Tag: relationships

“4 Essential Keys to Effective Communication”

🚨 MAJOR KEY🔑 ALERT 🚨

This one is going to seem like a no-brainer. It’s not.

It would seem as though we ought to have these skills down. We don’t.

I can only speak for myself when I say that literally anything can be broken down more effectively, or conveyed more empathetically.

Bento C Leal III (honestly, lets just take a moment to bask in the regality and phonemic fun that is this author’s name. “I am Bento, of House Leal, not even the first of my name!”henceforth referred to as BCL3) ‘s bite-sized book is an easy but nutritious read. It’s full of takeaways, and highly applicable.

Although tempting, DO NOT give it away to your best friend, or little cousin, or blabber-mouth coworker. Especially not in an earnest but shady attempt to get them to shut up and listen. You’ll find that to someone, and perhaps even to yourself, that you may be the blabber-mouthed, hard-headed, non-negotiator. Keep it and reread it. Find a few on Amazon, stock up for the holidays, or send them the PDF. This book makes an excellent turkey, stocking, or pie hole stuffer.

Trust me, I’m a person that was thinking about going to medical school doctor.

4EK’s twelve brief chapters set the scene and take the reader from symptom, to diagnosis, to cure. He starts in chapters one through three with an anecdote that rings all to true: routine conversations with friends, coworkers, strangers and loved ones. He outlines how we might easily convince ourselves that in our many years of travel around the sun, we simply MUST have picked up real and successful communication skills. We mustn’t.

Continue reading ““4 Essential Keys to Effective Communication””
by Roze Goes

All the Single (White) Ladies! 💁🏼‍♀️💁🏻‍♀️💁‍♀️

I’m not easily persuaded. My fingers are almost completely OFF the pulse of the zeitgeist. I have little-to-no idea what the young people like, or “what’s hot in these streets”. Thusly, I don’t often buy into hype. I just finished watching Season 2, Ep. 3 of Game of Thrones!

How to Be Single

The trailer didn’t sell me initially. The same ole trope: a young white woman longing to find herself embarks on an “I don’t need a man” journey of self-discovery in the big city.   What I expected was a New Girl/Sex In the City mash-up. I was pleasantly disappointed. Although virtually devoid of POC (except where they were offered up like optional side sauces in miniature tasting bowls; separate, other, and in quantities too little to appreciate), this white-chick flick hit pretty close to home.

A young woman, comfortable yet discontent in a relationship sets out to find out who she is. I am everyday working on the same. Some of the truths she stumbles up on are actually applicable.

  1. You only get a few moments of real self-knowledge when you’re not tied up in the accouterments of relationships.
  2. Young women, under the immense pressure and seemingly ultimate goal of relationship bliss and marriage, fall easily, and almost imperceptibly, into men’s “d!&k sand”; losing ourselves in the process.
  3. Openness and ownership of your body and the decisions you choose to make with it. Everything you do, makes you everything you are, and shame/guilt are nothing you should ever be or consider yourself.
  4. Finally, I UGLY LAUGHED all throughout this movie. I felt it deep in me. The little moments of insecurity that sometimes remind you of how hard you work not to feel empty. The value of friends. I was reminded of just how much self-acceptance is a  rocky, rewarding, and never-ending journey. Gotta work at being the you you want!

Lady Dynamite

I love alternative humor and lately the universe has been sending a bunch of really powerful non-traditional roles played by actresses that’s aren’t quite so mainstream. They’re older, and not what others may consider classically beautiful. More importantly, they play characters that push social commentary, have internal struggles, and are genuinely working to be better people. They have more than just man troubles, and aren’t encumbered with need to be bashful, comedically awkward, or cutely quirky. (I’m talking about you Zoe Deschanel!)

Spy


Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt 


Here’s what bums me out. That they’re aren’t more women of color in roles like this. Perhaps we’re too busy unpacking colonialism, defending the idea that Black Lives do in fact Matter, or bathing our children with bottled water. Maybe we’re not journeying to discover ourselves because our roles were written for us hundreds of years before were were born. Maybe they’re waiting for me to write their voices.

Roze Goes
… To a dark (skinned) place

by Roze Goes

Let’s #MarchInto This Month!

Today is the 74th day of this year. We’ve got more than 80% left to laugh, live, travel and  try!

day 74

Everyday is a chance to #marchinto your goals, dreams, passion-projects, new jobs, savings accounts, blogs/vlogs, relationships and whatever else we want to do! Last month was #febYOUary What can you achieve this chapter?

Use the hashtag #marchinto and tell me in the comments below what YOU want to achieve in days 75 – 365!

I want to #MarchInto more fulfilling and consistent engagement with readers through purposeful content curation!

Love you,

Roze

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by Roze Goes

February 14th is a Tuesday.

That’s it. It’s just a day. But, as powerful sentient beings we choose and create occasions to venerate. We make important that which we desire. Craft the world around us. Curate our experiences. Choose the people in our lives like players in a roster. Feed what we want to grow. Thus, an international outpouring of infatuate love. Valentine’s Day, and all the meaning that we’ve assigned it, could just as well be July 9th, or October 30th! {hint!}

Don’t get lost. Don’t forget about Black History Month! Remember to assign meaning to things on your own terms. You can’t be upset by something that never had power. Something that was never significant enough to disturb your peace. Don’t let Valentines Day be the dam in your river; even if you and your boo are #relationshipgoals

Be the sky; regardless of clouds or rain.

Today Valentine’s Day looks like this for me:

It started with fitful sleep and fearful dreams. I love myself. Then an overdraft notification. I love myself. Then I made lunch without pants. Super love myself. A great workout! I’m seeing the results of loving myself. Got dressed up cute. I love me… and makeup! Now I’m hammering it out at work. Giving 100%. I love my professional self, even while I’m looking for other opportunities, and figuring it out as I go.

I love you, too!

Roze Goes… to Taco Tuesday!

                                           

…Last year’s V-Day post…

Happy Valentimes Day

Let me first start off by stating that I absolutely HATE when people pronounce it “Valentimes Day”. When is Valentime? Point to it on a clock! When in the calendar year is it Valentime!? If you pronounce it this way, you don’t deserve any chalky heart-shaped antacid candies.  deserve to eat ONLY chalky heart-shaped antacid candies! FOREVER!!!

Moving on…

Pal-entine’s Day, Gal-entine’s Day, Single’s Awareness Day… For semi-Bitter Bettys and Barrys such as myself, this past February 14th took on a slightly different tone than the mainstream. For many of us it was a silent massacre. Millions of eligible bachelor’s and bachelorette’s unwanted bodies strewn about highways and workplaces; their faces twisted in agony with cold eyes glossed over. Tortured mercilessly, some for days, with your stories of how “Bae surprised me. He/She/It/They are sooo thoughtful!” We leapt like lemmings to our deaths.

1328485800301_8043646
As if you didn’t know you were single on the 13th !

For me, it consisted of staring at my phone, rolling/thrashing on the couch, and sort of mumble-sobbing. Mind you, I’m usually that emotional on every other day, it just FELT more poignant on that day… you know, on account of the nationwide peer pressure. (Note to whomever: DO NOT, I repeat, DO NOT get onto any social media on any holiday ever! Just don’t. Even Leif Ericsson Day.)

Moving on…

Read the rest of the post Here!

 

Roze Goes Footer

by Roze Goes

Thug-olutions: New Year, Essentially the Same Me

I’m a thug [read emotionally intelligent and proactively self aware individual]. Thugs don’t make resolutions. They are everyday attempting to review and renew in order to rise from their ashes and reveal and shiny new self [see also Phoenix]. Thugs don’t wait until January 1st. CLEARLY they wait until The 5th! In my defense, I began working on these months ago. I’m sharing with you in the hopes of getting a few accountability partners.

My New Years Thug-olutions (featuring some help from Instagram and a Buzzfeed post I read) are as follows:

1. You owe it to yourself to research your passions. Don’t bury them; unfulfilled and sitting silent in the soul like seeds seeds waiting in dormancy.  

2. Enjoy your own company. Stop linking your enjoyment of experiences to the company of others. Friends can make good times better, you always have the company of your closest friend… You!


3. Get out of your head! Sometimes im so cerebral, it’s like playing chess with people that don’t know they’re in a tournament. Just open your mouth. Tell people what you want/think/need/feel. Those who matter don’t mind, and those that mind don’t matter!

4. Save some money! You’re 25 years old! Have something to show for it!



5. Take care of your body! It’s the vehicle by which you experience this wonderful three dimensional world! Be a good steward!

Drink some water! Go to sleep on time!

6. Talk good to yourself. Make YOU feel good! Flatter the person in the mirror.


7. Take responsibility for your part in relationships that have failed. I don’t mean get stuck in the past, but there are things you can learn from it. You’re not just the victim, you’re also a perpetrator … in part. You allowed that person to enter and remain in your presence. Make a list and act on the top three steps (you don’t know them because they’ll be the things you repeatedly failed to do).

For me they are

a. Ask hard hitting questions that get at the heart of others’ intentions. Friends and loved ones may struggle to find the words, but not hesitate or attempt to deceive.

b. Be happy in/of your self so that arguments and discord in particular relationships don’t make your whole life feel like a failure.

c. Take responsibility for your interactions. Be conscious of how your speech/interaction style affects others and what it says about you. Be honest, I think long-term, think about what you want from that person and your relationship with them.

Happy New Year, lil’ thugs! Go forth and prosper!


Roze Goes. The blogger formerly known as “Not-so-Negative, Nancy”

by Roze Goes

The Ketchup

For my upcoming birthday I am giving myself success… or at least opportunities to attain it. I interviewed Friday and spoke with my soon-to-be-employer; she’s super enthusiastic to have me start immediately. I’m attempting … {cringes] to date.  I’m looking into grad school options, and doing a lot of personal inventory. Finally, as it pertains to this blog, I plan to establish a schedule for posting. Here goes:

Sunday (bi-weekly): The Ketchup

Thursday: List/Rant

Any Other Day: Reposts

Ok, so for this bi-weekly Ketchup I’ll fill you in on whats been filling my headspace..

There is no such thing as a big break! (I know, SHOCKING!) For many of the fields in which I have interest, a “famous” person could “put me on”. They could stumble across my work and immediately see value in it. But how, I query, will they see me if I am not yet a big enough stumbling block? I need to be a huge, obtrusive, stub-your-toe, unignorable cinder block. Without that work what would it matter? If I did meet the right person? What do I have but a head full of ideas without a body of work to support it?

Depression is like chronic ringworm, but thankfully motivation is like showering.

I WILL NOT tolerate people that don’t respect the sanctity of a relationship. Let me explain. If you hit on me and you’re in a relationship, I will SMITE you. Done. Worse still, are the people (I’m sure men and women are guilty, but as I am a Hetero woman, it comes from guys) who insist that a friendship could be maintained, or that friendship was their initial intent {viscous side eye}. Here, take my hand. Please allow me to guide you onto the path that will illuminate EXACTLY where you had me messed up! Take an everlasting musical chairs tournament worth of seats!

(I’m mad all over again… smh)

In parting I leave you with this. If you listen carefully, you can shake you bom-bom and be joyously inspired!

Negative, Nancy … now Roze Goes. (Get it, because life is an adventure?

by Roze Goes

Are You Happy?

I am not unhappy. Moderately depressed from time to time, yes, but not UNhappy. I don’t shun smiles or darken my windows with black velvet curtains while considering tattooing on my eyeliner (although that would save me time). I just refuse to lie. There’s nothing wrong with being unhappy, so turn your smile upside down if that’s what you feel. Don’t Disney Channel censure yourself  with glittery duct tape to make others comfortable. Forget FUCK others! Smart people are often unhappy, or find fewer moments to smile, but the moments in between are GOLDEN! I would have made a terrible cheerleader, I’m certain of it. But I still could have tried. I still should have gone to a tryout and maybe I wouldn’t have been a completely horrible base; perhaps an awkwardly tall flyer. Or maybe the petite blonds at my high school would have made fun of my frizzly brown hair. Maybe I would have cried. But I’ll never know now, because smart people don’t take unnecessary risks. They don’t open themselves to fresh hurts. We just keep picking at old scabs; sojourning nightly to cemeteries to exhume fresh skeletons to populate our closets. But I take heart in my real smiles, my true laughs that start deep in the earth’s core and travel up my feet. They shake my insides, tingle my spine, and come orgasming out of my mouth. THOSE are the best. I am not unhappy. I just happen to spend 6/10 of most days deep in contemplation, turning and turning over the mechanisms of this world, terrified by its possibilities.  Living lies that are not my own  and experiencing an algorithm of emotions. This phrase alone is incalculable. I start as a prisoner in my bed, shackled by my tears, and wardened by Netflix, then suddenly I’m free. Pardoned by a selfish ray of Shawshank Redemption. I am not unhappy. Happiness isn’t two monochromatic poles, it’s a spectrum.You’re just thinking about it wrong.  At any moment I can live on any of the 50 shades of archipelago grey  in between. I am not UNhappy. Or happy. At least not all the time. Does that answer your question?

by Roze Goes

Can I Have an Aaliyah Moment?

Can I come over? Come over… to see you tonight? Nights like these make me wish I had a single bed. That other side ain’t nothin but mockery. To press my forehead up to yours. Sappy eskimo kisses. Inhale kisses on your collarbone and exhale a warm embrace with hands wandering my thighs. And we’ll breathe like that every night; slow and easy.

by Roze Goes