love

Best marriage advice ever

May 13, 2020

Alright, let me first acknowledge that I am not married but I can tell you this advice is tried and true. When I was on an internship, a pharmacist that I worked with was celebrating an anniversary. I can’t remember how many years she’d been married but it was a long time (definitely more than 15 years). So I asked her what advice she could give me for the future. To my surprise, her answer was really simple. She said, “marry someone nice”. She didn’t say someone with a nice job or a nice car. She said to marry a nice, kind-hearted person. Because at the end of the day, that person will be considerate and not act harshly towards you.

I was like 21 at this point and to be honest, I did not really apply this advice to that period of my dating life because I was just having fun. However, this advice has always been in the back of my mind. Fortunately, I consider the person that I am dating now to be one of the kindest people I have ever met. However, I have overlooked this quality in the past for looks and other less important things. But I think deep down, I have always known what I wanted. I always use to say that I wanted to marry someone like my younger brother because he literally has no enemies. He makes friends as easily as counting to 10 and forgives as easily as a three-year-old.

I’ll admit that sometimes people can be nice to a fault. There are some people who are so busy trying to make everyone happy that they forget about their family. So in being nice, make sure that prioritization is also key. But if the drawback is being nice to a fault, I would rather take that than someone who is rude to a definite fault. At the end of the day, it will be the simple things that matter. Simple actions like buying your favorite snack or drink at the gas station. And always being honest with each other. I think love is just that simple too and in that case, then marriage reflects love. I hope we all find the “ying” to our “yang”. The Michelle to our Barack. And with that, I am hopping back to Netflix to finish this “Becoming” documentary.

She ain’t your momma

April 8, 2020

kayla and i tampa — pre-quarantine days, Tampa, FL

Hello old friends. I am sorry to have kept you waiting on this post about how our childhood impacts our romantic relationships. I have been working full time and the motivation to do anything productive is low during a time where our cities have turned into sleepy towns. This week I watched an interview of a Kenyan female songstress, Tanasha Donna, talking about her rocky romance with Tanzanian male musician, Diamond Platnumz. One of the things she talked about is realizing that her man was in love with the idea of her but not with who she really is. Long story short, they had a baby together last year and recently broke up due to him cheating on her. Her ex-boyfriend is well known for being a mama’s boy by the way and it seems he did not have a strong father figure in his life. So before we break this down further, let me reintroduce the theory that Oprah Winfrey shared on her podcast about how we try to recreate our childhood with the people we love romantically (see previous blog post for further detail on this theory and a link to the podcast).

If we apply this theory to Diamond Platnumz, it is possible that he is looking for a woman like his mother and he does not think he has found that woman yet. But let me tell you why men can get lost with this idolization of their mothers. Number #1, no one is perfect not even your mother. That is a tough pill to swallow for most men so they choose to have this idea in their head of who their mother is and then project that on the women they date. Number #2 no woman or man will ever be as patient with you as your mother so stop looking for that. But men who have not emotionally matured expect unrealistic levels of patience from their partner. It gets even worse when they do stupid things like, cheat to test this patience. In essence, they want you to accept their cheating to prove that you are a ride-of-die. Only a mother can love a cheat, a thief, and a liar so men please stop with this foolishness.

Now, women, I have not forgotten about us. In her interview, Tanasha talks about how she was doing everything to try to make things work and was not thinking logically about the relationship. She said that she lost herself in the relationship. In examining Tanasha’s background, she grew up with a step-dad instead of her real father. Therefore, she may be unconsciously attracted to men that are either similar to her father or step-dad. Or she may have been looking for a man to fill that void in her life. Either way, she admits that she listened to her heart a lot of times when she should have been listening to her brain. If a man shows you he does not respect you repeatedly then it is time to be brave enough to leave. I am glad that she seems really strong about the entire experience. She says that she does not regret any of her romances as she always chooses to learn from them.

I feel like I have to end with the disclaimer that this theory does not apply to all men or women especially if you have thought critically about your childhood and your romantic life. To be a little bit personal, my worst heartbreak occurred because I felt like I had fallen in love with this idea of who I thought the guy I was dating was and he had done the same in idolizing me. So I feel like getting to know someone very well in the courting phase can really prevent a lot of heartbreak because you do not want to wake up 10 years from now lying next to someone you don’t know that well. But before I let you go; men, please stop trying to find the equivalent of your mom in the dating world. And women please stop trying to raise a grown man. Send him back to his mama. 🙂 ❤

Emotional honesty ft Bob Marley

February 5, 2020

Screen Shot 2020-02-04 at 11.05.52 PM — Houston- Dec 2109

As the wise Bob Marley once said — ‘The biggest coward of a man is to awaken the love of a woman without the intention of loving her.” Bob Marley has numerous great quotes from his interviews and even more from his music. This one is somewhat of a paradox though especially considering that he had 9 children from 7 different women. So if Bob really believed and lived by his quote, that would mean he actually loved all those seven women. And maybe, it is possible that some people are able to love more than one woman equally. However, it seems that his wife Rita Marley also had a child from another man during an affair. So from my basic analytic skills, either Bob and Rita were hippies who freed each other of possession by loving others or they just had the same marital problems that most people have. Either way, I am sure they had love for one another. And Bob Marley will never be seen as a coward because he took care of all his children. He clearly set a good example for them as they all followed his footsteps in music. Also, quite a number of his children are happily married with children so the value of family was not lost on them.

But besides Bob Marley, let us dig into that quote a bit further. There are some men out there who get satisfaction from getting a woman’s number and keeping her wanting him for the sole purpose of an ego trip. Some men just want to be wanted. And once they feel wanted, they leave because the woman has been “conquered”. I have been fortunate enough not to deal with too many of these types but recently, it clicked in my head that one of the guys I’ve dated in the past might have this problem. And just for disclaimer purposes, people are complicated. Sometimes, someone is acting elusive after you gain interest in them because they are afraid of deep connection. You never know what that person has been through. But I will say this, please search within yourself if this behavior describes so that you can figure out why you do this. If you frequently end up on the short end of the stick with someone dropping you as soon as you gain interest, then learn to identify the signs of these emotionally unavailable people.

I will admit that I have been emotionally unavailable before and still ventured out in the dating world. However, I would disclose my emotional state to the other person if somebody gained interest in me. So, I think love is really about honesty and trying to do right by someone. Remember, actions speak louder than words. Be true to yourself and the other person. If your emotional states don’t mesh well, then move on. If Bob Marley was able to find 7 different women to have kids with, I am sure that there is somebody out there for you (if not multiple people, haha). 🙂 ❤

The blueprint for love: self-love

January 26, 2020

Image 1-26-20 at 2.42 PM — Houston wedding, December 2019

From the moment you become responsible for your life choices (let’s say adulthood), you become married despite your relationship status. Why? Because self-love is marriage. Self-love is a life-long commitment to one-self to make decisions that serve to protect and flourish oneself. Therefore, I believe that we enter a polygamous relationship when we get married to another person. How? Because your love for one-self should not dissolve once you say “I do” to another person. Love has to be divided between love for yourself and for the other person. Or if you and your partner are truly in sync, then theoretically loving the other person is like loving yourself. Either way, self-love should not be compromised in order to love another person: that would be the definition of a toxic relationship.

I am not a married person myself so my perspective may be a bit extreme but from what I have heard from people like Will and Jada Smith is that a relationship cannot complete you. You complete yourself through self-love. This is why understanding yourself and dating yourself first, before and during marriage is so important. Another person can only complement who you are. So I guess the “he/she is my other half” statement is a bit misleading. We are all our own people. A better statement that is now becoming popular is “I choose to love my husband/wife each and every day.” I agree with this statement more as it highlights that love is a choice. It’s not a feeling; lust is a feeling. Love is a choice and you have to mentally decide to love your partner through sickness and in health till do death you part.

Some people wonder about unconditional love. However, I think it is rare to find unconditional love between romantic love. I think unconditional love is usually for parents and children. Most people have a mental list of actions that would make them walk away from their partner: infidelity, dishonesty, addiction, and the list goes on. But I do recognize that most people continue to love the people who they walked away from or who walked away from them. However, that love decreases in intensity and is not as compelling for them to want to be with that other person. Therefore, I am of the theory that love does have conditions.

To tie the concept of unconditional love and self-love, I believe that we learn our requirements or conditions of love by loving ourselves. When you don’t tolerate negative self-talk, you will not accept someone talking to you in any kind of way. When you follow through on your goals and commitments to yourself, you won’t allow someone to tell you that you are too high maintenance or that your conditions are unreasonable. Therefore, how you love yourself provides the blueprint of how someone else is to love you. I wish you all success in love to yourself and to or from others. 🙂 ❤

You vs I

January 2, 2020

The picture to the left was taken at my best friend’s Vietnamese wedding/tea ceremony. It was a beautiful display of love and tradition. It was an honor being there for her big day. According to my dad, love is taking care. As her maid of honor, I have observed how both she and her now-husband care for each other ❤

Flowers were a major theme of both her Vietnamese and American weddings. Today, I found this poem I had started writing a while back and it reminded me of how understanding how to love a person can be as difficult as learning how to keep a flower or any plant alive. The poem is kind of somber but I hope you enjoy it ❤

You want to possess me
but you don’t nourish me.
You forget that even a rose withers
when it’s not watered.

You tend to my petals
but you forget my thorns.
You seek to explore my beauty
but don't seek to understand my flaws.

You look at me with lust in your eyes
yet you do not see me.
You touch my skin
but you don’t feel what’s inside.

I am more than this shell.
I am more than how my name is spelled.
I am more than the cards life has dealt.
I am more complex than the ocean’s depth.

Thank you for reading 🙂 ❤

Love poem- How was your day?

November 18, 2019

I would like to start this blog post by giving a shout out to my friend Ola who wrote this beautiful poem for a beautiful woman.

To be honest, I was shocked by his talent and I think he needs to perform this poetry live because it has great flow.

To answer your questions, Ola is like a little brother to me so I try to be his wing woman. Any ladies out there who want to be the beautiful woman by his side, come talk to me. ❤️🙏🏾

This question I ask
to catch the attention of this angel
on my mind all day
Curiously, I say
How was your day?

This question I hope
the birds, wild and fishes
in the mountains, forest, and seas
will scream with me
How was your day?

This question I know
Presidents, Kings, Queens, and everyone
upon seeing this angel named Renee,
will chant with me
How was your day?

This question I pray
The Cherubims, Seraphims
and all the heavenly host
will chorus with me
How was your day?

————————————–

More poetry and blog posts to come. I am sorry for my brief break from posting as my life went from 0 to 100 real quick with work, tennis, family, etc. I hope you are all excited for the holiday season. ❤️

on Gold-digging & career women

August 27, 2019

When I was in high school and college (of course broke), I would say that I am not a gold digger as I am actually more focused on digging my own gold than anyone else’s. Now as a career woman, I think dating becomes tricky when society views you as accomplished. Any potential suitor usually has to meet a checklist of the usual list: nice to people, family-oriented, but most importantly career-focused. Why? Because nobody wants to sleep on an empty stomach as a result of your husband being fired from his job for the third time. But on the other hand, women are also bashed for wanting a man who is financially secure as we are called gold diggers. So with these conflicting societal views, nobody can win.

This question came up recently on social media where a woman posted a quote saying “stop forcing women to love poor men”. I shared this quote with some male friends and they actually were understanding about this catch-22. Our society wants women to choose an appropriate partner that can provide for a family but we don’t want money to be involved in their decision. Does that even make sense? I don’t think a woman’s thought should be can this man be able to buy a car for me or other grandiose things but at the basic level, a man should be able to help put food on the table for his family (in my opinion). Another flip to this coin is what if the woman herself has wealth or some assets?

I think that if a person has worked hard for their accomplishments, including money, they should not be judged for looking for a partner with similar qualities. Barack Obama didn’t just go into the Chicago streets and marry the finest woman he saw. He looked for the woman who was career-focused just like him. Sure at the time that he asked Michelle out, he was just her intern. But Michelle saw his trajectory and knew he would catch up quickly. So on the same note, there’s nothing wrong with having great consideration for someone’s aspirations because guess what? If you’re shooting for the stars, career-wise, and your potential suitor is just dreaming of a Gucci belt then you might not be compatible. So don’t sell yourself short and accept just any person who locks eyes with you for more than 10 seconds. Look for the person that wows you with their hustle (legal hustles only). I pray that you may all find that person that aligns perfectly with what you deserve. May we all find the Barack to our Michelle or vice versa. 🙂 ❤

I wanna know guitar performance

July 29, 2019

I’ve been working on this song for about 2 months now and I finally recorded as I think there is nothing else to add. Adding some French to the song turned out beautifully and in the future, I would like to do a song in both English and Swahili. So more bilingual songs to come. FYI, the french words in the song are a translation of the English chorus.

LYRICS below:

I wanna know
I am looking for that sign
That green light
That tells me go
Or that red light
That tells me no

I wanna know
If this is real
If this is true
Me and you
Is this real?
Is this true?
I wanna know

Moi et toi
Est - ce vrais?
Je veux savoir

They say time will tell
If this love is a spell
Or if we both truly fell
So hold on to those wedding bells

Cause I wanna know
If this is real
If this is true
Me and you
Is this real?
Is this true?
I wanna know
Moi et toi
Est - ce vrais?
Je veux savoir

I wanna know
I wanna know

The power of love

July 10, 2019

This past weekend I had the pleasure of witnessing a beautiful wedding in the breathtaking location of Boothbay Harbor, Maine (Congrats again to the newly wedded couple). It feels like forever since I attended a wedding but it’s only been like 2 years haha. My first career in life was being a flower girl. In fact, some brides were begging my mom for me to be in their wedding but at some point, she had to say no because attending multiple weddings in a year can really deplete your pocket. My cousin tells me that I wasn’t very good at being a flower girl since I did not smile a lot but I guess I was cute enough to be marketable. We were both flower girls at her parents’ wedding and I can tell you she did a way better job than me. There’s photo evidence to prove that I was “stone face” instead of radiating with smiles like she was. Fast forward, years later and I am supposed to be the maid of honor in my best friend’s wedding so I guess that is kind of a promotion. Don’t worry, I’ll make sure to smile from ear to ear even if I get lock-jaw.

Smiley or not, witnessing the union of two people is a blessing. Weddings are always a reminder of the power of love. Love is one of the few forces that can transcend race, class, education, and even politics. Also, it is a force that can grow exponentially. At the wedding I attended this weekend, one of the speakers remarked that how greatly the bride loves her groom now will grow even more with time. Often we love someone so much that we cannot imagine loving them more but wait until they are the mother or father to your children. My father spoke at the rehearsal dinner and revisited his tested and true theory that “love is taking care” (now that I think about it, the children’s book Le Petit Prince (The Little Prince) also has this central theme). To summarize, don’t just tell someone you love them when showing them love actually means more. Other married couples, came up to my dad to show appreciation for his message so I think my dad is on to something.

To reference Le Petit Prince a little bit, love is like a flower. It is undeniably beautiful but you have to handle it with care. You cannot give it too little or too much water. You have to protect it from the elements such as wind. And people say when you talk to plants, they grow better so communication is key in gardening just like in love. Also if you do your gardening right, one plant can bloom many flowers and even help the ecosystem by helping produce pollen for the bees. Bees then pollinate the world further and increase the number of plants in the world so that we have enough oxygen being released in the air. Similarly, one love story can inspire more love in the world and I think weddings provide a great forum for just that. I am sure every married couple that goes to a wedding gets inspired to love their spouse more while every single person gets inspired to prioritize love in their life. So yes love is truly powerful. May we vow to treat it as the precious force that it has the power to be. 🙂 ❤

Love, success, and the universe

June 24, 2019

I would like to start this post by questioning what exactly the phrase “hopeless romantic” actually means. I have heard people use it as both as a positive and negative term either meaning that you are stupid for being a hopeless romantic or you are courageous for being one. When I googled “hopeless romantic”, the top definitions were negative such as the following from Dictionary.com: “a hopeless romantic is a person who holds sentimental and idealistic views on love, especially in spite of experience, evidence, or exhortations otherwise.” Surprisingly, Urban Dictionary had a very lengthy and positive write up on hopeless romantics. Here’s my favorite section from the write up: “Hopeless Romantics are NOT Hopeless per-say, but very true, caring, and loving people. They are “NOT MADE FOR TODAY’S STANDARDS”, sadly. They believe in passion, chivalry, and true love.” Based on how I think the universe works, I think the Urban Dictionary definition is more correct.

I believe in the concept of faith and good effort being rewarded (some people call it karma). So with that positive force of energy of the universe rewarding us, I think truly believing in love makes you a “Hopeful” romantic not a “Hopeless” romantic. Even if the current relationship that you are nurturing does not work, you are preparing your heart for the relationship that will work. Of course, you always need to have your priorities right in life and there are times where you feel like you need a break from relationships (whether due to school, work, or other reasons). However, I think if you find what you are looking for and at an appropriate time in your life then you would probably regret a missed opportunity if you did not pursue it.

So maybe we should hope more and doubt less. If you’re gonna do something, do it to the fullest. Because when people give us advice for success, they tell us things like “shoot for the moon. Even if you miss, you’ll land upon the stars.” My home room teacher in 6^th grade had that quote on a poster and it always peaked my interest. I think to me in education terms it meant, shoot for an A+ so if you don’t get exactly a 100, you could still have an A or A-. In love terms, I think it means that if you really feel good about a relationship, give it a really good effort and even if it doesn’t work out, you’ll be one step closer to finding the person that you’re supposed to be with.

I hope in 50 years (God willing), I can come back to tell you that this theory worked out for me. A lot of things in life are won by mental and emotional strength, so what you believe can make or break you. I choose to believe that the universe is conspiring for us because it gives me positive energy. And at times it can make you, fearless and full of hope. So with that I choose to be a HOPEful romantic that is fearLESS. May we all extinguish fear from our lives and be one step closer to success. 🙂 ❤