The Year of Two

Simone Momplé

This year taught me that playing it safe will have you feeling anxious and fearful, but trying things will have you feeling the same, with just a little twist of excitement. I’ve heard it before, but now I believe it. 

This year I did things that I was afraid of doing. Afraid that people might let me down. I was afraid to step up because what if it fails and those people who have always looked up to me or believed I could make anything work will no longer do so or they will be disappointed. I felt those uncomfortable feelings and did it anyway. Sometimes my fears came true and sometimes the complete opposite. 

I started this year feeling helpless and not knowing what I wanted to do with my life…again. Staying the same did bring me comfort, but it brought depressive thoughts and anxieties. I thought that if I am gonna sit with this comfortable pain then I cannot preach about pulling the thorn from your foot if I am the one choosing to walk around with it. 

This year taught me that allowing these uncomfortable feelings to just exist gives you a chance to see why they are there. These feelings are not meant to make you stop living, they are meant to show you why it is such a beautiful thing to be alive. People might say that I only have these insights in retrospect, obviously! The clarity of thought cannot come when the tape is running on auto. What I did realise in the midst of the auto-play was that I had a choice. I can do nothing and continue to feel this way, or I can try something and maybe, just maybe I will feel better. I chose one thing to focus on at a time… 

Fitness. I started with just 10 minutes of workout, and I ended up joining the gym and teaching more which upped my fitness levels and led me to feel the most confident in my body. 

Then diet. I chose to eat more vegetables and fruit, and I ended up doing a 60-day no sugar, no alcohol diet that made me feel more myself and healthy! 

Then my creative and artistic side. I started dancing again and drawing now and then, I ended up doing a writing course and producing a quite few new choreographies for the year. 

Then spiritual. I started by meditating at least 10 minutes a day (not every day), I ended up doing a 7 session empowering, focused and uplifting coaching programme with a life coach that proved I was the only one holding myself back from greatness and my success while I was blaming others for it. I even learnt about my human design and what I need to do in life to live a life of purpose. 

Then business. I started this year by attempting dance workshops again (after the 2-year break) and I ended up with a registered company which brought in financial and marketing benefits. This company also ended the year with its first production ever! 

This year I took on new experiences and I let go of ones that no longer served me. How do you know if they don’t serve you? Simply examine each experience and ask if it is pulling you forward into new possibilities or is it pulling you back or is it making you feel stuck right where you are. 

This year I lived out the slogan of my company GODANCE: ‘be YOU in a world of them’. 

I now ask you the question, who are you in this world of them?

Read my follow-up article here:

Things You Should Rethink In 2023

Breaking generational curses!

"I'm breaking generational curses!"

BREAK

If only Do you have a girlfriend/boyfriend at school? was replaced with, Do you have an idea for a game kids your age could play?

If only Girls don't dress like that was replaced with, What was your inspiration for your outfit?

If only When are you getting married? was replaced with, When are you starting your own business?

If only you recognised your own discomforts and not disrupt my comforts.

If only you had made different choices instead of criticising mine.

If only we were not constantly compared to someone you thought was doing better than us.

If only we were praised for thinking outside of the box and not criticised for it.

If only Creativity was praised as much as marriage in our society.

If only the expectation to break generational curses didn't rest solely on our generations' shoulders.

If only you would let us break these generational curses instead of telling us how to break them.

If only you didn't comply with or possibly create those generational curses.

US

If only we stopped trying to 'break generational curses'

If only we stopped making it a fashionable term.

If only we stopped calling them curses.

If only we stopped...

If only...

...

Blank Slate

14 March 2016 (Monday)

As I spent the best part of Saturday cleaning and scrubbing the walls in my room, I realised how therapeutic it really was.  I cleared out the furniture, got the ladder, got the cleaning materials and had Eminem blasting in the room.  It is usually activities or an experience that makes me think about and reflect on much deeper things in life.

I bought some room décor a while ago and didn’t want to put it up until I cleaned the walls! So I finally decided to do it this past weekend.  It’s amazing how something so small and beautiful, can make you take on a big task such as this one.  As I began scrubbing the dirt off the wall, I realised that this is pretty much like life… We’ve been given these ‘blank slates’ to doodle on it or decorate it how we want. 

When I was a teenager, I really wanted my room blue.  My parents did not really agree with this, plus, why blue? I’m a girl? I loved blue, pink was too cliché, I told them.  So eventually, they bought me the blue paint and I did it myself.  I sanded areas that needed it, but I was too lazy to put primer on, so I just started painting it blue! All the walls and the ceiling too! It was so much fun.  My dad did help me here and there, probably to make sure I didn’t mess it up too much.  This is why I love my parents so much, that even when it is something they do not really want, they will help because it is what we want!  Great support is needed!  The end product was not too bad.  I was proud of myself and bragged about it to all!  As it dried, over the next few days I started noticing that I didn’t really do so well in certain areas.  You could see streaks in some parts and you others were a bit blotchy.  No problem! I’ll just cover it with pictures and posters!  So I did, I put up things that I liked and once again, made my room how I wanted it.

So while I was not living at home, and my dear parents took this opportunity to restore this room they had to bear with for so long!  So they painted it a light cream colour.  First time I saw it, I was a little bit upset because they had covered up my identity! (That’s how I saw it).  But after a while I started to realise that it looked a lot nicer, it made me feel calmer and it really lit up the room!  So I then did what any normal person would do…I put up pictures and posters that identified me…again!  I made the room my own. 

Now, years later, I felt a need to refresh!  Washing down the walls helped me to cleanse my thoughts too.  I started thinking about how much dirt we allow to gather in our minds and lives; how much dirt we allow others to put there.  We must find the will to get rid of this dirt.  We are reluctant to deal with the dirt in our lives because we are afraid it will hurt more.  Relate this to having a thorn stuck in your foot… It hurt when you stood on the thorn and will continue to hurt with every step, until you remove it.  Yes, removing it will hurt too, but what is better?  To feel hurt once or to continue feeling it for days, months or even years!  Let’s work through this together.  I would like for everyone to experience the cleansing process and then, once again, be given a blank slate to decorate all from over. 

Give me the reasons you are unable to address the hurt in your life…

Tell me what is holding you back… 

So will you keep the thorn in your foot, or will you remove it?  The choice is yours…

The finished product: