Don't Stunt Your Growth

Hi again... I'm Manda.

I know you all are probably wondering "When is the skincare and beauty coming, Miss Girl?" I promise, it will after this. I'm a little spinning ball of ideas, and as soon as I get a good one, a great one comes, and we end up in situations like this, haha.

Really wouldn't want it any other way, though. Keeps my life interesting.

It may be news to some, and not news to others; but there's one person who has influencer status that I absolutely love. And when I say love? I mean I LOVE them. I'm liking everything they post, keeping up to date with everything they do, and sometimes even crying at their content (judge all you want... but you'll understand why).

Now, keep in mind, I don't idolize this person, but this person is someone I truly believe is someone worth listening to. You may think "It's Rihanna... she's always talking about Rihanna (and the R9 album that I will never get)." That's my homegirl who doesn't listen to a thing I say... but no. It's not her.

It's actually Tabitha Brown.

If you know about Tabitha (in this post, I will now be referring to her as Auntie Tab- like I do in my house), She's literally a ball of sunshine that happens to be vegan, and probably one of the most joyous women to see on any social media.

I found out about her on TikTok in the middle of lockdown, and would love to watch her cook vegan dishes, even though I knew I would never try becoming vegan myself (In my defense, it's simply because God made chickens, and I believe that if he didn't make chicken, I wouldn't be like this lol). Hearing her always say "like so, like that." and "Because that's my/your business." has been engraved in my sentence memory ever since. But then, I would notice that she would also post videos of her simply giving advice. And I loved that it always came across like an Auntie was having a conversation with you, and it would be a judgement free zone. So many people would go to the comments and say how comfortable they felt hearing her talk to them about problems they didn't even know they had, and I became one of them.

A year or two down the line, I became an even bigger fan, and purchased her first book that she put out, Feeding the Soul (Because It's My Business): Finding Our Way to Joy, Love, and Freedom. I've had the book for a year now, and I love reading; but never made time to pick up the book and read it until recently. There is one chapter in the book called, We All Have Value; and theres a quote that she said that really stuck out to me in the paragraph I read.

"There is an enemy, and he has a job to seek out and destroy your dreams and your life, if possible. Don't you dare buy into it. Don't let anything stop you from growing."

- Tabitha Brown, Feeding the Soul (Pg 160).

I believe there are many times where fear of what's impossible, makes us shield our eyes from what's possible. It makes us question ourselves; and sometime's those questions can lead us down a hole on not valuing what's already in front of us, what we are, and what we can do. We are meant to fail at certain things, just as much as we are supposed to succeed. Everything is always a lesson... and sometime's lessons are very hard to learn and receive. But, please allow yourself enough grace to experience growth in every win and loss.

Your goals should be just as limitless as your dreams! Especially as women!

Now, I'm not saying growth won't be a scary thing. Sometimes we have to leave a few things and people behind to grow. Sometime's we have to leave specific habits and fears... but isn't it beautiful to see the outcome of growth?

The way I see it is, we're all like flowers.

Before a flower can be put into the pot in needs to be in, they how to start their growth process in the starter pots. They're watered, fed sunlight, and some of us may even talk to them to encourage growth. Now as time goes on, flowers may have some dead leaves in their growing process, or some flowers may dry out in the process of them growing. Before you know it, you've got a little bunch.

We want them to continue to grow... but they can't continue to do so in a small space, so we uproot them and take them over to a bigger pot.

Bigger pot = more soil, more room, and no tangled roots.

Now, the uprooting process can be tricky because you may have some flowers that have died or won't stay together with the bunch... but you don't take them with you. They all won't grow! So, don't be afraid to leave some things behind in your own personal life so that you can grow, and don't let fear of the inevitable stop you either.

We're all here to grow and learn. It's hard, it's painful, and it can sometime's be triggering... But, I promise the outcome of it will make you look back on what you went through and say, "If I did this, I can do what's coming next."