I can buy myself flowers! I can hold my own hand!

Ahhh, I have a new favourite song! (Well, a new favourite to add to my list of 7000 favourites)

I can buy myself flowers
Write my name in the sand
Talk to myself for hours
Say things you don’t understand
I can take myself dancing
And I can hold my hand
Yeah, I can love me better than you can

Miley! Miley! You’re talking my language Hannah Montana! Damn girl.

I do buy myself flowers. I’ve been taking myself on solo dates, solo hikes, solo holidays, solo everything since day dot.

Why? Well, I happen to like my own company. Just like I love me a good one-on-one date with my hot man, a book club session, moms night, and those boozy Sunday lunches with 50 of my closest family members (ha! ha!), I happen to love me a little diner pour un too.

I’ve never felt awkward about these things.

In fact, my sister Chrissy reminded me just last week of the time when I was 14 years old and took myself out to a fancy restaurant by bus, wearing my mom’s perfume – which I stole while she was at work. Yes, I know, I know! I was always a bit of an early-adopter…or what do they call them now…INFLUENCER? I sat down, surrounded by business people in their fancy suits having business lunches and ordered a Coca-Cola which I asked the waiter to pour into a wine glass. “I’ll have the…escargot” I probably said, trying to act fancy and not knowing that it was in fact snails, you know?

But you get the point.

Self-love, self-care, self-respect are not buzz words. The more you do it, the more you’ll find that what you’re looking for out there you can probably give yourself, given half a chance. And then when and IF you add other people, they’ll slot into the open spots you’ve created for them just beautifully. Right!? (Besides, another lesson I learnt age 14 is that sitting around and waiting to be taken out on a date is sooooooo last season. Beautiful sunsets wait for no man).

Listen to the Miley song guys.

Do the things,

xoxo

Lee

The Power of Words

My husband said the most romantic thing to me last week.

“You’re a kind one” he said “don’t let them make you who you are not”.

Straight to the heart

Just like that, I remembered! Love helped me to remember my name and with that, I was back on track.

Forgiving easily,

Giving easily,

Back in the groove of being free, open, flexible ME.

That wavelength has opened so many doors for me over the course of my life (after I accepted that it was not being “WEAK”).

Interestingly too, that awareness of the nature of my highest self, has pushed me to draw boundaries and ring-fence my peace, keeping all things that threaten it well away. Yes, it has lost me some people but gosh, isn’t that the best part? That the more ME I am, the more the people, things and circumstances that are not aligned to that vibration drop off?

LOVE, I tell you. It’s always the way home.

Lee

A Monday “Accident”

After a rush to get the kids off to school, I grabbed my diary off my bookshelf and rushed out of the front door in my white Converse.

 

I sat down at my corner spot at my local coffee shop, pulled out my notebook and turned to November.  Damn! Wrong notebook. Many years old.

 

I flipped through it and I looked at the words. 

 

List after list

Chest pains

Deadline after deadline 

Anxiety

 

Stress

More words

More deadlines

More stress

 

I recalled it all. 

 

I must tell you though, the coolest feeling in the entire world was as I realised that all that was in the past. 

 

…and that the crap we stress about today, will also just be old words and old memories in scruffy notebooks one day too. 

 

Shucks, that’s a lovely feeling! Don’t you think?

 

 

© Lee Mayimele

 

Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Where we don’t know the origin of the pics used, all respect and due credit are hereby given where appropriate. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Lee-Ann Mayimele and A Heart Full of Stories with appropriate and specific direction to the original content. All media rights and copyright for the words reserved.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Warning: Kindness is Dope

I met someone recently who thanked me for something I did for her 20 years ago.

I kid you not.

To be quite honest, I did not recall the detail or that act of apparent kindness at all. She tells me that it came at a time when she desperately needed a strong mother figure and that young-me stepped up.

I must say, our exchanges back then never did feel like “rescue” or “help” to me. In fact, I reckon I was the one who felt good. I was the one who felt useful. I was probably the one who felt high from the endorphins that make us drunk with purpose. That’s really all I remember about our interactions ~ how lovely I felt around her.

How cool?

Her testimony has since inspired me to write some random “Thank You” notes of my own. Because the stars know that there are plenty of people who have touched me over the years. And just like that, I’m part of an energy that keeps the magical vibration of GRATITUDE in motion.

Perhaps you feel inspired to hop on the train and thank someone today too? If so, I can tell you without a doubt that the wise ones were right: It is indeed GIVING that we RECEIVE.

Try it. Thank me (29 years later).

Lee Mayimele

Chief Storyteller

Dear Kids (A reflection from a greying Mama’s Heart)

Dear Kids

Whilst no parent has all the answers and whilst this mama is constantly, still learning, know this for sure:

1. You are never alone
2. Travel is the best teacher
3. “No” is a good word. Use it often. It’s particularly lovely when there’s a dead silence and you offer no explanations
4. “Please” and “thank you” never goes out of fashion
5. Water heals. Oceans. Tears. 2 litres a day
6. You have a built-built in “people” radar. Please listen to its beep beep beep when something feels offish
7. Sleep is medicine
8. Play, play, play. Never stop playing
9. Less sugar, less screen time, more grass, more laughs
10. God is inside you and no one one has a special hotline that you need to go through
11. Betrayal is painful. Nothing can prepare you for that kick in the groin
12. Go out and explore. You can always come home to cry
13. Try and remember who you were before the world started pinning its labels on you
14. Your body is beautiful. Exactly as is. Explore it. Admire it. Treat it right and it will reward you so much
15. No one knows it all
16. Blood makes you related. Loyalty makes you family
17. Believe in magic. Those who don’t, never find it
18. Your word is your honour. Do what you say you will. Always
19. A grateful heart is a magnet for miracles
20. Give freely. Of what you have. Of your time. And quietly please
21. No one likes a show-off
22. Learn to listen. To God’s voice in the early morning. To yourself. Certainly to people who you trust
23. Shortcuts never work
24. People will forget what you say but they will never forget how you made them FEEL. Be kind
25. Books, music, thunderstorms and tea are good for lonesome days when you need your mama
26. Abundance and prosperity are your birth right
27. Look beyond the labels of race and religion, gender and social standing. How people treat people from whom they need nothing is where you should focus your scoring and grading
28. Jealousy is when you count other people’s blessings instead of your own
29. Love does not need to hurt
30. Speak your truth. Even when your voice shakes
31. What sets your soul on fire? Go there
32. Learning is constant
33. Messing up is okay. Intentionally hurting someone never is
34. You teach people how to treat you
35. You may have one “true love” or many or even none. Remember that you are whole anyway
36. You have a story that only YOU can tell

 

xoxo

Mama

 

© Aluta continua, as they say.  A Heart Full of Stories, 2017

Have You Ever? (Version II)

Have you ever been lost?

Were you lost in the forest of someone else’s shadow or perhaps lost in the company of familiar people dancing to a beat you could no longer hear?

 

Have you ever traveled alone?

Did you have a partner with you who was not there in spirit? Did the vibrations of civilisations past call out your name and send you home changed but on fire?

 

Have you ever received a gift?

A blessing out of the blue for which no amount of gratitude would be appropriate?

 

Have you ever felt like you’ve been kicked in the gut?

How did the breaking of your heart sound? Did it grind, wring and burn corners of your chest that you had long forgotten?

 

Have you ever felt satisfied?

Was it as though everything was finally falling into place or was it perhaps just the knowing that you are God?

 

Have you ever been betrayed?

Did you stand in the doorway of broken trust and bleed as the shattered pieces of glass cut you as they fell?

 

Have you ever danced? Really danced?

Did the primal impulse to sway create waves of sexual energy that made you high?

 

Have you ever participated in a witch hunt? 

 

Were you on a warpath in pursuit of mob justice or were you the wide eyed attackee, bewildered by the “charges” and drawn into the fight kicking and screaming?

 

 

Have you ever sold out?

 

Did your team mates see it coming? How did your conscience deal with the conflict afterwards?

 

 

Have you ever eaten through your heart?

Was it your granny’s roast potatoes that transported the seratonin throughout your body or was it a hot curry shared with a hot body on a cold day that stained your arteries with bliss?

 

Have you ever been touched?

Whether by the 80 year old hand of a stranger, rough with callouses but warm with unspoken stories about abuse, slavery, loved ones that have never returned? Or, was it simply a simple line from a simple song that charged your soul’s batteries and flooded your bones with warmth?

 

 

Have you ever blessed someone with prayer?

Did your heart send vibrations across tall walls and rough seas; intercessions seasoned with grand visualisations of success, prosperity, abundance to people who you dreamed great dreams for?

 

Have you ever had a brush with God?

Did it happen when you were at the top of a beautiful mountain or did it happen when you came face to face with a hijacker?

 

Have you ever been an addict?

Did your drug of choice soothe you, own you, control you and lift you all at once? Did your alliance seem unbreakable?

 

Have you ever received a compliment?

A genuine string of words about who you are, not what you can give? Did it remind you of the value you create, the impact you have, the light that only you bring?

 

Have you ever been seduced?

Did it help you to escape your bad reality only later to return you changed and unsure of the way forward?

 

Have you ever wanted a glimpse of your future?

Did you follow that need to seek guidance from soothsayers, Tarot cards, and horoscopes perhaps? Anything that promised the slightest secret fast forward to a life more grand?

 

I bet you have! And, guess what? So have many spirits before you, many souls yet to come. These shared experiences give us the assurance that we are part of the same journey and that the “answers” we seek already exist. 

 

These experiences should also remind you that YOUR unique set of experiences, YOUR unique choices, YOUR bespoke combo of emotions is what makes YOUR story a story that deserves its own page in the great book of life.

 

May you learn to appreciate that. There is no story without YOU.

 

Believe it!

 

© A Heart Full of Stories, 2016

Aluta continua, as they say. Our journey together continues….

 

 

My True Love (A Tragedy)

I was wearing the world’s most comfortable onesie and I really did not want to change. We had a bond. A warm, assuring intimacy built on years of trust, closeness and chemistry.  And, as often happens with real love, dark forces try and creep in and threaten to tear you apart. 

 

In our case, it was coffee. There was no coffee! The dark force decided to strike on the coldest morning of the year.

 

So, I did what any self-respecting woman in love would do. I lifted my game, taking the risk and going in the direction of my destiny. Showing the dark force who’s boss, I put on a long coat, Jackie O glasses, a baseball cap and I headed out.

 

I was also wearing sneakers because I told our cleaner I was going to the gym. She side-eyed me. I knew it! We had to keep our love a secret. Nobody could find out. There would be consequences. People were talking. I could see it in her eyes.

 

As far as I was concerned, our secret was still pretty safe. Safe under the beautiful vintage cover of my granny’s tweed coat.

 

Still acting like Madonna, and just like the lovers who err every now and then and risk getting caught, I had a serious case of the guilty conscience. It hit me hard.

 

Hot, sweaty, high from adrenaline and feeling the full pressure from “society”, I decided to do the “right” thing.  It was painful but I had no choice but to break up with my onesie.

 

It wasn’t him, it was me. He didn’t deserve it.

 

It was either that, or my husband would get the text message telling him that our gym membership was about to be revoked because we had used it less than 3 times in one month. (Can you imagine our cleaner’s face then?)

 

…I still think about that onesie.

Especially during squats when I think I finally know what Adele meant when she said “sometimes it lasts in love but sometimes it hurts instead…” 

© A Heart Full of Stories, 2016

COPYRIGHT: 

Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Lee-Ann Mayimele and www.aheartfullofstories.wordpress.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

 

 

 

Pick Your Battles (A story about standing up)

It was lunchtime and I was hungry. I was rushing past the two Manchester United T-Shirts and the whiff from their cigarettes seemed to add to my hunger. One guy said “what are we chowing brother?”  The other responded “I wanna chow that…nice and juicy!”

 

They both laughed as they watched me walk down a longggggggggggg, dark passage that seemed to go on forever.

 

I knew what they were trying to do. I hadn’t been in a situation like that for a long time, but I certainly had not forgotten my old friend “harassment”.

 

I could have turned around.

I could have confronted them.

I could have humiliated them.

I could have humiliated myself too, actually. 

 

But I was hungry.

So, I kept walking.

Defeated.

 

After paying my bill, a young woman’s red shoes caught my attention.  I also noticed the two Manchester United T-Shirts vying for her attention.

 

She turned around.

She took their compliments to heart.

They invited her to join them and together, they had a lovely time knocking back blue shooters.

 

As the waitress brought my bill, one of the men tapped a cleaner on her shoulder saying “excuse me, do you like big or small bananas?”

“Bananas?” she asked, genuinely missing their crudeness.

The girl with the hot bum laughed loud, further adding to the cleaner’s embarrassment. The cleaner was an old woman, with her head covered, wearing a church badge I recognised.

 

I turned around.

I confronted them.

I humiliated them.

I humiliated myself too, actually.

 

But there could have been no other way.

 

So I kept walking.

Conflicted

 

…but completely assured that yes we need to pick our battles, but some battles pick us and give us zero choice but to engage.

 

© A Heart Full of Stories, 2016. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Lee-Ann Mayimele and www.aheartfullofstories.wordpress.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

One person for a lifetime OR …

Someone asked me if I believe that we are supposed to be with ONE PERSON FOR A LIFETIME.  I responded frankly. I said that I was “not Oprah” so could not offer a Soul Sunday sort of answer.  But, my belief was that we did need to be with ONE PERSON AT A TIME. He called me “quite a deep serial monogamist”. I had to laugh! It had quite a nice ring to it.

 

As far as my statement went. I must say. it was one of those moments when something profound comes out of your mouth and you are left wondering where exactly it sprouted. Did you read it? Did you dream it? Did some romcom plant it?  I said “one person at a time” and it did sound rather Oprah afterall.

 

So there I sat, finishing my cocktail and contemplating fidelity with a feeling that the issue wanted me to sit with it a while. Reflecting and dissecting.  And that’s what I did in my morning meditation.

 

I came to the conclusion that relationships are funny things and that monogamy is indeed a choice. Not an everyday sort of choice, like pizza/no pizza.   It’s a call you have to make again and again and, because we’re ever changing spiritual beings living in blood & energy bodies, shit is changing all the time. We are changing all the time.  Our partners are changing all the time.  Variables are changing and life is throwing us a million little plots and subplots, each with its own peaks and dips. So, who are we to say that our “choices” will always reflect that exact perfect tune which we set out to dance to, when we first commit to being with just one person?

 

For me, the answer lies in holding to the fantasy. The dream. That vision of ONE person. A shared life. One common plot. Plugging into a central system wired so intricately, that the magnet automatically pulls you both back in when you need it most. (And yes, that last sentence is another such moment when I wonder where on earth those words came from!?)

 

Today, I am grateful for the inspired thoughts.

 

Alow me to wish you well on your journey.  May you always be guided to make the choices that honour the highest version of you.

© A Heart Full of Stories, 2016

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Why I was late, why my iPad was pregnant and why I hate yoga

I believe in being punctual, well prepared and flexible.

I was on my way to a storytelling event. Although I had prepared well in advance, I arrived five minutes late. Now five minutes is no misdemeanor for sure, but for a time-stickler like me, it’s a self imposed spot-fineable offence.

I was late because my direction-bearings were off and I had taken the tram in the opposite direction to where I was going. Then, my Uber driver was grumpy, so asking him to speed was out of the question.

The first person speaker was a beauty. A dark haired woman with the biggest smile — the kind you see in toothpaste commercials.

I caught her story in the middle : her husband was having an affair. 

I listened attentively as she waved her hands while giving an animated (and very detailed) account of how that affair drove her into the arms of a lesbian lover and then right back to the arms of the new and improved version of the very same husband.

She radiated light, vitality and sunshine. I loved listening to her bare her soul. People were drawn to her light.

I was up next. It was a hard act to follow.

I turned on my iPad just to get to the right spot for my storyguide and it was dead. Just dead.  I had no backup notes and as I fumbled in my handbag to try and find a pen, the American voice called out my name.  It was showtime.

Instead of sharing the beautiful story I had written about how I was forced to confront my bully, I had to make some shit up. Fast.

I said “I believe in being punctual, well prepared and flexible. So, I am here to tell you why I was late today, why my iPad is pregnant and why I hate yoga.”

The laughter helped me to relax and I continued to waffle off a lot of crap.

After the event, the toothpaste commercial girl said “You know, your story and mine are pretty much the same.”  I wanted to reply that I had never had a lesbian affair but said “How so?” instead.

She flashed those sick pearly whites and said “In the end, we only regret the risks we did NOT take.”

And, she was right. The risk of telling that story opened up yet another door for me and today I am grateful.

© A Heart Full of Stories, 2015.

Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Lee-Ann Mayimele and http://www.aheartfullofstories.wordpress.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content