Pick Your Battle!

      There is no geater struggle when you feel alone than the battle between your own heart and mind. The people closest to me, as pictured in this post, have taught me the true meaning of unconditional love! I have two healthy great-nieces!!  I love you Ember and Violet. I love Karen and J R the Great. I love you Shane and Shaniah and Dakota and Kiana and Savanah and Emma and Sissy and Chloe and Mama and Colin and Daddy!!!  Also, a shout out to my homeland at Tomahawk and Reedville!!!My family always and forever! Please thank God for your blessings each and every night!


Please see my Facebook page for pictures!:

https://m.facebook.com/auntieashley34/
 

For Freedom A Cost Must Be Paid

       I loved and tried and dreamed. My supportive family were always behind me and always will be. Should I say SOME family.  Also, please remember family is not always blood.  I beg all teens of this world to think, at least as long as their extension span and hormones hold out!  

     I have turned into Dr. Brown-Still and Miss Auntie Ashley (as opposed to Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde).  The only dreams I sometimes have left are for my family's success and happiness, my freedom to sleep in any room I wish (same with trying to have my God and Music therapy), and to feel any freedom but at least freedom from unnecessary questions and walking on egg shells and being able to not fear an inevitable confrontation because I am required to be in whichever room someone else is in. The cost to pay is too high some days. The cost is sanity, self-questioning, at least when you hear them say they are by themselves hatefully and tell you they are alone so they are just going to bed and throw their hands in the air as all I do is listen to music and write, well you end up with that other person staring down the business end of a hissy fit!  Freedom always costs.  Peace and be free!

I Live A Stress Free Life! (Maybe not but let's pretend.)

     Does so many awesome things ever happen to other people besides me in such a short amount of time (say a few weeks!!!) that they start to wonder when the bottom will fall out?! It's easy for me to allow myself to sink into this line of thought. I have two beautiful and healthy daughters I love. Each has their own unique sense of humor and personality yet we all get each other and are very close. We have a lot of fun together!!! My niece is having my great niece Monday and my new niece (my nephew's wife) is having my other great niece shortly after. Two of my nephews' band White Fox Kill is taking off in this world and they are realizing their dreams! They have won Battle of the Bands and will play at The Shrine Mosque April 1st for the first day of Carnival of Ink. Many great musicians that literally changed the very nature, view, and love of music throughout the last several decades have been on that stage (perhaps you've heard of Bob Dylan?!). I couldn't be more proud of all my family. I also have another niece and nephew I love with all my heart! On top of all this I am fixing to be a proud owner of a Stevie Ray Vaughan Strat(see picture). With all this love, excitement, and anticipation building I should be bursting with pure joy instead of waiting for the ball to drop; therefore I am going to do something simple. This is something anyone can choose to do. I am going to believe I deserve to be happy and proud and have beautiful and loving friends and family. I am going to enjoy every moment as it comes without expecting all hell to break loose. I am going to laugh and love and rock out as much as humanly possible without reservation or irrational fear. I would suggest doing the same. Live without looking over your shoulder for the upcoming catastrophe!

Resolve for Repair Without Resolutions

     It's the beginning of a new year. One of my hopes for the new year involves Frog not asking me all year if it is 2018 (he asked this about 2017 throughout the last year). Most people have been analyzing and forming resolutions and have possibly already given up on those resolutions. I don't analyze myself and my life every new year because I do that constantly each day all year long. Resolutions involve regret that maybe we haven't made enough family time or learned something we've always wanted to learn. We may resolve to analyze and correct weaknesses in ourselves such as anger issues, bad habits, being a doormat, or addictions. The truth for me, though, is that I know a resolution could never be a solution. I am broken and need to believe in so much more than a miracle resolution to heal from the past. Every single day I could choose to change a bad habit or exercise more or practice more patience. My point is that I always know actions I should resolve to take towards improvement. I can also take those actions anytime of the year, should I choose to. Resolutions are only pressures that panic me and set me up to fail. They have the feeling of a time limit and hold me in fear of shame and failure. They also instill in me a nagging fear that if I fail a New Year's beginning resolution, then the rest of the year will be a continued failure. A choice to change and the motivation to do so may come under any circumstance, at any time, and completely unexpected. These moments are the ones that change my life. These are the moments I have learned the most and grown as a person. Congratulations to anyone that makes a resolution and empowers their life by continuing it. I implore the many, though, that either never follow through or try but can't make a resolution to stick to. Please take a few moments every day to reflect and just feel. If a change is wanted, then you will know the choice you need to make, and you will choose in your own time when you know you're ready. Success is within each of us and not held in a fortune cookie or a resolution. No matter your line of thinking around a new year, I do hope the best for everyone and a blessed year ahead (as uncharacteristic of me as it may sound to people that are in my circle)!