The What Ifs: The Truth Behind A Supa Star

Hiii, I know I haven’t posted an entry since December (which I recently deleted due to personal fear of oversharing), I apologize for that. The truth is after December life sped up..and got very very real in such little time. Where do I begin?

First of all, I would start by saying I am officially an alum of the beautiful HBCU, Hampton University. I graduated top of my class, and top of my department, and as mentioned before created a partnership with NASA to build my business! I also won a pageant, performed at the White House, and went to Miami. All great things, very great things right? You would think I'm up right now. LOL. God has so many plans for me and I see it all in my head. I have so many ideas I want the world to see I just don’t know how to express or show y’all because, of course, Hampton taught me how to build something, and how to lead something, but now that I am out of college, it is hard to see how can I build something without the proper foundation. Now someone is saying oh but you already have the proper foundation you graduated from a top-ranking HBCU! Right. I get that. I think it's just post grad depression that I’m using this summer to sort out. I had a plan to get a job by my 22nd birthday which is Aug 2 almost a week from today, move to Atlanta by November and build myself there. But…..as time goes on I have some type of vision to build myself here in the DMV and create something new. I have a beautiful vision but I am terrified to make the jump because what ifs. I got rejected from a job I very much wanted, I wanted it badly. After that, I felt low on my vision to get to ATL which is the best city to live in for people who are creative, passionate, and BLACK like me. My head filled up with all these what-ifs. I truly am working hard to overcome this block. But let‘s pause and backtrack.

January was the WORST month of my life. So many things happened and I truly did not know how to get out of it. I truly did not know how to move forward. I was depressed, stressed, scared for my future, and simply at an all-time low. I felt like I hit rock bottom. I felt unloved and lonely, and I had to do major self-reflection because no one knew. If you did know you couldn‘t do anything about it. My mental health was so low and my body was so stressed out that I didn’t even have a time of the month. YOU KNOW HOW STRESSED OUT YOU HAVE TO BE????? Yeah. I was out of it.

But as time went on, I healed, rekindled relationships, established new ones, and biggest of all, I established boundaries. I established what I will not tolerate and what I will tolerate. Now this is something I‘m going to go into later on so keep that thought at the back of your head. Anyway, I healed, learned, and breathed. I am a firm believer God wouldn't give you anything you could not handle, so I handled it. Life was beating my ass and I‘m still here, standing. I decided to take myself out again, let myself go on dates, and let myself cry. I let myself feel everything I was feeling and isolated myself from everyone. The isolation included muting group chats, not spending as much time around people, and just making sure I spent a massive amount of time with myself.

One thing I grew to hate was the perspective that I am a strong woman who doesn’t care about what others think and follows her drum or whatever they are saying about us as black women in high positions. Now don’t get me wrong, I don’t care what people who aren’t benefiting me in any type of way think about me. Yes, that's towards the people who were posting about me on social media, I truly have a fan club. Hampton's social media culture is so sad and desperate to not be losers because I am what you WANT to be. But ya it took me a while to think about things like that because I was so wrapped up in trying to understand why everyone thinks I'm so STRONG. Like I am human, I don’t have all the answers. Another thing I saw was people do not know social cues for people who are social butterflies. Like y’all…..I can talk but at heart, I truly do enjoy being ALONE. I can be quiet in a room full of people if I don’t want to talk. AND THEN I get hit with “Lena are you ok?“. I don’t think people understand that just because I am not talking doesn’t mean I'm upset. I just don’t want to talk like HELLO. People at that school are such wannabes that they don’t even understand that there is always a flip side to PEOPLE. I know this is a bad example but take Doja Cat and her fan's interaction into consideration. She said y'all aren’t entitled to anything she does. Just because she makes music doesn’t mean she HAS to interact with her fans. So yeah. I‘m not saying I’m like Doja Cat. I am saying I truly hope for this next chapter in my life. I am surrounded by people who understand that I am not strong, I like to be alone sometimes, and just because I walk in confidence doesn’t mean I am always confident. Even Beyonce cries.

Now why did no one tell me that my love life is going to drastically change as I got older? Like, let’s be serious. What’s going on? I swear I’ve been on so many cute dates this summer. I mean I knew I was pretty but people think I'm pretty. Both men and women will actively pursue me in the club, at the store, and anywhere. WHAT'S GOING ON? The pandemic did a number on me mentally because I was 18 when it started. I am 21 now. It's crazy how much things change. I didn't even know I could LIKE someone. But when it came to dating people I had to set boundaries. I learned a few things.

1. Set the boundary and they will lead themselves to the door if it doesn’t work.

2. MAKE THEM SPEND MONEY ON YOU ON THE FIRST LINK TO SET THE TONE. Because what type of person you want to be with if they can’t even get you food outside of Wendys.

3. Let them THINK they‘re setting the tone on how the relationship will flow.

4. Have your intentions and standards already set in your mind.

5. Please stop seeking relationships out of situationships.

6. Understand that everyone reading this (Unless you‘re my family member) is in their 20s right now. YOU really think anyone our age got it figured out girl? Are you really dating to marry? Let's get serious. LIVE your life. Stop worrying if someone likes you.

7. Why have one when you can have five? Why have five when you can have NINE. If you know you know.

8. People, specifically men, always will think what if there is better than YOU. So girl you need to think the same thing. Like…….they really do. They can like you and all that but fr if they‘re like our age…they thinking its someone better. SOOO you need to shift your mindset to focusing on YOU.

Good luck finding someone better than me bookie!

Anyway, we are living. I'm going to 100% figure it out. I just need time, everyone including my family thinks just because I was a supa star at Hampton means I got it figured out for life. EYE DON'T. I think me realizing that and learning I am human really helped me with being able to understand that its okay to not have it figured out. I think for me I am so stuck on putting myself on a timeline that I forget things aren’t supposed to just flow. I forgot how hard I worked at Hampton to be the person I was when I graduated. I am trying to figure out what I want out of life, this includes also my career, my love life, my friends. I realized one thing, Life is supposed to be beautiful. I learned if it's not benefiting me then I have no need to keep it around. I learned so many new things these past few months.

I think the biggest thing I learned was everything happens for a reason. I used to really stress out about what ifs. Even in this blog entry I explained how I am having a mental block because of the what ifs. I think the first step for me to get where I want to be is me posting this blog. I usually don’t listen to a lot of people, growing up I learned to tune out things because of the abuse I was living through at home. But I was told something that stuck with me recently how everything happens for a reason. I also was told by a few people I need to learn how to listen. So I am working on that. I am working on listening and understanding that if God did not want it to happen it will not happen. EVERYTHING I mean everything happens for a reason. I learned that this summer and that is the one thing that is helping me get through these blocks in my head: the what ifs.

I know this entry is all over the place.

I am not sorry. I‘ll be posting more thoughts throughout the summer. <33