triggers, I have learnt, may never go away however what helps is the ability to identify when one is being triggered and respond in a way that does not cause harm or regret.

Triggers motivate you to attack yourself and others which depletes your energy, to find someone to blame. Triggers  apply guilt and guilt demands punishment. Triggers make you defensive and you will look to defend yourself and possibly others when there really is no need to. In response to a trigger you will be hard on yourself and others.

Confessions on the Journey, I was shocked to learn what my triggers are!
Who Knew??

1. Rejection
2. Abandonment
3. Telling me that you will do something on this day or this time and not do it
4. Control
5. Feeling Dismissed and Ignored by others
6. Injustice
7. Felling that I have to do what others want , having to comply
8. Being blamed, shamed, judged and criticised.


So the journey has begun on healing by owning the feeling of being triggered by these events. The next step is learning how to respond in a healthy manner
The Journey continues

Peace


Have you read any of Akosua's work?What Did I Learn Today? Lessons on the Journey to Unconditional Self Love

Nyabo (Madam) - Why Are You Here?Daily Lessons on the Journey - A Journal
Follow Akosua onTwitterInstagramFacebook

What Do You Stand For?

not everyone you’re ready for will be ready for you. the energy you possess, the passion you possess, the love you possess. not everyone will be ready for the light that beams and magic that spills from your chest. do not let impatience or loneliness lower your standards. Billy Chapata

What do you stand for?

Somehow it is usually the simple questions that stump me, I have learnt that simple is not always easy.

What are the qualities that you put your faith and trust in?
What makes you light up?
What would you fight for or give up everything for?

What you stand for helps build your character
What you stand for guides you to your purpose
What you stand for supports your courage muscles
What you stand for guides how you live

What you stand for demonstrates what you believe it with an unwavering faith, and know that whatever happens you will be ready to make the required changes or decisions in life to live for what you stand in.

I stand for love, peace, equality, justice and minding my own business. Sometimes love means saying no, not settling and having clear boundaries.
What do you stand for?

Have you read any of Akosua's work?What Did I Learn Today? Lessons on the Journey to Unconditional Self Love

Nyabo (Madam) - Why Are You Here?Daily Lessons on the Journey - A Journal
Follow Akosua onTwitterInstagramFacebook

Just make it through.

I am sharing a post from Maxi McCoy that really resonated with me today.

Why you can FORGET BEING ‘PRODUCTIVE’ RIGHT NOW.
When the world came to a screeching halt, it taught us so much more than we expected. We've learned, painfully, the depth of our pre-existing vulnerabilities in communities that need us the most. We've remembered, the hard way, that we quite literally have nothing without our health, both individually and collectively. We have been reminded of the heroes that already existed. The people who were on the frontlines of our functioning society are the same ones on the frontlines of a global health war: our nurses, our teachers, our mothers.

For those of us whose lives haven't been utterly turned upside down by loss: of loved ones, of health, or of financial stability ... we've been thrust into a situation that's uncomfortable. One that requires us to be at home with ourselves and at home with our relational realities and at home with our work. There's no escape. There's no distraction. There's simply an invisible cage.

What I've noticed is that in an effort to escape ourselves, we've done what we always do: made ourselves busy. But that busyness looks different – because now, there's no ability to over schedule & over travel & over commit. Instead, there's the busyness of an entirely different sort: of producing and crafting and creating and transforming.

It feels like the race is on to see who can make the most of their time in quarantine. And who can come out on the other side of this with the most to show for it. So, let me stop you right there: you don't need to show anything on the other side of this except that you stayed healthy, sane, and well. That's it.

All that is expected of you right now is to do the best that you can do. Which just might be the minimum.

For some people that might be writing fiction to escape their phone. Some might bake in order to forget. Some might attend family zooms to cure their loneliness. Others might take long walks to stretch their legs and their sanity. All of those things are good. All of them are likely important to the person doing them. But don't look to those things and think it should be you. And you sure as heck don't need to do an Instagram Live.

Instead, look only to yourself and ask, "What do I need?" And do that. Only that. It can be as simple as five breaths in the morning or a few purple-marker doodles at night. It can be a dance in the kitchen or a call to your mom. Whatever you do, do it for yourself. Because you need it. Not because you need to come out on the other side of this "with something to show for it." F*ck that. You don't. You don't need to be productive, or crafty, or excellent, or strong, or ahead, or better, or anything other than aligned with yourself enough to make it through.

Just make it through.

Start Where You Are

THERE MUST BE A STARTING POINT at any juncture of development. You must start from where you are, not from where you want to be . - Steps to Knowledge

One of my absolute favourite lessons on the Journey, a woman in Uganda told me to just start with what you have in front of you.
Use what you have in your space.


When she told me I got so annoyed because I was of the view that we needed so much more to start our project. A laptop, a business plan and the list went on.
So if you don't start where you are with what you have how would you get to the laptop and the plan? Just start!
Can't you write the business plan?
Must you type it on a laptop?
These things will come when you start
I got it! It resonated there and then

Stop waiting on the perfect moment to start something, to start anything! Be willing, be courageous, be ready!

Peace
Have you read any of Akosua's work?What Did I Learn Today? Lessons on the Journey to Unconditional Self Love

Nyabo (Madam) - Why Are You Here?Daily Lessons on the Journey - A Journal
Follow Akosua onTwitterInstagramFacebook