🔚 END THE CYCLE 🔄 (START TODAY) 🤲🏽

Each day offers us an opportunity to renew our resolve to the universe, that we're ready for change.

One of the hardest things in life is feeling stuck in a situation that we don't like and want to change. We may have exhausted ourselves trying to figure out how to make change, and we may even have given up. However, each day offers us an opportunity to renew our resolve and to declare to the universe that we are ready for change. We may even say out loud that we have tried and struggled and have not found a way, but that we are open to help, and that we intend to keep working to create change for ourselves. Making this declaration to the universe, and to ourselves, may be just the remedy for the stagnation we are experiencing. And, it can be done today, right now.

It is difficult to understand, even with hindsight, how the choices we have made have added up to our current situation, but it is a good idea to examine the story we tell ourselves. If we tend to regard ourselves as having failed, this will block our ability to allow ourselves to succeed. We have the power to change the story we tell ourselves by acknowledging that in the past, we did our best, and we exhibited many positive qualities, and had many fine moments on our path to the present moment. We can also recognize that we have learned from our experiences, and that this will help us with our current choices.

When we do this kind of work on how we view our past self, we make it possible for the future to be based on a positive self-assessment. This inner shift may allow us to get out of the cycle we've been in that's been keeping us stuck. Now we can declare our intentions to the universe, knowing that we have done the inner work necessary to allow our lives to change.  Allow today to be the day to end cycles and enter into a new way of being.

🎄THE 7th GAY 🏳️‍🌈 OF X-MAS: CELEBRATING THE END 🎉

The intention behind this entry is to offer some food for thought to contemplate certain topics more deeply and perhaps discuss more openly when social etiquette considers them uncomfortable or even taboo. This year alone many of us have tackled insecurities, judgment, identity, and forgiveness, among many other subjects, and now, as the year is coming to an end, I figured we can talk about the end.

Regardless of race, gender, religion, age, political affiliation or even species classification, what we all have in common is the very thing we’ve been raised to never discuss or even think about: death. Any mention of it is often considered morbid, defined by the dictionary as “an abnormal and unhealthy interest in disturbing and unpleasant subjects.”

Our culture celebrates youth and vitality by efficiently filing the elderly and less-abled into retirement communities, practically out of sight. How are we supposed to develop a healthy relationship with these facts of life and death if we don’t see or talk about them on a regular basis?

 In what used to be minority circles (interracial couples, for example), the rule of thumb has always been: visibility leads to acceptance (the more often we encounter something, the more comfortable we become with its existence), be it women in power, same-gender couples, blue hair, etc. So the opposite must also hold true: the less often we see something, the less prepared we are to deal with it. Even if you’ve ever seen a corpse, it was probably in a coffin, wearing makeup, and dressed in fine apparel. This gives a whole new meaning to “out of sight, out of mind.” If we don’t see it then we don’t have to deal with it, which is wrong. We do and will have to deal with it, but if we’re ill-prepared for death when it comes in whatever form it chooses (either for someone else or for ourselves), then the experience can be downright devastating when it doesn’t have to be.

 So how is it that despite death being all around us, we’re still shocked by it the same way a lazy student is thrown off by a pop quiz? I mean, from a very young age life has prepared us for death’s inevitability by first taking our goldfish or dog away, for example, then our grandparents, parents, friends, often without any warning, and sometimes very early on. Yet people still claim to be devastated by the loss of a loved one who was taken “unexpectedly.” How is that possible? Even if they mean the timing was unexpected, having an expectation that someone, anyone, would live to be a certain age before they die is proof that we are not honest with ourselves about death’s seemingly irrational timing. Somehow, in our generally overly pessimistic society, we are unreasonably optimistic about how long everyone we know is going to live (including ourselves).

 I would love to see us more honest with ourselves about the fact that anyone’s last breath could be taken at any moment. I think we would appreciate each other and life itself a whole lot more. We would save ourselves much devastation while significantly increasing our celebration of every living moment, don’t you think?

🎄THE 6th GAY 🏳️‍🌈 OF X-MAS: COMPASSION FOR SELF🤞🏽

So often we are sabotaging ourselves by being in our own way without even knowing we are doing so. 

During those times when our lives are filled with what seems to be constant change and growth, it is important to remember that we need to be gentle with ourselves. Since it can be easy to use our energy to keep up with the momentum of our lives, we may not be aware of the fact that we are much more likely to run ourselves down. When things seem to be moving quickly, it is especially essential that we make a point to slow down and be gentle with ourselves.

It might be difficult to notice what is happening to us for we may be so caught up in the whirlwind of our lives that we lose sight of the direction in which things are heading. Being gentle with ourselves doesn't mean that we don't accomplish things. Instead it means that we honor ourselves on an ongoing basis and take care of the needs of our bodies.

Putting our energy into ourselves in this way helps create space for a more positive, loving, and accepting view of our lives. By setting the intention to do so, we will be more cognizant of our energy levels on a daily basis and more able to replenish them as needed.

The more we are able to treat our bodies with gentleness, the more tenderness and compassion we will call forth into our lives. Learning to understand and pay attention to what our self needs will in turn allow us to fill our lives with unlimited loving and healing energy and to truly take care of the things that mean the most to us.

DECEMBER 2K20 WHAT I LEARNT…🤞🏽🫂❣️🔮

🎄THE 5th GAY 🏳️‍🌈 OF X-MAS: ALLOWING FORGIVENESS TO MOVE YOU FORWARD 🤲🏽

We’ve made plenty of bad decisions in our lives.

 A few judgment calls that were damaging to our well-being, and many unwise choices ended up unintentionally hurting others in some way. Many of us don’t have a problem apologizing to people for my wrongdoings and promising to be more mindful in the future to never repeat the same action (or inaction) again. But when a decision we make ends up hurting us, the conversation in in our head isn’t so civil… It goes something like this:

 
     You’re such an idiot!

     How could you be so stupid?

     What a loser!

    Okay… calm down, you’ll do better next time.

    No, you won’t! That’s what you said last time.

     Come on, if this was a friend, you’d tell them to relax.

     But this isn’t a friend, it’s me, and I know better!

    Idiot!

     [Repeat all of the above on a loop…]

Every time we make a mistake, that voice would bully us into admission that we are the worst human being on the planet (as if the damage from the mistake itself wasn’t bad enough, we'd make it worse by beating ourselves up about it).

 This can continue for years until one day we realize that we can forgive ourselves. For the entire concept of forgiveness to even exist in our social construct, we first create the duality of a wrongdoer versus a victim, and then we play the role of the victim until we get the apology we demand, at which point we can choose to play the role of the compassionate forgiver (or not). But it’s all just a power play. A game. I’m not saying we shouldn’t apologize, I’m saying the person we’re inclined to dub as the “wrongdoer” doesn’t need to apologize or even be sorry in order for us to forgive them because forgiveness is a gift you give to yourself.

 Forgiveness is so much better than the vicious loop of blaming and waiting for forgiveness (from ourselves or from others). It’s not the traditional “I’m sorry” and “I forgive you” model with which we were raised, but it does obliterate guilt, shame, and victim mentality, to make way for empowerment, betterment, and progress. In this model, nobody is “indebted” to anyone else.

So ask yourself: do I want to stay stuck, or do I want to move forward?

'DRAG RACE' JUST DROPPED SEASON 13s FIRST LIP SYNC & IT'S GOOD

As 2020 winds to a close, the next season of RuPaul's Drag Race is gearing up. Though the show is currently running a marathon on Logo — they started with the first season Friday and are playing every single episode until January 1, 2021 when season 13 will launch — now, they've released the first act of Drag Race season 13's premiere. The surprise twist: we've already gotten a lip sync.

The franchise previously announced that the season premiere would host a whopping six lip syncs. What we didn't know until now is that those lip syncs would be the first things the queen ever encountered. In the new clip, after Joey Jay and Kandy Muse make their entrances they are asked to report to the Main Stage. Muse has already gotten a few cracks in about Jay's chicken feather look but now she has to turn out the moves — and she actually does.

The lip-sync is a pretty decent one to get so early into the game. It is kind of also interesting given that the first impression that judges are getting of the queens is of their lip syncing skills, which has historically come as a last resort on the show — you lip sync if you don't do well generally. This feels slightly refreshing.

The clip confirms that the season will see judges separated by pandemic appropriate dividers. The first ten minutes show no evidence of a guest judge — which we previously feared we might have to go without given the idea of having a pandemic pod. But it does bring with it a whole slew of questions, namely: will they really be sending one person home from each of the six lip syncs in the first episode? That's impossible right? RIGHT?!

Whatever happens, the teaser marks the kickoff of the Drag Race Olympics. Season 13 will debut on New Year's Day 2021 and just two weeks later RuPaul's Drag Race U.K. series two will drop — Ru is hosting that as well. Later on in the year we are also expecting Drag Race: All Stars season six as well as Drag Race U.K. series three. A Spain-based franchise has also been announced and is expected to debut in 2021.

SOURCE: OUT DOT COM

🎄THE 4th GAY 🏳️‍🌈OF X-MAS: STEPPING OUTSIDE OF LABELS 🙅🏽‍♂️

Ever since infancy, we have rapidly developed an advanced mental filing system to make the world less overwhelming: we notice something, we cross-reference it with everything that is already familiar to us, and quickly label it as either Harmless or Dangerous, Cute or Scary, and so on. But where do those labels come from?

 One problem is that we label everything unconsciously and automatically as individuals and the second problem is that we do it collectively as a culture. We use preassigned labels for whatever we don’t understand by looking for society’s pre-existing categories as a guide. These values may have been set by our parents, our close circle of friends, or worse yet, the internet.

 

Many of our thoughts, opinions, and beliefs, it turns out, are founded on information we subconsciously receive from sources as unreliable as the grapevine. We see this when a celebrity recommends something, for example, and it immediately becomes an overnight success. There is nothing inherently wrong with having leaders like that, but there's a difference between leaders who tell you what to think and those who invite you to think for yourself. We apparently love it when other people do the thinking for us, yet we insist on referring to ourselves as independently-thinking individuals.

 As children and teenagers, many of us attached ourselves to popular beliefs in order to be popular. But as adults, I think it’s our inherent responsibility to question those beliefs. If we never step outside of our small circle of friends and family, we end up living in an echo box, agreeing with everyone who agrees with us, and unfriending or disowning anyone who does not.

Ever since infancy, we have rapidly developed an advanced mental filing system to make the world less overwhelming: we notice something, we cross-reference it with everything that is already familiar to us, and quickly label it as either Harmless or Dangerous, Cute or Scary, and so on. But where do those labels come from?

 One problem is that we label everything unconsciously and automatically as individuals and the second problem is that we do it collectively as a culture. We use preassigned labels for whatever we don’t understand by looking for society’s pre-existing categories as a guide. These values may have been set by our parents, our close circle of friends, or worse yet, the internet.

 Many of our thoughts, opinions, and beliefs, it turns out, are founded on information we subconsciously receive from sources as unreliable as the grapevine. We see this when a celebrity recommends something, for example, and it immediately becomes an overnight success. There is nothing inherently wrong with having leaders like that, but there's a difference between leaders who tell you what to think and those who invite you to think for yourself. We apparently love it when other people do the thinking for us, yet we insist on referring to ourselves as independently-thinking individuals.

 As children and teenagers, many of us attached ourselves to popular beliefs in order to be popular. But as adults, I think it’s our inherent responsibility to question those beliefs. If we never step outside of our small circle of friends and family, we end up living in an echo box, agreeing with everyone who agrees with us, and unfriending or disowning anyone who does not.