on me by both Black men and White society, and the consistent betrayals and emotional devastations that I was subjected to as a child.
As my anger surged and then peaked, I screamed, “God, You’re a liar and You play favorites! The Bible says You are not a respecter of persons. You rain on the just as well as the unjust. But what I see is Whites getting all the privileges and Blacks, well I guess to hell with us! I’ve done everything people said I was supposed to do to be successful. And I’ve done everything to win Your favor. Yet I keep coming up empty handed, betrayed, and frustrated. I’m tired of picking up the broken pieces of my life! So tell me what’s going on?” I demanded.
If there was a feeling deeper than depression, I was feeling it. My life was so dark; I couldn’t see my hand in front of my face. I was convinced, more than ever, that God didn’t care anything about me. Before I knew it, I was in a full-fledged affront against Him.
Physically and emotionally exhausted, I heard God say, “It’s not Me, it’s you!”
Shocked and still pissed off, I responded, “What do You mean, it’s not You, it’s me?”
Then I heard Him say, “While you do have a lot of responsibility in your situation, I don’t mean ‘you’ alone — I mean ‘you’ as a human society — far too many people are locked in the residue of their past.”
This outrageous conversation, precipitated by my matter-of-fact, in-your-face attitude, led me on the most extraordinary journey of my life. First, I was eager to find out what God meant by me being responsible for my dilemma. Second, what was this residue of the past that human society was locked into?
Why Can’t I Stop the Madness?
As time went on, I began entertaining the suggestion my colleagues made about becoming a professional speaker. Just out of curiosity, I contacted a few public speaking seminar companies and within one month, I landed a job as a corporate trainer. Not having anything else to lose, I thought, What the hell? It can’t get any worse. I actually did begin speaking professionally, not because it was an intentional career move, but because I needed a job.
A year passed and things seemed to be leveling off financially. My head was beginning to clear. Over the course of time, I met a man who pastored a church. He seemed really interested in developing a relationship with me. Within six months, he asked me to marry him, and I graciously accepted.
Since my job as a corporate trainer required frequent travel, he insisted that I quit. He argued that a pastor’s wife needed to be available at all times to assist with ministry work. It sounded rational, and as you might suspect, I quit my job to fulfill my role as pastor’s wife. As the old adage goes, if it seems too good to be true, it probably is.
Within the first month of our marriage, the good pastor became physically and emotionally abusive. Rather than entering into a marriage, it seemed I had entered into the ring to spar with an aggressive boxer. Then, as if things weren’t bad enough, I discovered he wasn’t legally divorced. Here we were three months into the marriage and we weren’t even legal! Can you see where this is headed?
The what else could go wrong? list kept growing. This man, whom I thought I loved, stole large sums of money from me and pawned my jewelry. I simply couldn’t believe that my life had taken such a downward turn. Devastated, I had to find a way out of that nightmare and somehow regain my dignity and sanity.
At the same time, life had presented my daughter with her own set of challenges. It seemed as though she was repeating my life patterns, because she too had become a single parent of two children. Eventually, she moved back home and we worked together to get over our hurdles. Months passed, and even with the two of us working long hours to get ahead, we were barely able to make ends meet.
An Unexpected Journey
By the time God revealed the philosophy of learning to give myself permission, I had gone back to conducting public speaking seminars for corporate professionals. It had been four years since my failed marriage to the pastor, which not only created heartbreak, but financial setback. I had decided to embrace the gift and talent of touching people’s lives through words.
My hope was restored, and I had set my sights on becoming the next great speaking sensation. But with this grand idea came a bigger problem — I had no idea how I was going to accomplish the goal. So, when a colleague sent me information about a weekend retreat designed to help small business owners and entrepreneurs market themselves, I jumped at the opportunity. The event was held in La Jolla, California, and seemed like the perfect solution to help make me visible, busy, and booked!
It was November 2001, and the purpose of the retreat was to bring together a small group of entrepreneurs who had become stagnant in their efforts to move to the next level of success. The location overlooked the Pacific Ocean and was simply fabulous! We were all invigorated by the view. And certainly the presenter had done an outstanding job of inspiring us to refocus and pursue our dreams. During the conference, participants engaged in passionate discussions that produced tears, hugs, prayers, and major breakthroughs. Then — too soon, it seemed — the weekend ended.
There was no doubt our passion had been rekindled. We were headed toward the next level of success! As we said our goodbyes, a few of us lingered in the corridor of the facility and continued to talk about our weekend experience. We shared how the feedback from other creative, like-minded people had been simply stimulating.
After awhile, the pleasantries began to fade and the conversation began to echo the exact same conversations we had when we first arrived. Somehow we slipped away from the talk of hope and possibilities and reverted to doubt and impossibilities. It was almost as if we were openly reaffirming our loyalty to remain restrained by our limitations.
I chuckled and said to myself, Wow! We managed to spend an entire weekend making a 360 degree turn — only to end up exactly where we began — stuck in our own private hell of limitations and inhibitions. You know how it is. Sometimes we do things in life that are so asinine or bizarre that the only thing we can do is laugh. Any attempt to explain it would create even more confusion. This was indeed one of those moments.
My flight home was scheduled to leave in a few hours, so I said my final goodbyes, retrieved my luggage from the hotel bellman, and took a cab to the airport. As I waited to board the plane, I resolved in my mind that the retreat had only been a temporary mental departure from a darker reality that none of us wanted to acknowledge. It seemed our reality was far bigger, stronger, and more sinister than any pep rally weekend could change. I had experienced this feeling before. All too often, throughout the course of my life, my efforts to move ahead were met with criticism, and even ridicule, from others.
In retrospect, I realized the taunting didn’t always come from other people — most often it came from my internal self. However, when it did come from others, it was as if I somehow gravitated toward the negative words spoken about me. My pathetic attempts to break free from the mental and emotional self-sabotage seemed to intensify the abusive self-talk.
Over the years, I learned the only way to silence the taunting was just to be content with mediocrity. Unfortunately, for me, this method rarely worked because whenever I gave in to my negative thoughts, my passion and desire to pursue my full potential would rise up to haunt me. For as long as I could remember, I had lived in a constant internal tug-of-war between my potential and this dark feeling that I just couldn’t seem to shake.
The Awakening
I boarded the plane and was waiting for takeoff. Reluctantly, I had decided to pamper myself and fly home first-class. Fighting to keep the internal lunacy of negative self-talk at bay, I thought
