The Last Word:  I was awakened by the magnificence of the morning pouring into my quiet retreat.  In the company of my thoughts, I began to move quietly through the house listening to all the messages of my soul.  Among the lessons that came bursting into my view were the desires of my heart to just fit into the world around me.  I found myself standing in front of the mirror thinking about what to do with this hair, I began to remember all of the hairstyles that I have worn over the years and how I just wanted to make the presence of my hair smaller, more compact and on some level unnoticeable.  I even recalled how I have battled with my weight in pursuit of once again weighing 1 hundred and anything.  As if that was not enough, while humming my favorite hymn I remembered being told by a choir director that my voice was too deep for a woman, so I spent years trying to fit the true tenor of my soul into the alto-esque refrains of every Gospel song that I know; all in the name of fitting in to something that has no name. From all of this total recall, the lessons of authenticity of spirit, mind, body and soul rang loud and rang true.  Each time that I tried to make some aspect of my physicality small enough to fit into another’s construct, that same smallness was transferred to my very being.  Yet, what I know to be True in this moment is that I was not born to fit into anyone else’s anything.  I have not survived all of this folding, squeezing, lightening, straightening, twisting, starving, softening and blending to finally fit into something that is simply too small to contain God’s plan for my life.  So today, I am quite comfortable wearing my hair big loose and natural.  Today, the weight of my weight is far less of a burden than taking on and carrying the expectations of others.  The depth of my voice is enough to speak life to those who would hear.

I am strong enough, brave enough, colorful enough, creative enough, kind enough, educated enough; I am all that I have been becoming and wherever I God is, I am more than enough.  No one knows the way to your Truth but you and it is time to head out on the journey of a lifetime; the one that takes you deeper into your being.  So, if you have in some way taken on the views of others as your own, or find yourself laboring to meet goals and expectations that are not your own or you have been pouring your authentic beauty, depth and character out into the void, just to take on something less than the Divine expression that you were created to be, then the last word belongs to you:  Enough!