Have you ever struggled to accept or change your present situation because of past experiences?
On April 12th 2024, I delivered a TEDx presentation recounting the silent battles and struggles I've encountered over the years. By sharing my story, I aimed to convey the empowering realization I gained: your past isn't a life sentence.
A month later, TEDx has officially posted my @tedxuky talk on their @tedx_official YouTube channel! Given their channel's massive following of over 40 million subscribers, the possibilities are endless!!!
It's truly a remarkable opportunity, and I'm filled with gratitude! Now, those who couldn't make it to the event and even those who streamed it online can relive the experience.
Although my story is now accessible to the world, I refrain from labeling this as just the beginning. I've been focusing on embracing both past and present achievements and internalizing them. It's essential to emphasize that I've been doing the work for years now, and this marks another important milestone towards fulfilling my dreams.
The link is in my bio! Run it up please 🤞🏽
My 2025 @universityofky commencement speech on shame, delivered in front of thousands in person and over 28,000 viewers on the YouTube livestream, was truly a dream come true.
In 2016, I applied to be a commencement speaker but wasn’t selected. Being chosen in 2025 was a full circle moment and a powerful reminder that delayed doesn’t mean denied.
Sometimes the path doesn’t look the way you expected. It can hurt and feel discouraging. But that doesn’t mean you’re being denied—it just means it’s not your time yet. That’s one of the biggest lessons I’m taking from this experience. Because Lord knows, when things don’t happen on my timeline, it’s easy to feel like they never will.
I’m honored to be the first in-person PhD commencement speaker in UK’s history and the first Black PhD speaker. Giving that speech felt like walking in my purpose. After my TEDx talk, I knew this was the next mountaintop, and now I’m standing where I once prayed to be.
This moment helped heal both my inner child and my younger adult self. And it’s a powerful reminder to my future self that I’ve always been capable of bringing my dreams to life. I don’t need more proof. I am the proof.
In this next chapter, there’s no more playing small. Taking up space is uncomfortable work. Standing in your light is uncomfortable work. Being louder about who you are is uncomfortable work. But I’m ready to get real comfortable being seen, because that’s the only way to step fully into what’s next. It’s one thing to receive what you prayed for. It’s another to pray for the discipline to keep it, the wisdom to multiply it, and the courage to carry it.
I’m going to occupy space and believe, deeply, that I deserve to. That I’m meant to. That there’s a greater calling at work, one that will unfold in my favor, no matter the obstacles or how I’m feeling. Because it will. And it always has.
#graduation #graduationspeech #classof2025 #shame #morethanenough #iamenough #mentalwellbeing #grad #gradschool #phd #masters #undergraduate
At least if I’m not using them right now, I wanna see my people thrive! 🖤
What should I add to the list? đź‘€
#datenight #date #dating #single #fypage
We have to give ourselves a lot more grace and compassion especially when we've experienced repeated disappointments.
#single #dating #triggered #datingtips #datingadvice
I'm preventing situationships at alll cost this year. I'm using these 5 questions to do that:
- Does this person actually have the emotional, relational, and logistical capacity to build what I want or am I drawn to their desire rather than their ability?
- If I stopped initiating, clarifying, checking in, managing, and holding the emotional thread, what (if anything) would still exist between us and would that be enough for me to thrive, not just survive?
- If a real issue came up whether that's hurt, disappointment, disagreement or whatever, do I trust that this person would meet it with accountability, or would I be left managing the aftermath alone?
- Is responsibility for the direction of this connection shared or am I carrying the weight of defining, sustaining, and moving it forward while being the only one who adapts and changes?
- Does this person make intentional room for me in their life or do I only exist where it’s convenient, unclaimed, or low-impact for them?
#journal #therapy #dating #situationships #datingtips
If you're going to put yourself out there, might as well know how to navigate getting your feelings hurt. Here's 5 questions you can reflect on if you get your feelings hurt.
The questions:
- Did my emotional investment genuinely reflect what was consistently shown or did my feelings quietly outrun the evidence I actually had and at what point did assumption begin replacing observation?
- Was I becoming attached to this person or to the version of myself that existed when I felt chosen, desired, or seen by them and what exactly feels lost right now?
- What did I sense early on that I chose not to confront or communicate because it felt uncomfortable, premature, or “not that serious” even though the truth might have required me to walk away before I felt ready to and where did I prioritize maintaining potential over protecting my own emotional certainty and self-trust?
- Am I genuinely processing the hurt of this connection or am I trying to legitimize my feelings by needing them to have been wrong, careless, or the villain in my narrative and what does my need for them to be wrong protect me from examining about my own expectations, attachment, or emotional investment?
- How much of my pain is about losing this person and how much is about releasing the future, meaning, or identity I had already begun constructing around them and what does the story I now have to return to make me feel about my life and myself?
#journal #heartbroken #single #dating #therapy
5 Questions to reflect on how emotionally available I am.
- When someone needs reassurance, consistency, or emotional presence from me, what do I feel in my body first:openness or resistance and if I feel resistance, what does that teach someone about how safe it is to need me?
- As intimacy deepens, do I notice any shifts in how I show up whether that's pulling back, becoming less expressive or consistent, or leaning in quickly, intensifying, and rushing closeness and if a shift shows up, what story do I tell myself about why and what story might the other person tell themselves about their worth because of that change?
- Have I mistaken emotional intelligence for emotional availability (knowing my patterns, wounds, and attachment style) while still avoiding the risk of sustained presence, follow-through, and mutual dependence and if someone mirrored my exact level of availability back to me, would I feel secure or slowly unseen?
- Am I calling myself emotionally available while choosing someone emotionally unavailable because it lets me feel ready in theory without having to practice emotional availability in reality?
- If someone learned how to be interested, like, or love me by studying how I show up for them, would they experience closeness as steady and safe or conditional, cautious, and earned and what does that say about my emotional availability in practice?
#journal #emotionallyunavailaible #emotionallyavailable #dating #datingtips
It's okay to wait for the one, but please don't wait for someone to become the one. Learn from my mistakes!
#waitforyou #dating #datingtips #therapy #journal
