Exorcising Demons

Exorcising Demons 

11/16/10

Disclaimer: Some people will read this and might not like some of the things that they read, but that's okay with me, because I didn't write this for people to like it, I did it to get some things out of my system. The people that I tag in my writings are the people I feel would understand where I'm coming from the most, especially since they knew me when I was going through certain things in life. I have had a lot of people read what I write and think I'm trying to get back at somebody. That IS NOT true at all. I have strong feelings about certain things, and all I do is express them. I ask that anybody that reads this would disregard everything that does not apply to them. When it comes to exorcising demons, breaking yokes, and getting rid of strongholds in your life, YOU HAVE NO CHOICE BUT TO BE STRONG. If not, those things will take you out.  

I felt that it was necessary to put myself out there because if I don't tell my story, somebody else will. If they tell it, they'll either add something to it, or take the truth away from it completely. Everybody has skeletons in their closet, and it's good to dust them off from time to time. This is not about being bitter or holding grudges, it's strictly about exorcising demons and getting my mind rid of all of the garbage and negativity that it's been cluttered with, and plaguing me for so many years and holding me back from a lot of blessings and opportunities that I should have had. A person can't function the way they need or should be able to with all of that going on.  

If I had to choose a single biggest positive from 2010, I would say it's me going through this whole purging/cleansing process. I won't even lie to you, this process does not feel good at all. The hardest and most painful part of this whole process is that you have to relive all of the trials and tribulations that cause you all of the pain and suffering, after you thought you had moved on from them. I want to warn you that old feelings will come back up that will have you upset and wanting to fight somebody, you might even feel depressed, and you probably might feel drained after a couple of days of doing it. Like I found out the hard way, putting issues in the back of your mind and moving on to something else is not the way to handle them. I had been doing that since I was 8 years old, and now I'm paying the price for it having to relive 23 years of pure hell just to be able to move on with my life and reach my full potential. One step in this cleansing process, probably the most critical, is forgiveness. Unforgiveness will tie you to a person in a negative way, and it's like drinking poison and hoping somebody else will die. The people that wrong me have moved on and are living their lives, and now it's time for me to do the same. After you finish reliving all of this stuff, you still have to forgive all of the people who wronged you if you want to be completely healed. The silver lining to this dark cloud is knowing that I'm reliving all of this stuff for the last time. 

Here is a small list of things that I'm cleansing from my system so I can move forward: 

-traumatic childhood

-not feeling safe at home as a child

-being played against my sister by family

-treated differently from my sister, driving a wedge between us

-scorned, verbally abused, having my self-esteem SHATTERED mainly by family and classmates

-often feeling unloved and unwanted

-being the most misunderstood and disliked in my class (I had classmates in grade school constantly tell me that nobody in the class liked me, sometimes with smiles on their faces.)

-constant rejection, in every form or fashion

-being homeless

-16 different jobs in 5 years

-heartbreak by 3 women in the same year

-constantly being told I wouldn't be able to do what I set out to do  

Again, this is just a fraction of all of the things that I went through, that molded and shaped me into who I was before I started this conviction of myself. I didn't realize just how broken I was and how fragile my psyche was until I started this process. I was conditioned to be that way starting at 8 years old, and as I got older I started to accept all of that garbage as normal, and I never learned how to speak up for myself. I also didn't have the option of acknowledging, "Something is wrong, I don't like the way this feels.", because I was trained not to recognized my feelings and only have a limited sense of constriction or emotional numbness. Growing up in the environment that I did can have lasting costs, and you can inherit habits and beliefs that complicate relationships, decision making, spirituality, and emotional development. After starting this process of cleansing, I realized that the very thing that needs to be changed is the thing that we got accustomed to and learned to tolerate. When you get tired and want a change, you have to desire it more than just about anything. You have to want it as bad as you want to breathe. 

I had to ask myself 2 very important questions: 

1.) "Do you want to get well?"

2.) "How bad do you want it?"  

I want it so bad, that I was willing to go all the way back to when I was 8 years old and relive every bad thing that happened to me, every bad thing that was said and done to me for the last time so I can finally be freed from so many years of bondage once for all. I realize that this is the price I have to pay for me to truly be happy and live the life I want to live and have the things I want to have. I also realize that you can't be powerful and pitiful at the same time. If you feel like you are wearing yourself out and not getting results, it's time to get a new plan. Emotional baggage blocks spiritual, physical, and financial prosperity. It affects how we live, earn, believe, and choose everything in life. Usually, the root of most of your problems is how you feel about yourself. When you learn to love yourself, you end up giving standards to everybody around you. Whatever you accumulate in life is a direct consequence of your mindset. Every aspect of your world is somehow a result of your creation. When you feel good about yourself all the time, you attract both the people and the events into your life that empower and position you for opportunities most people never dream possible. You can solve or avoid a lot of problems if you surround yourself with the right people. It's crucial that you surround yourself with people that are excited, and can get you excited, not drag you down.  

It also took me a long time to figure out that people either come into your life for a lifetime or a season. I had a hard time trying to tell the difference. Think of your life as a tree:

Some people are leaves on a tree, the wind blows and they go left or right. They are unstable and you can't count on them. All they ever do is take from that tree. Leaves have a season, and in that season a leaf will wither and die, then blow away. LET IT GO!! The branch people (be careful) come in all shapes and sizes, and you never know how strong they will be in your life. Tip out on that branch slowly, and when you go out on a limb, don't put too much weight on it at one time because it can fall and leave you high and dry. Sometimes you have to wait for the branch to grow up before it can hold all the things you want to share with it. Finally, there are people who are like the roots at the bottom of the tree. The roots don't care about being seen, they are there to hold the tree up, and to make sure it stays in the air. It comes from the earth to give the tree everything it needs. All you really need is 2 or 3 solid relationships with people who want to be in your life for the right reasons.

Up until the last couple of years, I often felt defeated and like I needed to be rescued. I also found myself sometimes trying to make up for not getting enough love and affection growing up, which is probably why I felt like I didn't get enough attention and nobody ever took me seriously. The root of these feelings came from all of the rejection that I got over the years from family, classmates, teammates, women, etc. For a brief time, I did have a couple of friends in elementary school that helped to lighten the mood and take some of the sting out of it. (Mel, Tameka, I'm talking about you. I definitely appreciate y'all doing what you did to help soften the blow. You have no idea.) I was always surrounded no matter where I was (EVEN AT HOME!!) by people who made me feel like I wasn't loved, accepted, not good enough, didn't belong, unwanted, unimportant, and not being valuable. It was the worst for me in elementary school, and some of the hell I caught in elementary school followed me to high school, mainly because I ended up going to school with a lot of those people. A combination of all of those things by all of those people SHATTERED my self-esteem and sense of self-worth over the years.  

On a final note, I want to point out that everything you do or say to somebody else is a seed that you set up to come back to you more than how you gave it out. Your mouth is the most powerful weapon on your body, and is 100 times more powerful than most people realize. You really have to be careful with what you say to somebody and how you say it, because you can definitely scar a person with your words. Once you say/do whatever you said/did, YOU CAN'T TAKE IT BACK. IT'S TOO LATE AND THE DAMAGE HAS ALREADY BEEN DONE. How you treat a person is how they will act, whether they are that way or not. You can tell what's in a person's heart by what comes out of their mouth, because it will control your life. If you see where you have wronged or offended somebody, PLEASE don't hesitate to make it right with them. While it's good to apologize, apologizing WILL NOT stop what you already put in motion. You have still sown a seed, and that seed is still going to come up. A lot of people think that just because they apologize they won't reap what they sowed because they don't reap it right away. Even if you don't see it right away, just know that it's coming. To the degree that it was sown, like corn, it's coming back more than how you dealt it out, and it will hurt VERY BADLY. You can't keep sowing negative things into the lives of people and not expect it to come back on you. 

Once again, I want to reiterate that all I was doing with this writing is expressing myself, and exorcising demons and releasing strongholds from my life that have held me in bondage for so many years. After writing this piece, I'm proud to say that I took a huge step in that direction, and that I'm coming to grips with all that I had to endure in my past.

How Football Ended For Me

How Football Ended For Me 

11/16/10

Disclaimer: Some people will read this and might not like some of the things that they read, but that's okay with me, because I didn't write this for people to like it, I did it to get some things out of my system. The people that I tag in my writings are the people I feel would understand where I'm coming from the most, especially since they knew me when I was going through certain things in life. I have had a lot of people read what I write and think I'm trying to get back at somebody. That IS NOT true at all. I have strong feelings about certain things, and all I do is express them. I ask that anybody that reads this would disregard everything that does not apply to them. When it comes to exorcising demons, breaking yokes, and getting rid of strongholds in your life, YOU HAVE NO CHOICE BUT TO BE STRONG. If not, those things will take you out.  

Another painful, but critical step in this cleansing process is being honest with myself about how devastated I was when football ended for me and the effects that it had on me when I got pulled off the field. For a long time, I was too embarrassed to talk about it because of how it happened, and I didn't even talk about football to certain people just to avoid talking about it. I just carried the hurt, agony, and bitterness around for a long time while I suffered in silence. It was only 3 years ago when I started getting answers to questions and figuring this whole thing out. Now that I have it all figured out, I can deal with it accordingly, and finally move on with my life the way I should have a long time ago. I felt that it was necessary to put myself out there because if I don't tell my story, somebody else will. If they tell it, they'll either add something to it, or take the truth away from it completely. Everybody has skeletons in their closet, and it's good to dust them off from time to time. This is not about being bitter or holding grudges, it's strictly about exorcising demons and getting my mind rid of all of the garbage and negativity that it's been cluttered with, and plaguing me for so many years and holding me back from a lot of blessings and opportunities that I should have had. A person can't function the way they need or should be able to with all of that going on. I honestly didn't realize just how scarred I was by this whole thing until about this time last year. 

This is how it all went down: 

Because I was (am) misunderstood so much, when I was in school I was the butt of a lot of jokes, as well as the center of gossip. It was especially true in high school, and I was an easy target, mainly for my football teammates. First of all, I didn't have the advantage that most of them had of playing peewee football. I didn't start playing until 10th grade (I was held back from it until then), so I was already behind the 8-ball coming in. Another strike against me was my size, in the 10th grade, I was 6'2" and only weighed 145 pounds, and was weak as all hell. I could do 10 push-ups, if I was lucky, without straining and had a max of 65 pounds on the bench press. By the 12th grade, I was up to 6'4" and still only 160 pounds, with an 85 pound bench press. The only things I had in my favor were that I was fast and I could catch. Because of all these shortcomings, I caught all kinds of hell from my teammates AND coaches. I constantly was laughed at, put down, and scorned by them every chance they got. The same energy that they used to dog me, they could have used it to help me develop my shortcomings and deficiencies so I could make a contribution to the team. I didn't go through this in just the 10th grade, I went through it in the 11th and 12th grade as well. What really got me was how one of my fellow wide receivers refused to help me learn our playbook when I reached out to him a couple of times, and I reached out to one of my captains to vent to him and he blew me off. I told him I was thinking about quitting, and he told me it was my problem, not his, and that he didn't care.

During track season, I didn't catch hell like this, things went much smoother for me. The sad thing is that a good chunk of my track teammates were football players too, and had a couple of the same coaches for track that I had for football. Again, I got COMPLETELY DIFFERENT treatment during track season than I got playing football. I told a teammate about that one time, and he told me that it was because I was better at track than I was in football. It frustrated me so much because I felt like the reason he gave me for that was a cop-out. I'll even admit that because of the way things went back then, I didn't have the motivation to work harder and get better, and my grades suffered too. I went to summer school my first 3 years. I was just going through the motions in every aspect of my life, and all of this was on top of the hell I caught at home everyday, but that's another story in itself.

After high school, I thought I would never play football again, but right before I went to Alabama A&M I changed my mind. When I visited the school that summer, I talked to a couple of players that were already on the team. With me being so skinny back then, I asked one of them if they thought I was too little to play football. All of them told me no, and that size didn't matter. Then one of them told me that he expected to see me out there when it was time for walk-ons to come out. That's when I decided that I would give it a try because of the way it turned out in high school, and plus I didn't want look back one day and wonder "what if". I knew college football would be a lot tougher than high school, but I never thought I would end up back in the same situation I was dealing with in high school. This was supposed to be my second chance at football, and I really wanted to make the most of it. Man, was that a big letdown!! Like I said, I went through the same thing in college that I did in high school. Since basically every player on the team had a nickname, the one they picked for me was Ziggy, and I hated it like hell. (It doesn't bother me now like it did then, but I only let my Bulldog teammates call me that.) The coaches said that nickname was a perfect fit for me, and then they started calling me that. I can't remember exactly which teammate gave me the name. As soon as the team started calling me Ziggy, it was downhill from there because I was always a target all the way to the very end.  

After a while, I got so tired of being picked on by my teammates on and off the field, I started threatening to shoot them (literally) if they didn't leave me alone. I didn't know what else to do to get them to stop. I felt like I didn't need the garbage I was getting from them after what I had already came out of because I was already mentally fragile with a lot of wounds still being fresh. Sometimes I really did feel like there was a chance I could go postal on somebody. One day in the weight room in the middle of a lifting session, I had a teammate really let me have it that day, and I told him that you really need to watch what you say to people because they can take what you say to heart and commit suicide. Then this cat told me, "If what somebody says to you can make you commit suicide, then you need to go ahead and do it." I can't repeat what else he said, but I could not believe what I had just heard. I used to catch the most hell in the weight room than any other place, especially my freshman year with teammates yelling "Ziggy put some weight on that bar!!" across the weight room. It was mostly from the seniors, but that came with the territory. One day in practice my freshman year, I was sent across the middle on a slant and got my block knocked off by a linebacker, and was slow getting up. When I was on the ground, that same LB told me, "That's why I keep telling your ass to put some weight on that damn bar!!". After taking that hit, every practice for the rest of the season, I always knew where #59 in the maroon jersey was.  

Toward the end of my redshirt freshman year, one day after practice, my position coach pulled me to the side to have a talk with me. He started out by saying, "You ARE NOT a Division 1 football player." Then he went on to tell me why I wasn't cut out to play football. Then he told me, "The only reason why I let you stay on the team this long is because I like you." What made things worse, was that my head coach started to wonder if I had ever played football before. He asked me had I ever played, and where I played. Then, HE WAS TEMPTED TO CALL MY HIGH SCHOOL COACH TO VERIFY THAT I PLAYED!!! He didn't tell me that outright, but it was obvious to me that it crossed his mind, and I was FURIOUS. Two days after that, I was even approached by the equipment manager to be one of his assistants. What made everything so bad was that our coaches didn't pull players to the side to talk to them, they called us out in front of people, whether it was teammates, other coaches, cheerleaders, whoever. I used to catch a good chunk of it. I don't take that too well at all, that's a good way to get me ready to fight. Anyway, my teammates gave me hell after they heard the equipment manager ask me about working with him. They even found creative ways to tell me that I sucked at football. Again, it felt like high school all over again. They even started telling me I looked like JJ from Good Times. I might have grown maybe an inch in college, but I was still 160 pounds (I was that size until I was 22), and was still weak. By then, I really didn't have the motivation to push myself to get better.  

Including me, there were about 115 people on the team, and I was the only one who couldn't bench press 200 pounds. As a matter of fact, I still couldn't even do 100. Everybody, coaches included, was quick to remind me about it. Just like in high school, nobody would take the time to help me get better so I could be able to contribute, instead they would dog me about what I couldn't do. I had one teammate say that the team "had to make a man out of me first before they could make me a baller". One day at practice, one of the coaches that ran the scout team offense even told me that since I didn't know what I was doing, he didn't want me in at scout team receiver. I even had a fellow scout team receiver cock-block me from getting reps one day in practice, but since I was trying so hard to be nonconfrontational, I just let it ride. Also by then, I was being kept out of hitting drills and from using the blocking sled. 

Not quite halfway through the season my redshirt sophomore year, I was ostricized from the team. One day in practice I made a wrong move in the bull-in-the-ring drill, and the head coach blew his whistle before I would get contact. He looked at the equipment manager and said, "He's a part of your staff now." Words can't describe the embarrassment, shame, and anger that I felt at that time, especially with as many people out there as it was. After that, I was so numb that all I could do was watch the rest of practice. As soon as practice was over, I flew to the locker room to get dressed. I waited until I got back to my dorm to take a shower because I was too embarrassed to be seen by anybody from the team at that time. The next day when I went to talk to the head coach, he gave me his parting words, basically telling me how dangerous he thought it was for me to be out there and how scared he was of me getting hurt. I tried to at least get him to let me work out with my teammates so I could have somebody to push me to get stronger, and he wouldn't let me. 

After I left my meeting with the head coach (which I thought would be private), I went to see the equipment manager to turn my equipment in. He told me that I would never be able to come back to the team as a player, I would have to be a manager. Then I bumped into the recruiting coordinator/offensive line coach a few minutes later, and he also told me there was no way I could get back on the team because I was too little and that I was puny and had no strength whatsoever. After that, I went to the cafeteria for lunch. After I got my tray and was heading to a table, I felt a bunch of my teammates' eyes on me, so I looked over that way and saw them laughing and talking, and glancing at me. I already knew they were talking about me because I heard Ziggy come out of one of their mouths. Then one of them looked up at me, gave me a dirty look, shook his head and told me "YOU SUCK!!". I didn't want to be seen anymore after that, so I stopped going to class and turning my work in. 

Like I said about my teammates in high school, I felt like the same energy used by my teammates to pick on me and make fun of my shortcomings could have been used to help me develop into a key contributor for the team. I'm a firm believer that NO teammate should be left behind. I was the one that got left behind and allowed to slip through the cracks. I went into a deep and long depression after I left the team. I was so depressed after turning my equipment in, that for a split second, I wanted to go home and DRINK A BOTTLE OF PINE-SOL!! The best way to describe how I felt, to borrow a line from Kelis, "YOU TOOK MY HEARTBEAT FROM ME, SHOULD HAVE JUST STABBED IT FOR ME." I really felt like I was being thrown away.

My grades dropped so low, that I ended up being suspended for a semester. The worst thing for me at that time was for my family to find out, because the way they do things is KICK YOU WHEN YOU'RE DOWN/POUR SALT IN THE WOUNDS FIRST, ASK QUESTIONS LATER. They refused to believe any explanation I gave them, took the easy road and gave me hell about it instead of helping me cope with it and taking the time to find out why it happened, and when I was official that I would be out of school for a semester, they did and said everything they could to make me feel like they didn't want me there.  

Not too long after the school year ended, I ended up making what I feel like was the biggest mistake of my life, I enlisted in the Army. I can promise you this, if you go in the Army or any other branch of the military and not join for the right reason, it won't take you long to figure it out. Up until 3 years ago, I knew I had made the wrong choice to get in the Army, but I didn't know what my reason was for enlisting. It came to me out of the blue that the reason I went in the Army was because I was so depressed about being ostricized from the football team, and I felt like the only thing worse than being treated the way I did by teammates and coaches was having to deal with a drill sergeant in basic training, so I went on and enlisted. How is that for a wrong reason? Combine that with being 20 years old and "young and dumb". After I got out of the Army, I thought I would be able to move on with my life, until in June 2004, I got a Western Union telegram and a manila envelop from the Army with orders in it. They were calling me back in so they could send me off to Iraq. God had other plans, because 2 weeks before I was supposed to leave, I had a car accident on the interstate. The weather was awful, it was raining so bad that I couldn't see, and as I tried to pull off the road and wait for the rain to ease up, I did a couple of 360s and hydroplaned off the highway and landed in a ditch with the front of my car caught in a sewer. Since I couldn't open my door, I had to punch out my window to get out, and then I climbed out of the ditch. When I went the doctor the X-rays showed that I had a TWISTED SPINE, 6 sprained ligaments in my back, 5 pinched nerves, 2 of my discs came out of place, and I had a sprained neck. I WALKED AWAY from the accident and I didn't even have to be put in the hospital. Even though I regretted being in the Army, I did learn some valuable things that still serve me well today, and the strengths that I had to develop to survive my childhood got even stronger. I'm talking about things like resiliency, resourcefulness, perseverance, intuition, and sensitivity. I definitely needed these for what I was about to go through next. After I got out of the Army, I stumbled on some hard times for a little while. I had 16 jobs within a 5 year period, 13 within the first 3 of those 5 years, and I was homeless for the better part of 2 years. The majority of my struggles were from 2003 to 2005.    

Looking back on it, being pulled from the team started a disturbing trend for me, a domino effect of me starting things that I couldn't finish. I'm talking about everything from football to school to jobs. I didn't have this problem before that happened. Going through this also played a major role in my self-esteem being shattered. Like I said earlier, I was already mentally fragile when I first got to college because of things I went through growing up, and this just compounded everything. Now at 30 (almost 31), I find myself trying to figure out how to scratch this football itch that never went away before I really get too old. I also have ex teammates tell me all the time that if I was the size I am now back then, I would be in the NFL, and that's getting old. That's something I have been dealing with for the last 10 years. I won't stress it though, because I know it will work itself out. 

Thanks to writing this and taking the other necessary steps to get over this happening, I can officially say that I'm no longer angry and bitter about going through the football banishing. It wasn't easy to get to this point, and it didn't happen overnight. After I left the team, I have to confess that I was so bitter, that I rooted for the team to lose every week up until the teammates I had graduated. I have only been to 3 games since I left the team. At first it was because of my bitterness, but then after a while life got in the way. I can honestly say I would be OK from now on if I went to a game. I'm still a work in progress, nowhere near a finished product. I'm not where I want to be, but I'M NOT WHERE I USED TO BE EITHER!!!

Set Apart For A Reason

Set Apart For A Reason  

11/30/10 

For years, mostly when I was in school, I tried my best to fit in with everybody else to keep people off my back and minimize ridicule and scrutiny. No matter how hard I tried, nothing ever worked. Somehow, some way, me being different from everybody else always had a way of coming out, and I was even treated like I was different. Even in pursuing relationships with women, I had being different used against me. The biggest reason for it was mainly because I have morals, values, and standards to live up to, and plus I actually know how to treat a woman. It became obvious after a while that the women that I dealt with in the past were not used to how I treated them and the lengths I would go to to make them happy. Because I'm cut from a different cloth than most people, I have always been misunderstood. I don't particularly like it, and it even gets frustrating at times, but I have learned to deal with it. One big reason for being misunderstood is that people don't take the time to get to know somebody, so they make assumptions and judgments based on what they believe. That is a form of laziness. This is why I have the saying, PEOPLE NEVER LET THE FACTS GET IN THE WAY OF WHAT THEY WANT TO BELIEVE IS TRUE!!!I believe 3 of the most crucial things that hold people back and keep them from ultimately getting what they want in life are negativity, judgement, and imbalance. Which brings me to another phrase I live by: 

IF YOU DON'T LIKE IT, DON'T KNOCK IT, SOMEBODY ELSE MIGHT WANT TO ROCK IT.....IF YOU DON'T NEED IT, DON'T WASTE IT, SOMEBODY ELSE MIGHT WANT TO TASTE IT. 

It wasn't until I was 21 that I realized that I can't be anybody but myself. From that point on, I was done with putting up a front and trying to be something that I wasn't. I decided that if somebody was going to like me, they had to like me for me. If not, that was one less person in my life that I had to worry about. That's also when I realized that true friends know ALL about you, even your most embarassing, deepest, and darkest secrets, and they STILL like you and embrace you for you. I also learned that everybody is unique in their own way, and that we all bring certain gifts to the table that nobody else can bring. People have found all kinds of ways over the years to tell me that I'm different, like calling me things like weird, strange, eccentric, or just simply not normal. Up until about 4 years ago, I hated it like hell. But now, it's whatever. Think about it: with everybody being different in their own way, is there really a such thing as normal? The perfect scripture to back me up on this way of thinking is 1 Corinthians 1:27, which says that God uses foolish things to confound the wise. It's amazing how much people run away from things because of the way they are disguised. Sometimes the very person or thing you can't wait to get away from might be the source where you find everything you are looking for. 

Besides educating myself, my purpose for my research and my writing is to:

-change people's perspective/give them a different understanding in some areas

-get people to think outside the box 

-turn people's view of the world upside down and cause them to be brave enough to rethink everything they ever thought

I see life much differently than most people, and I don't process information the same way everybody else does either. I also see a lot of things that are not obvious to most people, and I give examples in everything I write. If any of these examples sound familiar or make you uncomfortable, then that might be a sign that you should assess some of these for yourself.  

Here are a couple more random examples of how my mind works: 

Example 1: Real life and sports mirror each other, and not just on the playing field.  

One good example I can give for this, is how the Dallas Cowboys ended up with Dez Bryant. I'll make the connection with that process to my own life. Underneath every point I make about Dez Bryant, I'll have a parallel about myself in parenthesis. 

-Dez Bryant was labeled as a thug and a character risk because of a dysfunctional upbringing and a bad habit of always being late.

(I was labeled as simple, slow, retarded, soft, etc. by people growing up while I was dealing with a traumatic childhood and all the things I went through along with it.)

 -Dez Bryant had football taken away from him when he was suspended by the NCAA 3 games into his junior year at Oklahoma State.

(I got football taken away from me during my redshirt sophomore year at Alabama A&M when I was told by my coaches that I wasn't cut out for football. I went into depression and got an academic suspension.) 

-After being suspended from football, Dez Bryant declared for the 2010 NFL Draft.

(After being suspended from school, I enlisted in the Army.) 

-Dez Bryant was EASILY a top 5 talent, and most definitely was the best wide receiver in the NFL Draft. In my opinion, he was the prize of the draft. He was definitely a steal for where the Dallas Cowboys picked him. Dez Bryant is a once-in-a-generation talent, blessed with extremely rare physical gifts. Even as a rookie, he is physically the most gifted wide receiver in the NFL, and as soon as he learns the ropes he will be the best wide receiver in the NFL for years to come. With all of that being said, as talented and as physical gifted as Dez Bryant is, he slid all the way down to the 24th pick in the draft. Not only was he not selected near the top of the draft, he wasn't even the first wide receiver picked. He was passed over for a another wide receiver, as well as other players with inferior talent. The Cowboys traded up a few draft spots and drafted him, and now Dez Bryant is well on his way to proving everybody wrong that passed on him.

(I have several different rare and unique talents, and considered a rare breed by just about everybody I meet. I'm a late bloomer and still learning the ropes in some aspects of life. My inexperience in these things have hurt me in crucial areas of my life. I have been overlooked and passed up by not just women, but just about everybody I encountered, even given up on at times. When it came to women, I was passed over quite often for men that were dishonorable, dishonest, and all other traits that give men a bad rap. I feel like once I gain a little bit more experience in life and mesh it with all of my gifts, I will live as an UNSTOPPABLE force of nature.  At that point, I'll be well on my way to proving everybody wrong that passed on me.) 

Like Mike Jones said, "Back then they didn't want me now I'm hot, they all on me." 

 Example 2: Controlling Your Own Destiny And Becoming The Person You Were Meant To Be 

My blog that I wrote 3 years ago called Slavery In America & The Prison Of Hope covers this very topic, and I'll be writing several more blogs on it in the future. To make a long story short, you WILL NOT reach your full potential and become the person you were meant to be by playing it safe and not taking chances. The biggest reason people don't want to pay that price to make that happen is because by nature, we don't like to unsettle things in our life. Because of that, we settle for mediocrity when we could have a miracle. Only 3% of the world population have decided to pay the price to have that freedom, and the other 97% are employed by them. The 3% crowd are very open-minded, know how to make the most of their opportunities, and most importantly they know how to work SMARTER-NOT HARDER. Because of that, the 3% crowd also control 97% of the wealth in this world, whether they got it the right way or the wrong way.  

I honestly believe that I'm a part of that 3% crowd myself. I believe I can hang with that crowd because I fully understand the mindset that you need to have to be in that position, I'm very well aware of the price you have to pay to have that kind of freedom, and I'm definitely not afraid of failure. If anybody from that small group of elite people in the world came to me and wanted to have an intelligent conversation, I'm confident that I most definitely would be able to keep up. In other words, I have the makeup of those people, but not the wealth just yet. With that being said, I have absolutely no problem being labeled as a MISFIT, and I embrace it all day every day. 

The biggest obstacle that I run into is that things like education, past experience and habitual thinking patterns keep people trapped in limiting assumptions. It takes a real effort to challenge those assumptions and think outside the box. Most people are very poor at doing this and have to work hard at it, unlike creative geniuses to whom this kind of thinking comes naturally. I feel like once you learn how to think outside the box, you open up many more possibilities, and problem solving becomes easier. One of the biggest (probably the biggest) prices to pay for not rethinking what you believe and not learning how to think outside the box is that you will continue to be deceived. Deceived is seeing things from the wrong point of view, leading your mind in the wrong direction. Deception can get so bad that the person that is deceived will think the person with the truth is the one that bought the lie. If you don't rethink what you believe, you will find yourself in a life of maintenance, working hard to stay in the same place. 

One last thing, I had to totally rebuild my confidence in myself and my abilities, as well as my self-esteem over the last 3 years. In the past when I didn't have much confidence, a lot of people used to tell me that I need to work on it. When I did show traces of it at times, those same people thought I was being cocky or arrogant. I'm not either one of those by a longshot, I just know who I am and know what I'm capable of. I even believe that if I get my needs and wants met, everybody that's connected to me in some kind of way will benefit from that, because then I'll be in a position where I can pull everybody else up and make sure they get theirs too. I also know that your mouth is the most powerful weapon that you have, and that what you say is what you get. It's absolutely critical that you believe in yourself the way I do myself, because nobody else will believe in you the way you do. You will never go beyond what you believe about yourself. 

CHOICES!!!

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CHOICES!!!

5/14/09


ALL choices have consequences, whether it's positive or negative. Every aspect of our lives is affected by our choices, which can lead to either success or failure in whatever we get involved in. Neither success or failure happen overnight, the little choices that we make add up to it. I have often wondered if people know enough to make wise decisions when they make their choices. Every decision that you make is based on knowledge to some extent, whether it's right, wrong, or not enough.

Whatever criteria that you base your decision on, that decision will be born out of that knowledge and it will take you to a place. Just to keep it simple, I'll just focus on failure and negative consequences. Like I said earlier, failure is not an overnight thing, it's the inevitable result of an accumulation of errors in judgement and bad choices. Another way to put it, failure is errors in judgement repeated everyday, and they get repeated everyday because the person responsible for these choices doesn't think it matters.

On their own, the little things we do everyday don't seem to be all that important. A small oversight, a wrong decision, or a few wasted minutes normally won't have an instant or serious impact. More often than not, we escape from immediate consequences of our actions. One simple example I can use is smoking ;One pack of cigarettes probably won't kill you, but a pack a day for 30 years might. I'm quite sure most smokers realize that they are contributing to a future health problem, but the joy of the moment overshadows the consequences of the future. The pain and regret from these bad choices and errors in judgement have only been delayed for a future time. Consequences are seldom instant. Instead, they keep piling up until the inevitable day of reckoning comes and you have to pay the price for your bad choices.

The worst price to pay for bad choices is when you already know better and STILL make the mistake anyway. The worst part is not that you made the mistake, it's that you KNEW what would happen and you did it anyway. Then you ended up paying the price you KNEW you would have to pay for the mistake. It even says in the Bible that it's better to not know the truth than to know better and still do what you want to do, because your punishment for that would be TWICE as harsh. Foolish decisions are not only foolish, but they are also costly. Every foolish decision you make, you have to pay. Every foolish decision you make outside the Word of God will cost you some money. (ex: It might cost you to lose your temper. You end up in jail and miss 2 or 3 days of work, they decide to fire you for missing critical time at work.)

Failure's most dangerous attribute is it's subtlety. Since nothing happened to us and there are no instant consequences to get our attention, we go day to day, making the same mistakes, thinking the wrong thoughts, listening to the wrong voices and making the wrong choices. With better concentration and a better effort, we become more aware of our mistakes and more aware the each error in judgement reallyDOES matter.

10 Common Tricks Stores Use On Customers

10 Common Tricks Stores Use On Customers

10/22/07

1.) Keep 'em in the store longer- The single biggest factor in determining how much a shopper will spend is how long they stay in the store. Stores will do whatever they can to slow you down-they use things like soft, soothing music and lighting to relax you and slow down your pace. The less shoppers blink, the more relaxed they are, and the slower they go. The reason the aisles of the produce section wind all over the place is so people will slow down and buy more.

2.) Increase the number of impulse buys- More than 2 out of every 3 items we purchase are impulse buys. Stores are set up by retailers to encourage shoppers to buy more stuff on the spur of the moment. Examples: The candy display at the checkout counter, and in the produce section, shortcake and whipped cream are displayed next to fresh strawberries.

3.) Sell to the kids, and the parents will buy- Studies showed that pet treats and cereals are often picked out by kids. These items used to be on the top shelves and kids used to climb the shelves to reach the boxes. When the stores moved the cereal and pet treats to the middle shelves where kids could reach them, sales went up overnight.

4.) Exploit the human element- The number one thing shoppers look at is other people. That's why some of the most effective signs in fast food places are the ones sitting at eye level on top of cash registers. When customers look at the cashier, they see a sign. Smart sign placement is a definite way to increase sales.

5.) Mix up the merchandise- With there being many different varieties of soup, possibly hundreds, on display at the soup section, you would think stores would alphabetize the soups so we could find what we wanted more easily. Stores mix up the different soups on purpose, so shoppers will have to scan all over the shelf for the flavor they want. In the meantime, their eyes light on all kinds of specialty soups they never knew existed.

6.) Silence the cash registers- The noisy cash registers have been replaced by a register that hums instead of clangs. Purring cash registers and buy-now, pay-later credit cards soften the impact of spending, which means higher volume per customer for stores (and higher credit card debt for customers.)

7.) Communicate in sign language- Think of a store as a 3-D TV commercial. In effect, the store is a walk-in container for the words, thoughts, messages, and ideas that stores want shoppers to receive. Well-placed signs and strong messages can dramatically increase a store's profits. If everything inside the store is working right, the signs grab the shoppers' attention and induce them to look and shop and buy some more. The job with the signs is to figure out what to say and when and how to say it.

8.) Make 'em walk but not wait- Buyers who are on a mission won't take time to shop until their mission is accomplished. That's why stores put their pharmacies in the back of the store. Customers looking to pick up a prescription will go straight to the back, ignoring every sign and display until their mission is accomplished. It's futile to try to sell them anything until they complete their task. Once customers get their prescription, they have to walk all the way back to the front of the store. Savvy stores place signs and displays facing the back of the store so that people coming from the pharmacy will be tempted with impulse buys.

9.) Feed 'em for "free" and they'll line up to pay for it- Watch out for people in supermarkets handing out "free" samples. Up to 90% of shoppers who try certain products will buy them (impulse buy). Guilt plays a factor in shoppers who feel obligated to buy a product they just received for "free". Stores don't care how sampling works, they just know it increases sales.

10.) Start 'em young- stores are like tobacco companies- they want to start you young and hook you for life. That's why so many stores are designed with kids in mind. Junk food, cereal, cookies, and snack foods are displayed about 4 feet off the ground, right at a child's eye level.

The 7 Reasons People Reject You

The 7 Reasons People Reject You

10/7/07

1.) You Are A Threat To Their Lack Of Performance

-A winner mentality threatens other people whose approach to life is different. If they are lazy or don't want to take a risk, your positive attitude will annoy them, and then they make excuses. Some may even do all they can to try to bring you down and keep you from reaching your goals.

2.) Jealousy

-We have a serious problem in society. We cannot increase the standard of living for everyone without generating more wealth, and at the same time we hate on whoever is generating the wealth. Business owners are the very ones who create jobs and build whole industries, who put their heart and soul, blood and sweat into a company to produce something that can help thousands, even millions of people.

3.) Reluctance To Change

-Some people prefer the certainty of misery instead of the uncertainty of change. For some people change itself is an enemy. When you come along and challenge them to take a definite step toward changing their situation, you put them in a position where they have to make a choice. That's the one thing they don't want to do, so they come at you with resistance or rejection to avoid the confrontation of change.

4.) Misconceptions

-People don't know what they don't know. They reject what they don't understand. Sometimes it's the only reason why a person rejects you. So many people don't take the time to understand the dynamics or principles involved in what we represent. Instead of doing their own research, people prefer to make judgments based on fragments of hearsay. The unresearched judgments are a form of laziness that results in undeserved criticism and rejection of things they don't understand. This happens ALL THE TIME. No one can make an intelligent appraisal of what you do without accurate information.

5.) Mistrust

-It could be your reputation.

6.) Dislike

-If people don't like you, they don't want to believe you. That's why first impressions are so important.

7.) Experiences Of Personal Rejection and Disappointment

-Some people reject you because they have been rejected themselves. Sometimes people can have so much pain and disappointment that they fear their dreams can never come true. People are afraid of disappointment. If you keep believing in them and their dreams until they can start to believe with you, great things can happen.

Your Job DOES NOT Love You

Your Job DOES NOT Love You!!!!

I had to speak in front of a small crowd 11 years ago, when I was 22 years old, and this is an essay that I wrote for part of my speech. I was kind of nervous because I wasn't used to speaking in front of groups of people, and by the end, I was pleasantly surprised by the reception I got from everybody.

Keep in mind, I was only 22.

March 3, 2002

Your Job DOES NOT Love You

Financial freedom is a matter of choice-YOUR choice. Professionals, executives, blue collar workers, and everyone else is trying to get ahead by trading time for dollars.

You have 2 income-producing capabilities with your body:

1.) multimillion dollar income capability- from the neck up.

2.) $6.50/hr. income capability- from the neck down.

The problem is that everybody is so busy trying to make money, that most of us miss the opportunity to create wealth. People need to ask themselves "What's the highest salary I can expect from a job?" because by having a job, you only earn what SOMEONE ELSEwill allow you to earn. This country offers a gift called free enterprise. ANYONE can own their own business and set their goals and achieve whatever they want. There is a money-making, time-generating system of modern marketing perfect for anybody who is ready to choose financial freedom.

People make different choices, with the most common one being a JOB, where they get told how much they would make. It won't matter how hard you work, you will still be paid the same hourly rate. You only get paid for what you do. When your production is tied to your ability and your income is tied to your production, you will be limited in what you do, and you can only do so much because you only have 24 hours in a day.

People have a false sense of security with their jobs. They think that's where the security is. Worst of all, if a company is mismanaged, they just downsize you. People deserve better than going to work and making sure they don't say the wrong thing to the wrong person because they can DESTROY YOUR FINANCIAL FUTURE. As long as you have a job, you will always face limits to your earning potential. If you are on salary it's even more restrictive, so even if you work more hours you STILL make the same amount. YOU GET PAID LESS PER HOUR TO WORK MORE HOURS.

The system is set up for you not to make it on a job. Not only do you pay taxes on everything so much, but the government purposely reduces the value of money every 10 years, not counting all your taxes. You can't make enough salary increases to make up the purchasing power that you lose. Also, when you get occasional raises on your job, the raises can't keep up with inflation, so you are WORKING HARDER TO JUST TO STAY IN THE SAME SPOT.

You won't make it on a job because you won't use your ability or stretch yourself the way you would for yourself.- THAT'S WHY YOU WIND UP BROKE. Anybody who has a job is right near poverty all the time, and when you get older, you can't save enough money to take care of yourself at your old age because there is not enough money to take care of the sickness created by people that don't stretch themselves and use their talents and abilities.

What also won't matter is who determines the amount you make because as long as someone else determines your salary and potential, you will ALWAYS be under rewarded. You should always want to be in a position that allows you the freedom to reach your full potential. the only way to do that is to participate in the free enterprise opportunities of business ownership. The free enterprise system and financial freedom IS NOT designed to learn in school. You learn it from people who made it happen.

YOUR JOB DOES NOT LOVE YOU!!!!