Hey roots,

I know, I know its been a while. My inconsistencies is making this hard to be followed BUT i’m back with the writing and hopefully be more consistent. However, I do have a VERY good reasons for my inconsistencies.

It was MAINLY due to that fact that, I have no idea what direction this blog was suppose to go. It was so broad, it made it difficult for me to sit down and just type with no direction; especially when I am not getting emails coming with with suggestions of topics (no shade lol).. BUT yesterday, it hit me this blog is KNOWING who you are and whose you are with NO hesitation, UNAPOLOGETICALLY rooted beautifully in Christ. This platform is for all newly married women who are just in a place of being lost and confused because there isn’t a structure yet. This is for all women who have been married for a while and forgot who they are because their lives have been wrapped around everything but them. This also for the single women who are in a serious relationship and need to understand marriage a outside of Hallmark movies and #marriagegoals (BTW, that was the worst hashtag that could happen to relationships). Hallmark movies is not real, its called acting so do not base relationships on what is done in a movie or from a snap of a picture. Those are not what you need. THis platform is about stregnthen your inner self becasue without realizing you will forget and become someone different that you dont even recognize. I have so many stories to share in real time regarding this 1 year and 5 months expeirnce I’ve had in being married. Now PLEASE by ALL means I am not an expert nor am I trying to be. I just wanted to create an interactvie blog where newly wedded women can come and just admit, ‘ I have NO FREAKING idea what I’m doing, i feel lost” and be ok with it.

I will admit that I still have no clue what I am doing as a wife. All I know is, I wake up and there is a fine specimen of a man next to me that is so complex, stubborn and frustrating at times and I LOVE HIM. Two things I know, I KNOW I do not want to have the marriage my parents had nor do I want the marriage that his parents had. I want my own marriage, the way God intended MY marriage to be. So, everyday I wake and ask the Lord for help to be the wife that God created me to be for this wonderful, patient, stubborn (strong willed) and frustrating man. I want my marriage to be MY marriage not no doggon #marriagegoals (TCHUIPS- sucking teeth).

On this platform, i promise to be honest and raw. I need your help as well, I need the interactions. Tell me your stories, and how you handle certain situations with your spouse because you are in the process of shifting yourself in a new direction towards your new self.

With that said, I have an assignment for you, it might look crazy but you need to do it. Go stand inf front of the warrior and say hello new self, i am introducing you to a new path and direction #NotSorry. Now, go to your spouse and children and say Im sorry to do this to you but there is a new me emerging and you are going to have to learn this new person. I know you know this version of me for 3, 4, or 5 years but it ain’t. The real version of me you may not like now but you will because you don’t really have a choice lol. So, get ready to see, know and enjoy the new me in every way

Let this new direction and journey started. I am so excited. Like i said i need some interaction, so feel free to leave a comment or email me at rootedbeautifully@gmail.com with any questions or comments you may have. #unapologeticallyrooted#notsorry.

-Sincerely, RL

In July 2015, the most devastating thing happened to me, my mother passed away due to cancer. It initially was breast cancer and then progressed into her liver. I was distraught, hurt, angry, confused, and felt alone. My mother tried to protect me from her reality but now her reality was kicking her butt and mines along with it, the reason is because she tried to hide it from me (its a little difficult to hide stage 4 cancer, so I don’t know why she thought it would be possible.. silly mom lol). She was a very strong woman and I learned that from her. What she did not teach me was, how to deal with her death (not that she would know lol).

In times like these, you turn to your community of family, friends, or church for support and encouragement. I turned to the community in my church because I knew I would get the word of encouragement I needed to be good. (I know your probably wondering, why not family? I turned to family too but they were not primary. In my mind, they would support and show up no matter what). I was very wrong, I was hurt by the treatment and lack of compassion. I then grew to resent the people in the church, I started to see them as fake and hypocrites; I started too see why everyone believes Christians to be hypocrites. When I needed them the most, they were not around. So I kept to myself and shut EVERYONE out. I started having very bad anxiety, panic attacks, and heart problem. Had to wear a heart monitor for 1 month; to top it all off, I was depressed and suicidal. I did not want to kill myself but I started thinking about the thought of me not living anymore. I tell you, it was bad. BUT, looking back at that moment in my life, I see God’s finger print in every minutes of the days, until I completely recovered and grew to be a better version of myself (well… still working version lol)

I want to talk about the way society view the church. When someone states that they are Christians and believe in Christ, society tend to immediately set up standards that no one can attain; put them on a pedestal as though people can not make mistakes. And when they do make mistakes society and even those in the church shuns them. That is not God, those actions are done by ignorant people; they are the ones doing the shunning, the bible says, come as you are; with all your flaws and judgement and imperfections, EVERYTHING you are is welcome (my version simplified). Somehow, people now think, they must be clean before coming to the Lord or they don’t live up to the standards that were set in their imagination of what a Christian should look like or act like. When meet me and know I am a christian, they try their best to be not cuss or talk out of turn. But once I crack a joke, they realized that I am a person just like them but we are 2 different people living life dictated by different things.

It took me years to forgive my church because of the hurt, anger and neglect I felt but in reality it not on them. The Lord only allowed a few people to speak life into me as I was going through this tough patch because He knew they would be able to speak into my soul; but  because I was hurt and angry, I shut those people out too. But God did not give up on me, because He used my colleagues as my church. Society believes the church is a building, when in reality the church is the people. I learned that, the perfection of Christ is found in the imperfection of people. Its people who makeup the church; hating the church is hating people and hating people is hating the Creator. So, if you hate the Creator are you truly a believer? If your angry at the church you are therefore angry at the people. If you call the church hypocrite, you are calling the God a hypocrite because He never created humans to be Him, he created them to be LIKE Him.

The Lord graced me a with great boss, who allowed me to have time off and great colleagues who prayed for me everyday and spoke word of encouragement. It took me about 2 years to forgive and about 2 years be able to go back to church. I love my church and its perfect imperfections. No matter your religion, understand that we are not perfect, we are imperfect people living for a perfect Creator.

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Hey guys,

March 22nd was my 1st anniversary and let me tell you, it was DEFINITELY not easy. Statistic states that the first 2 years of marriage are the hardest. Those who are married will agree because you are getting to know a WHOLE new person outside of yourself (matter a fact, once you get married you have to re introduce yourself to you as well; or else you will lose you; but I digress). Since I am an only child and lived with my parents all my life, theirs were the only habits I to get know. So living with another person in which i did not grow up with was NO JOKE. I not only have to introduce WHOLE myself and crazy weird habit (eating white rice, ketchup and bananas) to this wonderful man whom I said, “I do” to; he has to do the same.

Let me tell you something, all those happily ever after movies, books, or shows are LIES. About 3 months into my marriage, it was NOTHING like the movies (I felt hoodwinked, bamboozled and led astray lol).  I was confused and thought I was doing something wrong. My current reality did not reflect what i always saw on TV or in the movies.  Comparing my REAL marriage to FICTIONAL characters in movies or books is MOST certainly not the best to start a marriage. Then I started comparing my marriage to others and that was DEFINITELY not good.

So I went where all smart people go- Google, Amazon and YouTube, to find sermons, books or even a blog on marriages and how to navigate it especially the first few months to years. I found absolutely nothing that I felt related to me and my situation. I was getting upset because I am getting to know this handsome, loving man who is my husband but yet I feel he was a stranger to me. After a few days of looking, I gave up and decided to pray about it (why did I wait so long, I have no idea). Once I was in my quiet place, the Lord had me realize that, there isn’t a specific guide to marriage and I cannot look or rely on another person to tell me how to make my marriage work. All marriages are different; I needed to stop compare my 1 year old marriage to another 1 year old marriage because they are different people with different personalities compared to me and mines. I, most certainly, cannot compare the obstacles I was facing in finding our groove to a 15 years old marriage because they’ve already found their groove (several times over since).

All those sermons I listened to or books read about being a better spouse, understanding your husband or just about marriage in general were good but honestly, really did not do much for me. WHY? Because the season I was in was a personal one, the speaker/writer was just speaking/writing from THEIR personal experience and giving me THEIR opinion of what could/ might work but in reality may not work WHY? Because again my marriage is not like theirs. Everyone’s marriage is different and beautiful in its own way.

So, how did I overcome the first few months my marriage? I accepted that I could not rely on other people to help make my marriage be what I wanted but I -personally- had to rely on God. Please do not misunderstand me, I am not saying that advice is not good. I’m just saying that sermons, podcast, and books about marriage are just that ADVICE, they do not provide you with the blueprint of what your marriage will be or should be, only God can do that. Unless you feel led to by the Holy Spirit to listen to a podcast or read a specific book or even speak to your pastor, by all means do it. But outside of feeling led, do not turn to friends, family, pastors, sermons, podcast or even books for advice or wisdom about YOUR marriage. You were joined in covenant in the name of the FATHER, THE SON and the HOLY SPIRIT so only HE can be the guide as you both enjoy the adventure in discovering the uniqueness of your marriage.

Proverbs 25:2 ” It is the glory of God to conceal a matter and the honor of kings to search it out.”

Go ahead, search it out and see the joy you experience once attained. Ok folks, remember to root yourselves by the river and grow BE-U-tiful.

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Hello roots,

It has been a very long time since I’ve posted an entry. Been very busy planning my wedding and the completing task before the wedding date. Today I am not writing about my relationship status (not now anyways) but I am writing about the statement “E pluribus unum,”

I was watching Jane the Virgin (yes I know , it is very dramatic) the specific episode of when Alba (Grandmother) gave a toast during her surprise citizenship party, “E pluribus unum” which was stated by Marcus Cicero in the discussion the subject of family.  It means out of many, one; when each person loves the other as much as himself/herself, it makes for one out of many.”

We all have our own personal journeys to go through but one thing I do believe we do not take into account is, how all of our journeys are interwoven with each other. In that interwoveness (I am sure that is not a word) we learn from one another and the time spent in each other presence makes for the creating of one.

I think I may have lost you, let me draw 2 pictures.

picture # 1:

One seed planted will create MANY roots and from those individual roots a single plant (it could be a tree, plant or flowers – choose your pick) and from that one plant/tree/flower there are many branched/sprouts/petals. This the cool part, when the seasons change the tree/plant/flower will shrivel up and re-energize to re germinate again. Our lives are very similar or knows someone who has gone through an experience.

Explanation: 

One seed = A person

The roots= experience/influences the seed has gone through with friends, family, and others

The tree = how experiences/influences has shaped the person (seed)

The branches = the experience/influence that the person (seed) has passed on to other person (seed), which can be good or bad

Out of many experiences it influences a persons ideology of who they are and their personalities. So DO NOT shut anything out, look at your surrounding.

I have an assignment for you, look at your day (yes today). Dissect a part of your day where your experience was shared with someone (good or bad) that changed their perspective and where someone else’s experience was passed on to you (again, good or bad) that changed perspective.

For me, its mostly at my job, I spoke with a fellow colleague from another location earlier this week and she just started sharing her life story with me ( i have never met this lady in my life but she felt very comfortable to share it with me). In our conversation, one things she kept repeating was she holds grudges for a long time. She does not trust ANYBODY, he trust needs to be earned. After a while of listening to her, I asked her if she is not tired and worn down by being a gray cloud. She said yes, I told her there is a whole world out there with beautiful colors and hues. You will never get to enjoy the beauty of life if you choose to focus only on black and gray, she agreed with me. Now will she take my words to heart, I do not know but one thing I do know is that I changed her perspective how she should view life and how the gray view on life is taxing on every part of her life.

My colleagues experience, caused my perspective of her has changed, not in a bad way. I just did not have a relationship with her, but after speaking with her, I realized that her life must be quite lonely especially when she trust NO ONE and you have to EARN her trust (her words). That made me a little sad and makes me want to reach out to her. Will I, I do not know only the Lord knows. All I know was, I was VERY HAPPY to speak with her because our conversation completely changed my perspective of her.

Out of many; One.

Ok folks, root yourselves by the river and BE-U-tiful.

Hey Rooties (clearly I am still working on a greeting name lol),

I know it has been a VERY long time since I posted last. It has been an eventful past month, and been trying to re schedule my life around these new events. Any who, that is neither here nor there.

I wanted to talk to you about worship, so I was in my car listening to a live worship session by WorshipMob (they are an AMAZING group of people), they sang this song by Bethel called, “Jesus We Love you.” The song itself is very touching but there was one a small part in the song that caught my attention, it goes:

“Our affection

Our devotion

Poured out on the

Feet of Jesus”

That part just touched me deep in my soul (I’ve learned that when something catches my attention to write it down and ask the holy spirit to revel it to me whats up because there is something deeper there). As I was trying to figure it out, I realized that it reminded me of  the story of the lady with the alabaster box.

In Luke 7: 36-38 it states “A woman in a town who lived a sinful life learned that Jesus was eating at the Pharisee’s house, so she came there with an alabaster jar of perfume.³⁸ As she stood behind him at his feet weeping, she began to wet his feet with her tears. Then she wiped them with her hair, kissed them and poured perfume on them.” In those times, perfume was very expensive; the cost of the alabaster box was 300 danerii which was approximately $ 54, 509 US in 2013 (can you imagine its worth today). That was her most expensive and valuable possession, especially since she was a prostitute. Not to be so vulgar, (I want to try and paint a picture in your mind) but she had to work VERY hard and accept judgement from both men (whom she slept with) and women for her choice of profession, she also had to do this for a very long time. However, she saw that the alabaster box was not as valuable as the forgiveness and love of Jesus . 

How does this scripture tie into the song? The alabaster box represents the lady’s affection and devotion for and to Jesus, before she poured the perfume on His feet, she cried, she then wiped His feet with her hair, and finally she poured the perfume on His feet.

Her tears represents her realization that she has sinned

Her wiping His feet with her hair (the hair is the crown of a woman, she was willing to dirty it and use it on Jesus’s feet as a towel) represents the asking of forgiveness

Her pouring of perfume (the most valuable item she possessed) represents:

her sacrifice

her dying to self

her sins which she chose to leave at the alter (His feet).

By doing so, she showed Jesus where HER devotion and HER affection to Him; in that moment she told Jesus you are more valuable than what I have ever worked for; in that moment she said you are worth more than 300 danerii ($ 54, 509 USD).

(Are your ready to grow some roots, because you are about to)

So my question to you is:

Where is your alabaster box ? 

Have you cried at his feet and whipped it with your hair?

Have you poured your affection and devotion at and on the feet of Jesus?