What doesn't kill you...

     This my friends is by far my new favorite song. I listen to it at the gym. I listen to it in the car. I sing it at the top of my lungs by myself and with my daughters. It is so powerful and in my own personal opinion should be every woman's theme song. What better person to present this song to the world than Kelly Clarkson? Even though I would love to say I knew her personally, I can not... But her persona is fantastic. She comes off as real, what you see is what you get. That is a huge part of what makes her so fantastic. Though I am sure she has her own inner struggles just like the rest of us, she exudes confidence! So today i will strive to be more like that. Confident, daring, and self assured. Harder than what you might think.

     What doesn't kill you makes you stronger..... words to live by and the absolute truth. Through every struggle and adversity we learn something about ourselves. Sometimes it is pleasing and sometimes it isn't so pretty. Regardless, however, it changes who we are. It is up to us to make that a positive revelation or a negative one. As someone who has voluntarily entered into every type of abusive relationship you can imagine, I  can honestly say that each and every time i took something away that made me stronger and wiser for the most part. Abuse is never condonable, I am just saying I chose to learn something about myself from it rather than  wallow in all the negative. I learned that I chose certain types of people as a result of my own insecurities. Somewhere within me I settled for less than I deserved. It doesn't make any of the things they did right but it also doesn't excuse my part as their enabler either. Ownership of the part that I did play was probably one of the most important things I did to start healing from that. No one can grow while in denial. So I owned up to it and moved on. All of those experiences made me stronger and wiser! They also made me less naive to what the real world holds for us. Our choices do matter, big and small. Choices effect everyone, not just the abused or neglected, but everyone. They make us fighters, teachers, and role models to the generations behind us. And I believe that it is our responsibility to show our children mistakes we make in life don't ruin us. In fact, they build us, make us stronger, and allow us to be more well rounded individuals if we chose to learn from them.