The 30 Day Inspired Living Challenge

The 30 Day Inspired Living Challenge was created to immerse you in 30 days of forward-thinking, personal reflecting, and conscious thinking. You will find yourself challenged at various points throughout the challenge. You will learn new things about yourself and the way you see the world. You will discover new passions and strengths and remember how amazing and divine you are! The challenge will inspire you to layer your life with new meaning - you'll be challenged to give, learn new things, nourish your body, nurture your relationships and so much more! Every day, you'll discover a new opportunity for growth!

This challenge is not for the faint of heart! While this challenge isn’t particularly time-consuming or difficult, it’s easy to do, and it’s easy not to do. So, I very strongly encourage you to begin now and set aside 1 hour every day to complete the challenge of the day. On most days, you’ll need less than 30 minutes, but the additional time will allow you to journal about your experiences or take your time completing the challenge.

You may be thinking, “I don’t have time! Where am I going to find an hour every day?” Listen, this is your life. And maybe this isn’t important enough for you to devote 1 hour every day to your own personal development and growth, but if you can’t set aside an hour for yourself, what does that say about your life? Are you short-changing yourself for the sake of tending to everyone else and chasing the elusive to do list? I don’t have a vested interest in persuading you to do this challenge as there is no cost to you and my only benefit is seeing people like you thrive and succeed. However, I do believe that as each individual makes a conscious commitment to live more deeply and passionately, we all get the pleasure of living in a better world.

And after all, if you start the challenge and hate it, you can always quit, right? If you don’t try, you’ll never know what was waiting for you on the other side of the challenge!

So, let’s go! Remember that this isn’t some outrageously difficult challenge…the real challenge is in remaining consistent and being willing to step outside of your comfort zone. Some of the challenges will be familiar…others will streeeeetch you in new ways. Stay the course! You’ll be amazed at how much you’ll grow in 30 days!

All you need to get started is a positive attitude! Most of the things you’ll need will be things you already have – paper, water, yourself, etc. I’ll give you a preview of the next day’s challenges the day before so you can get anything you need to make things happen.

If you find that you can’t complete a challenge in one day, keep going until you get it done! Finish what you start. It’s imperative that you do all 30 days of the challenge and that you play full out. It’s your time to thrive!

To begin, simply add The L Chronicles to your favorites or subscribe so that you don't have to hunt for the link each day. Every day, you'll get 2 things in the new post: The Challenge for the day & a preview of the next day's challenge. You'll also find out why each day's challenge is relevant to your life and the steps you can take to really get the most from the challenge.

At the end of the 30 days, I'll give you special instructions for how to end the challenge. You'll be pleasantly surprised.

The challenge officially begins Friday, October 2. Be sure to pass this on to your friends, family, and co-workers! The more people you have to enjoy the challenge with, the easier it'll be to stay the course!

You Are What You Eat!!!!

I'm always perplexed when I see people constantly eating junk food and chemical laden foods. I've grown to understand that a lot of times, people eat this way out of ignorance. If they knew better, they might do better. Also, I know how good it feels to have energy, sleep well, and be healthy, but for a person who's never enjoyed those things, they may not understand how critical nutrition is to their overall wellbeing.

A recent guest on my radio show discussed the connection between nutrition and professional success. I complimented her on that excellent point because most people never think about brain function and how it might be affected by their diet.

Years ago, I wasn't doing too hot. I had terrible acne, no energy, shedding hair, restless sleep, muddied thoughts, seasonal allergies, anemia, and a host of other ailments. I started doing some research on this store I discovered...Whole Foods. I had heard about natural foods and things before but I thought it was for those "healthy people". I realized that it was time for me to go deeper in my research and examination of food and the effect it had on my body.

The things I discovered blew me away. I could write an entire book about it, but in short, I discovered that dairy was not serving me, excessive cooked meat was not serving me, and that everything I ate and drank had an impact on my body. I started examining how I could correct some of my health issues with diet and exercise. I gave healthy eating an audition and the results were so phenomenal that I never looked back.

People kept saying that eating healthy was more expensive so I decided to comparison shop. I made a list of the foods I generally buy in a week at a conventional grocery store and decided to buy those same items at Trader Joe's and Whole Foods. Believe it or not, buying the healthier items was cheaper than the conventional items! I was pleasantly surprised and decided to stay the course.

So, here are some the things I did...
-Started drinking 1.5L water
-Started drinking green tea daily
-Stopped eating pork
-Started eating 3-9 servings of fruits and veggies every day
-Stopped eating candy
-Stopped eating fast food
-Stopped eating foods containing high fructose corn syrup
-Stopped eating foods containing partially hydrogenated oils
-Stopped drinking soft drinks and sugary juices
-Started eating organic foods whenever possible
-Started adding lemons and/or limes to my water (to increase my alkalinity)
-Stopped eating refined junk food (potato chips, cakes, etc)

There's more where this came from, but in short, I dramatically cleaned up my diet and started eating foods that would really serve my body and nourish my body instead of those that simply tasted good and satisfied my cravings.

I strongly encourage you to consider eating well! It's essential to your health. There are very few diseases and physical ailments that are not caused or cured by food and drink. Your body is a temple - littering is strictly prohibited! If you think "healthy eating" is not for you, just give it an audition and see how it goes. Your body may begin to detox at first but once you flush out the toxins, you'll have more energy, better sleep, more mental clarity, few colds, and all around better health.

Eat to live!

Check out this show entitled Necessary Nutrition featuring my special guest, Robin De-Ivy Allen. You'll learn new things about what it takes to properly nourish your body!

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/InspiredLifeRadio/2009/09/21/September-21--Necessary-Nutrition

Servanthood = Poverty?

So, this is something I've wrestled with personally and have only recently come to terms with...say in the past year or so.

Why do people insist on people/companies/organizations in service being broke or breaking even?

I know the answer to this question, but it perplexes and slightly annoys me. I mean, my thinking is this - as a person who is doing exceptional work in the world, serving people, changing lives, etc, , I deserve to be very handsomely compensated for my work. After all, I am creating value and adding to the lives of others.

I've seen this "Why do they make so much?" mentality a LOT with clergy, nonprofits, etc. Nonprofit shouldn't mean poor and struggling!!! But in this country, it does. People seem to associate corporations with greed while associating nonprofits with just scraping by. Why can't those who are doing meaningful work be paid well?

The thing about it is that there are a lot of people who ARE doing great work and are being paid well, but that's often because they keep their earnings under wrap.

I run a company that teaches teen girls how to successfully transition to womanhood...people assume we're a nonprofit, but we're not. The work we do SERVES young women and transforms lives - that's important! And it's economically viable.

I believe that God's children should live abundantly...after all, isn't that why Jesus came? Why, then, do we insist on pastors and other people barely squeezing by and even become resentful and indignant if they make 6 figures or better? They deserve to be WEALTHY! They deserve to have overflow!

I think part of the issue is this fear of not having enough...people almost subconsciously feeling that when the pastor/socially conscious entrepreneur/nonprofit founder has more, everyone else has to have less. But the reality is that the same way those people create value and are in turn compensated, others can be too.

I also think there's some strange idea that once the accumulation of money pass a certain point, it becomes evil. Money is amoral...it's neither good nor bad. Money is an energetic form of expression...if you are a generous and kind person, having more money gives you more opportunities to express that. If you're a selfish, arrogant jerk, then money only places the magnifying glass over that.

Financial abundance is not a bad thing...and there's nothing wrong with people who are servant leaders living well. If people feel guilty about another person's value creation, it may be time to evaluate whether they are truly living their passions and doing so at the highest level so as to create their own abundance. While those who are in the middle can be too self-righteous to give to the poor yet too noble to have as much money as the wealthy, I've never seen the wealthy criticizing another wealthy's wealth!

In short, you can't help the poor if you're one of them! Money provides more opportunities to express yourself and insisting that people in servant leadership positions avoid abundance is a reflection of one's own attitude towards money and abundance.

Just my opinion...for today. :-)

It's Natural...

So, I finally did it.

I transitioned from chemically treated hair to natural hair. Some will wonder why this is a big deal or something worth announcing but for many black women, hair is a “thing”…it’s not as simple as changing handbags or buying new lipstick. The roots of our issues, no pun intended, run very deep.

There is the ongoing dialog among some communities of natural haired black women that straight haired black women don’t love themselves enough – that because they use chemicals or heat to straighten their hair, they are weak minded and need the approval of white people for their identity to be validated. To an extent, I do believe that there is a population of black women who don’t understand how the media and society place an almost unbearable pressure on women to look a certain way…black women are no different only we have the issue of hair on levels I’ve not seen in other races and ethnicities.

There’s this underlying idea that many black girls learn from the time they even realize they have hair that kinky, coily hair is bad while straight or wavy is good. This idea of good vs bad hair follows many black women into adolescence as they see media images of actresses, models, and other “beautiful” women wearing straight hair. And so, they continue to get relaxers or have their hair pressed. For the sake of my position, I’m going to use straight and relaxed interchangeably until the end of this blog.

As an adolescent, I remember thinking that “nappy” hair was bad. That my hair in its natural state was not good, shouldn’t be seen, and needed to be “fixed” at the first sign of a wrinkle or kink. I remember not completely understanding why but going along with what my mother said was best. I didn’t think anything was wrong or that this was a programming issue…I just did it and liked having long, thick hair. Being natural was an exception and not the rule. Girls who had natural hair were seen as childish or eclectic. At the time, I was neither and only found myself identifying with bone straight hair.

Several years ago, I started to pursue healthier hair. I moved to California from Alabama and was on a never-ending quest to find a stylist who understood my hair care goals and would support them. I never found that person. After auditioning 17 stylists over the years, I gave up and decided to try doing my own hair. I did research and found so much information. Next thing I knew, my hair was growing and thriving…thicker and healthier than it had ever been. I was spacing my relaxers further and further apart until I was going 6 months or more before touch ups. I continued my research and discovered just how many women were wearing their natural hair…with no qualms, no apologies, no weird militant attitudes…just enjoying the way God made them. I started reading their stories and observed that for some of them, the “switch” was simple…they wanted a new style so they got one. For others, it required that they transition their minds before their hair. They had to first let go of the idea that straight was good and anything with a pattern was bad. They had to let go of the idea that other people would judge them because of their hair (even though this is true to varying degrees…I’ll get to this in a future blog). They had to let go of the idea that men would find them less attractive with natural hair. They had to let go of the idea that their natural hair would be unmanageable. They had to let go of the idea that natural hair was only for women who were “earthy”, “poetic”, or “artsy”. They had to let go of the idea that they would no longer project a professional image with natural hair. They had to let go of the idea that their hair would be “ugly” in its natural state.

I fell into the latter category. This hasn’t been easy – I had several failed transitioning attempts before this one. But the day came that I got fed up with the burning, the products, the anticipation, questioning the health of my hair and on and on and on…I do believe that it’s entirely possible to have a healthy head of hair with a relaxer but optimal health, in my opinion, is achieved naturally. I’ll never forget the day I decided to transiton…it was Saturday, April 7, and I had used a new relaxer attempting to get better results – shinier, healthier hair. I applied it, waited, and then experienced the tingling and burning. I started rinsing it and it burned…I mean, REALLY burned…enough to bring me to tears. As I stood in the shower crying and frantically rinsing, I asked myself aloud, “Why am I doing this?” I got out and looked at myself in the mirror and asked again, “Why?”

In spite of my previously failed attempts, I decided that I was going to give it another go. I don’t know why that experience was so different from the countless other times I had touched my hair up, but something changed in me that day. I was fed up. I was ready to make a change. I carried on as usual for the first few weeks and then it got tough…the new growth got thicker, the line where the 2 textures met got more noticeable, styling became more of a challenge…that was where the turning point was. Would I revert to what I knew like every other time or would I press on, deal with a bad hair day or 2 and see this thing through? I decided to just keep going. Even when I was tempted to go back to the chemicals, I always bargained with myself to wait at least 2 weeks before I did anything. Of course by that time, I had recommitted to my natural journey.

So I continued. 3 months went by, 6 months went by, an entire year passed, and I was still going. I changed products, I tried new styles, I tried new accessories and another year passed. At the 2 year mark, I realized how far I had come and that I was near the finish line. My hair was mostly natural and I had relaxed ends waiting to be chopped. I decided against doing a “big chop” of inches of hair because I’ve had long hair all of my life and in spite of having accepted the idea of natural hair, I wasn’t interested in short hair at all. My hair continued to grow and I was able to finally see the curl pattern. It was gorgeous! I couldn’t believe my eyes. I realized then that I had totally underestimated my hair and all of its potential.

Last week, I stood in the mirror doing my usual routine after having washed and deep conditioned my hair. I was gently detangling when I realized that there were just snippets of hair left at the very ends in certain areas. I wanted it off. I have no idea why…I just decided it was time. I reached in the drawer deliberately and calmly and pulled out the scissors. No deep breaths, no hesitation, no thought – I just snipped everything that didn’t resemble the curly, coily, wavy goodness I had come to know and love. When it was done, I exhaled and began to run my fingers through my hair…my hair. Tears welled up in my eyes as I realized that for the first time in over 10 years, I was looking at my 100% natural hair. I felt a wave of emotion…exhilaration, excitement, pride, confusion, joy, wonder…I felt so powerful, so authentic…so me.

So here I am…a black woman with natural hair…and what an interesting place this has turned out to be. I get so many comments on my hair now…people asking to touch it, if it’s mine, what I “do” to it, my regimen, compliments. It’s interesting to observe the responses to various styles and to reflect on the way people respond to me as a person with this hair. I’ll expound on all of that later…along with the changes in my personal style and confidence.

I’ve been 100% natural for just over a week and I couldn’t be happier.

Updates and photos will follow.

Welcome to my world!

GREETINGS!

This blog is a less formal dialog than my other online presences but it will still offer my signature brand of inspiration...plus a lot of humor and a dash of sarcasm.

I intend for this blog to be every bit as wonderful as my previous blogs...so for everyone who's followed my online migrations, make yourself comfortable! You'll get more of me here!

I'm excited about the L Chronicles and hope to be of service to the readers in some way. This blog is being born out of ongoing requests to begin a new blog so here I am...ready to share, observe, shout, cry, laugh, ponder, explore, and evolve.

Thank you for joining me on the journey. I promise to make it worth your while.