Cut It Off: Letting go of damaged things in order to thrive.
Too often we put too much focus on what could have been. We forget what it's like to live in the moment because we are too focused on the what was or what could have been. A few months ago I trimmed my locs. When I say trimmed, what I really mean is I cut off about 10 inches of my hair off. The reason I performed this act of treachery was because my hair was poppin off and I had to cut off the damaged hair in order for my new and healthy hair to grow. I talked about this in an older blogpost “2018 taught me.” You can check that out here. So, I cut all my locs except for one. I told myself that I was keeping that one to see just how much hair I had actually cut off. It's been months now and that one extremely long loc ia still hanging on. Damaged and all. For some reason I couldn’t work up the guts to cut it.
Frequently I'm asked why is there just one long loc hanging on for life in the back. I give my infamous excuse of wanting to compare what I cut off, but that's getting old. Leaving the one loc for comparison was the initial reason, but after I saw the difference I kept it for what? Truth is I never cut that one lonely loc because I wanted be able to tell people how long my hair was. It's proof that my hair was infact that long and I cut it by choice. I know, petty right! Holding on to that one long damaged piece of hair exposed just how insecure I truly am. My reasons for cutting MY hair shouldn’t matter to anyone else anyway. It's MY jhair. Long or short. I felt like a heavy hand slapped me across my face when I realized how silly I was being.
I decided that I no longer needed to hold on to what was just to flex. I soon recognized this like behavior in other areas of my life. I was holding on to old, long damaged things just because they once were. Everything that once was doesn't still hold purpose in our lives today. At one point in life they may have, but what about presently? We hold on to damaged relationships, friendships, physical and innate things because they once served a positive purpose in our lives and now not so much. For some of us they never held a positive purpose to us we just can’t let it go. I've learned that in order to grow you must cut off the damaged parts. Think of a plant. In order for a plant to thrive, the dead leaves must go. Keeping the dead parts eventually damages the whole plant. To thrive we gotta let go of what's hindering our growth. So get like Ana and Elsa and let it goooooo Sis! To bloom into your full self you can not keep the dead leaves. You must cut them off to thrive! You can't live yo best life when your bound by things that are slowly setting your demise.
Are you holding on to damaged things in your life that you need to cut off? What are some things that you are holding on to that are stunting your growth?
