Yesterday, I Cried_ Celebrating the Lessons of Living and Loving - Iyanla Vanzant [108]
It is one thing to think you know what people think and feel about you. It is another thing to hear it said out loud. One by one, each of the women told me how she viewed me, what I meant in her life, and what she wanted for me. Of course, we all cried! We were all holding on to each other as the circle grew smaller and smaller. As the women blessed me, thanked me, and issued decrees for goodness in my future, I realized for the first time in my life that I really did matter, that I wasn’t all bad, and that I was worthy of love. It was just the boost that Iyanla needed.
As I remembered that day, those women, their prayers, and the love I felt in that circle, I began to cry. I knew that I was not and would never again be alone. I knew that there were forty-two magical women who walked beside me, wherever I went and whatever I did. I realized that after all I had experienced in life, I was blessed, and that I could love myself. Recalling that experience gave me the strength I needed in that very moment to go back and lovingly bring Rhonda into alignment with Iyanla. The strength I needed to forgive Rhonda.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
What’s the Lesson When You Try to Cheat on a Test?
Have the courage to admit your mistakes so that you can forgive them and release yourself from pain, struggle and deceit. There is no mistake that cannot be corrected. There is no trespass that cannot be forgiven.
Paul Ferrini, in Love Without Conditions
BALÉ LOOKED GREAT! This was a man who never seemed to age. I had not seen him in fifteen years, and he looked exactly the same. I was looking forward to getting caught up on what had been happening in his life, and I knew he wanted to know about mine. That had been Balé’s job most of my life, making sure I did not go too far off center. If and when I did, he had a special way of bringing me back.
“How are the children?”
“They are fine. Damon is in the navy. He fell in love with a girl in high school. When she enlisted, he did the same. He’s stationed in Virginia. Gemmia is wonderful. She has learned how to braid hair and is working with a friend of mine. She is so beautiful and smart as a whip. Nisa is having a difficult time. She has been placed in a special education class because of a reading disability. She feels out of place, but she’s a good girl. She’s very athletic, and she’s working with retarded children for extra credit in school. I guess they’re pretty normal teenagers.”
Balé was an excellent cook. He had studied cooking most of his life. For him, cooking was therapy. To help him with his therapy, I was eating as fast as I could, but he kept interrupting to ask questions.
“Where’s Ray?”
“Ray got married a few years ago. He and his wife are living in Jersey.”
“And the drinking?”
“I think he stopped drinking and is doing other things. The last time I heard from him, he was still working and still complaining.”
I told Balé that my brother had a habit of getting drunk or high every holiday, then calling me at one or two o’clock in the morning. It wasn’t the fact that he called so late that bothered me. It was the fact that he always called to complain about how horrible our lives had been. How badly Daddy had treated him, and how stupid I was for refusing to be mad for all of the things we “suffered” as children. After a few years of Ray’s calls, I told him to stop calling me if that was all he had to talk about. He got so mad at me