my name is rinelis .

i'm on the brink of crying as i start off this entry. i'm not sad, however. ever since i was twelve years old, i've lived my life hopelessly searching for love. i didn't know it then but i do know it now. when i was twelve, i fell for an eighteen year old boy. i knew nothing about love, it just sounded good when i heard it coming from the opposite end of a telephone. i only saw the boy once. we lived thousands upon thousands of miles away from each other. he filled my head with beautiful words, hopes, and dreams yet i was the crazy one. at the time, i thought i was perfectly sane but as i look back at myself then, he was right; i was so far from it. one summer my cousin had asked him why i seemed to be so strung out on him. he told her he had absolutely no idea why because he had never done anything for me to have such a far fetched idea. that very same day i told my cousin i hated him when in reality, i hated myself, and i cried myself to sleep that night. i went on hating myself until this very moment.

i hated myself for being so damn naive to think an eighteen year old boy could ever love a twelve year old he only saw once and genuinely being surprised when i found out what he had told my cousin. i hated myself for acting like i wasn't hurt when he called me a few months afterwards and pretended as though i had no idea of what he had said; i believed him when he told his friend i was going to be his future girlfriend that very same day. i hated myself for falling in "love" in the seventh grade with a boy who flirted with me almost uncontrollably but wouldn't ask me to be his girlfriend because i was what he called prude. i hated myself for telling him i wasn't when i knew i was and he still ran off with the next girl who would make out with him on the back of the school bus on the way back from a school field trip. i was on that bus.

i hated myself for wanting to be wanted and dating someone my freshman year in high school i didn't even like. i convinced myself that saying yes to him would make me like him but instead i avoided him until i finally just broke it off. i hated myself for having my first kiss in the tenth grade at my high school's bus loop to a guy who didn't even have my number and never did... he was my boyfriend. i hated myself for dating my best friend and pushing him far enough away for him to hate me and emotionally abuse me until the point of me not even being able to take one look at him without crying. i hated myself for leaving a good boy for a bad one who only wanted me for one thing and entertaining him just a few weeks ago thinking maybe he did want to genuinely be with me. he didn't.

i hated myself for falling in love... real love this time... and thinking everything in the world was wrong with me when it all fell apart. i believed him when he said he loved me and that we would one day get married. when he broke up with me, i felt as though i had done something wrong when in reality, all i had done was given him the best of me. i hated myself when i found myself saying i could possibly love someone i was involved with for a long period of time who i never even went on one date with. i don't even know his favorite color. i hated myself for running to fetch my headphones so that i could hear your music just the way you had wanted me to. i hated myself for pretending it didn't affect me when all i was listening to was you rap about how she's the dopest girl you've ever met and naively wishing you had been talking about me.

all of this time, i've hated myself for so many things and all of those things point to the unhealthy fascination of needing to be needed... wanting to be loved by seemingly all of the wrong people. my father loves me, i've always known it but he was never there for me the way i wanted or needed him to be so i grew resentful. i sought after the attention from other men in order to replace the longing i had for his attention. my father loves me he just has his own way of showing it. i've let countless of people walk all over me and i cried over men countless of times when i had absolutely no reason to. i gave them all i could give them... i gave them me. i've now come to realize that when that isn't enough, that person is in no way meant for me. all i can be is me. i can't try and listen to all of the music a boy likes hoping it'll get me that much closer to being with him. i can't pretend to be this emotionless creature. i can't act like i don't cry at movies and television series. i can't buy a cd, i can't write e-mails, i can't draw pictures, i can't write letters, i can't do anything to attain someone who ultimately doesn't want to be with me. i can't control how another person feels and when i ultimately meet the person i'm meant to be with, all of the things i did for all of those men that went so unacknowledged will then actually matter and life will be that much sweeter. i have no doubt in my mind that that day is going to come.

i refuse to keep restricting myself from finding who is right for me by letting my path be chosen by all of these others who aren't. my name is rinelis and after this, i can look in the mirror and genuinely say that i love myself. i have a wonderful family, even with all of its imperfections, and i have wonderful friends. i'm single and that's perfectly okay because i won't be forever. i'm going to make mistakes and i'm going to stumble along the way but in all reality, who doesn't? will i let those mistakes and bumps along the road keep me from being happy? you bet your ass i won't because one day i'll meet that person who makes mistakes and stumbles along the road as well but doesn't allow it to deter him from being happy and we'll be happy with each other.

may you all have a blessed night and many more blessed days to come.

w'happy mama . enlighten yourself .

people say women are purely driven by emotion and well, i'm the perfect example. i'm not ashamed of it because to be ashamed of the fact that i'm one of the most emotional people i've ever known would be to be ashamed of myself. i rather explode with emotion than feel none at all.

the world is cruel and cruel things build bitter hearts. take a look at the picture above. " you change your life by changing your heart, " a to the men. harboring negative thoughts/emotions/etc creates a negative atmosphere. you find yourself thinking about more and more things in your life that could be better when you should really just be focusing on the good you already have. i have this problem all of the time so believe me, i'm struggling right along with you. then i find pictures like the one i've posted and realize that i'm the one with the power to change my own life. i choose my attitude, i choose my emotions and damn it, i choose to be happy.

i choose to take a look at myself in the mirror and no longer feel like a fat cow. i choose to stop letting things i can't control control me. i choose to get over the fact that not everyone in the world is going to like me. i choose to stop dwelling on all of the bad things that have happened to me in the past because i know nothing but good things are coming my way in the future. i choose not to believe that the world is going to end on december 21, 2012. i choose to let go of all the extra baggage in my life (preach erykah).

Lord knows i've seemingly been to hell and back more times than i can even count but if doing so continues to lead me to all of the goodness i keep stumbling upon and the ability to touch people with the things i say and/or write, then i say bring it the hell on. nothing brings me more joy than putting a smile on someone's face and/or making someone laugh. i've always believed i have been put on this earth to help people and with every obstacle i overcome, i grow stronger and stronger; strength i exert to relate with others... strength i exert to maybe help others learn from my mistakes. knowledge should never be kept to one's self.

the world is yours for the taking .

. smile amidst your sadness and you shall find peace .

Smiling is infectious,
You can catch it like the flu.
Someone smiled at me today,

And I started smiling too.

whole heartedly, a gift from me to you.

how many times have you heard someone say: " he or she completes me, " a lot, right? i have too and let me just say that it's probably one of the most ridiculous things i've ever heard. i'm sorry if you've said this in your lifetime.. i don't mean to criticize anyone or anything like that. you still have time to learn to grow out of that awful habit.

i believe a lot of the trouble people have with love comes from the preconceived notion that we have to find someone who makes us whole. take a second to travel through my thoughts with me. you want to give everything you possibly can to that one special person you love, right? well, if you're not "whole" then where in the equation are you giving him or her your everything?

in a lot of relationships i've seen go sour, there seems to be one major thing in common and that's one person (or even both) letting past relationships get in the way. why? because those said persons haven't given their heart the ample time it needs to heal. i've seen people jump from relationship to relationship cursing each and every one they break off from. never have i seen these people take responsibility for what they could possibly be doing wrong. they're breaking heart after heart without even knowing let alone caring. fast forward. pause. play. that good person you rushed to be with genuinely cared about you and because you were too selfish to figure out what it is you REALLY want in a relationship before getting into one, you've now left behind a wound in his or her heart; a wound that will take time to heal, time they could have spent being happy with someone who was more than aware of what they wanted, knew how amazing of a person he or she is, and would never even think of causing him or her any harm.

bottom line, you wouldn't want someone giving you their heart half-assed so don't do that to someone else. wounds take time to heal as does a person's heart. you're the only one who knows what it is you have to work on, don't go putting your burdens on someone else. they have burdens of their own. don't bring your past relationship experiences into your present ones, it won't do you any good, trust me. learn from your mistakes and most importantly, forgive those who hurt you. if you don't have confidence in someone to know they would never purposely hurt you, he or she isn't for you.

love takes time.. lots of it. good, lasting relationships are never rushed. take the time to get to know that special someone inside and out. don't force your feelings on someone else, he or she will flee. keep in mind that not all relationships end up working out how you necessarily wanted them to.. it's okay to let go. don't try making someone happy at the expense of your own happiness. you'll end up miserable and hating yourself and/or that person for it. if a person you are interested in has told you they're not ready for a relationship, trust and believe them. if he or she means that much to you, you'll wait and you'd be surprised at how much you'll be blown out of the water when they finally are and the person they're meant to be with is you.

inhale.

i have finally found not only the time but also the energy and stable state of mind to sit down and write. lately, my mind has been all over the place and people say i feel too damn much!? pft, try taking a trip through my mind on a day where not even a lot is happening.. let alone on a day when some drastic shit happens and lately, drastic shit has been happening to me left and mothertrucking right.

sometimes i sit down and wonder why my major isn't psychology. i've always been fascinated by the human mind and my curiosity goes beyond our solar space. why does this person act like this? why does that person think like that? these are a couple of questions out of many i ask myself on a day to day basis. friendship, such a vital thing to me yet something many people could care less about.. or should i say true friendship? yeah.. that.

my true friendship is unbiased and nonjudgmental, loyal and trustworthy, understanding and forgiving. i'll bend over backwards and give up the very clothes on my back to make sure a true friend is okay but to my dismay, this kind of friendship is hardly ever reciprocated. just when i think i've found it, i get down right slapped in the face. then i look down at my head, as illustrated in my entry picture, and wonder what the hell i was thinking. how do you cope with putting all of your trust in someone and finding out there's major things in their lives they're hiding from you? hell, not even major but MINOR things as well. why am i obligated to let you know everything going in my life when you don't even do such a thing?

friendship. just one of many things which makes my head spin all the way around and back again. i have had such a hard time focusing lately.. enough to self diagnose myself with A.D.D. i've been finding it rather difficult to retain information, not just in class, but all around me. i can barely even focus on one thing, let alone all of the million things life has been throwing my way lately and my memory? it's been in shambles. it doesn't help that i can't find anyone who's been able to help me. i always get the shrug of the shoulders and the "well.. i don't really know what to tell you," followed by several uncomfortable laughs, so i'm left to fend for myself, try to stabilize an unstable mind with.. an unstable mind. [insertfakelaughhere].

i'm not afraid of letting the world know i'm having some trouble. frankly, i'm tired of fear. tired of the internal and external battles i fight on a daily basis over love, lust, friendship, success, good and bad decisions, others passing judgment on me and what have you. i'm tired of being stuck in this perpetual state of trying to be perfect in such an imperfect world. it's suffocating and i need to breathe again.

spontaneous combustion...

it feels like i'm going to explode at any random second and that explosion would look just like the picture to your right. my heart (literally) is average sized or small if you will but (figuratively, metaphorically) it covers the world not once but two, three, four, five... an infinite amount of times. i call it my beautiful disaster. you might be asking yourself what would bring me to call it such a thing? well.. i've loved a lot and have suffered a lot.

i love a lot of things in life and a lot of people. i love waking up in the morning to the sun shining through my window. i love "good morning" text messages. i love holding hands with a special person. i love listening to a person's heartbeat. thump, thump, thump. such a powerful, underestimated, hardly ever acknowledged sound that the most powerful organ in our body makes. i could be angry, sad, hating myself for feeling all of these negative emotions towards things i have no control over.. things which keep going wrong no matter what i do, but all i have to do is be still, be silent, and listen... listen to the heart that keeps on keeping on no matter what life throws my way. i could want to punch a hole through the wall or through someone's face for that matter but my heart knows better so therefore, i know better.

i think with my heart. i've doubted many of its decisions but everything happens for a reason and i'm still breathing. my heart is still beating. that has to count for something, right? sometimes, i catch myself wishing i was someone else. an imaginative figure who doesn't feel any emotion, who goes throughout life taking care of business, doing what needs to be done to survive, and "get his/hers." then i open my eyes and realize that's no way to live life. people will let you down but many others will do right by you. people will break your heart but others will nurture it back into good health. every time i'm upset.. i close myself off to the world knowing that to regain some happiness, even in the slightest amount, all i have to do is pick up my phone and make one easy phone call. i realize now, at this very moment, that i need to stop doing that for my own sake. dwelling in misery isn't going to get you anywhere, it isn't going to change anything. have the courage to stand up to negative thoughts, emotions, etc. and say " i'll never let you get the best of me because i'm better than that.. better than this.. "

" first came the hurricane then the morning sun. " - lil wayne
the sun is always rising in the sky somewhere. don't ever feel like you're alone in this world, something i have felt one too many times until this very day, there's always someone out there who cares about you, wants to help you, and is more than willing to do anything in their power to make sure you're okay.

you can call me.

laughing at yourself is good for your soul. you can laugh at me, too.

spread your wings and fly..

i feel as though someone gave up on me today. life isn't easy.. neither are relationships, neither are friendships. do i scare you? why is it that we tend to most walk out on good things (good people) in our lives? if i could reach through this very computer screen and give you a quick shake, i would. i have let too many people walk out on me but tonight, i'm growing the balls to try and keep you from doing so. People are brought into one's life for a reason. stop closing yourself off, now is not the time to be stoic.

" if you believe in me that changes everything. " if you believe in me, i will make it to you.. one way or another. if you give up on me, i'll be out there, but we just might miss each other. if you believe in me, i'll give you all of the space you need because i know you need it. in a short month, you have exposed some of my deepest imperfections and as i work on fixing them, my life gets that much sweeter. i could sit back and do nothing, let time pull us further and further apart.. not distance. if distance was that key detrimental factor in our friendship's progress, it wouldn't have brought us together in the first place. then again, all i can do is say how i feel and you'll take it how you will, do as you see fit, and i'll have no choice but to accept it. for once in my life, i'm opting to take my chances.

my eyes have opened to the notion that what i'm looking for in a significant other isn't here; he isn't close to home. i've become too comfortable, too stuck in things i shouldn't be stuck in. over the years, i created a bubble around myself, a safe haven that isn't necessarily as safe as i coerced myself into thinking. it's kept me caged in insecurities and fear of flying.. fear of becoming who i was destined to be. there is so much more i want to say to you but i'll simply bring this post to a close with this:

we can go our separate ways. you can be with someone who isn't me, i can be with someone who isn't you. i won't connect with him the way i connected with you, he won't make me smile the way you do, he won't keep me on my toes the way you do, keep me in line when i need to open up my eyes and look reality dead in the face, that glow you instilled in me won't be the same because well, he won't be you. no two exact feelings can be attributed to different people. i'll always be here for you. always.

i called this reflection...

life hasn't been very easy for me from the very first day of the first grade .
no bills, no real responsibilities .. sure, but people had some real harsh things to say .

i cried tears as a newborn baby, as a toddler, as a child, as an adolescent, as an angst teen, and now as a woman .
i've suffered many losses, many friendships too unmeaningful to save, too many promises made and left broken .

plenty of late night dreams of awakening to a father's warm embrace, harsh realizations of waking up empty handed .
one too many encounters with demons in disguises painting beautiful pictures only to leave me jam packed in a corner, stranded .

every ongoing step i take with caution .
no room for error, no time for mistakes in fulfilling what this world deems as perfection .

looking out to the world from inside protective barriers with only room for one .
wondering if all of these things were planned for me when realizing who i've become .

and with all i've had to go through, i'm still here, still believing there can be some good in this world .
giving my all to people who whimsically decide to ignore the heart i've layed at their feet and not say a word to me anymore .

no more .

i often find myself a victim to probably the two most annoying words ever.. " what if? " i see no good coming from that mere question. every time these words cross my mind, i start thinking of things i have no business thinking about. i have kept so many thoughts and feelings to myself out of fear.. what exactly am i afraid of? i could probably go on for pages upon pages answering that question. i've come to realize that i have to stop bottling things up before i explode and cause more harm than good. i can't keep carrying the weight of the world on my shoulders. i'm only one person.. a fragile one at that. most of the time, when i'm off in a corner not saying a word is when i have the most to say.

i'm a small woman with a big heart. it gets heavy at times. it's heavy right now. i wear my heart on my sleeve, you can tell everything i'm feeling by my facial expressions. no matter how hard i try, i can't be all dark and mysterious. that's not me. i can't pretend that i don't care about something and/or someone when i do. i can't find it in me to be mean to a person when a person is mean to me without going back and apologizing. doesn't really matter if i did anything wrong in the first place. i swear if i could make all of the people in the world the happiest people they could ever be, i would do it in a heartbeat, even if it was at the expense of my very own happiness.

when i tell you that i miss you and you say nothing in response, the first thing i tell myself is that i shouldn't have said it. " you're doing too much, rinelis.. take a few steps back. " but if i miss you, why wouldn't i want to tell you? maybe i feel too much, too fast but rather than sit in a dark room and shed unnecessary tears over what could possibly be wrong with me, i have to grow up and realize that this is who i am.. and this is how i'll always be. my feelings are intense.. my love is and always will be unconditional. i forgive easily, shed tears frequently. i'm confident in God.. enough to know He made no mistake in creating me.

and so.. if you're to get anything from what it is i wrote today, understand that just because someone doesn't react to something you say and/or do they way you had hoped they would, have the confidence in yourself to know you did what you felt was best, said what you wanted to say and there's absolutely nothing wrong with that. always give a person the benefit of the doubt because you would want him or her to do the same for you. you never know what a person is going through, what he or she is thinking, where he or she has been, what he or she has seen, so on and so forth. there will come a time where that person will think of you and what you may have said and/or done for them. they'll appreciate you for it whether they say something to you about it or not and if they ever come back to you, welcome them with open arms. you always have the power to save a life.

if i could turn back the hands of time..

time. crazy thing to write about huh? i've come to realize that 'crazy' is my second most favorite word because i use it to describe almost every damn thing. random realization aside, i'm sure we've all seen constant movies, tv shows, etc. based on this subject.. whether it be focused on the creation and use of time machines, a boy with a fully developed, grown man's body at the age of ten, or a man who ages backwards. to me, time is of the essence and one of the most powerful things in this world. it builds nations and destroys them. you could miss things in a blink of an eye and once time is gone, it's gone for good. when your time is up, it's up.. there's no going back. there's no going back to that person who you knew loved you more than you could ever possibly imagine but you ignored because you were too wrapped up in being single, sexy, and free. that time where you may have lied to your parents, ended up doing something you weren't supposed to, and went through more distress than happiness.

it's funny being a cancerian woman. i'm emotional, shy, reserved, the works. i spent most of my life in tears and regret.. that feeling where i knew in my heart i should have taken more risks and done a lot more things i wanted but was too afraid to. i tend to look to the past way more than any person should which has caused me a lot of strife but is something i'm repairing each and every day. i can't go back in time and talk to all of the people i wish i would have. i can't go back and stick up for myself when all my peers did was pick on me. i can't put back that keychain i stole from dots and take back those nights where my conscience slowly ate away at me until i finally broke down and told my mother what i had done. i can't keep wasting time being stuck in the past either. every day that i learn to let go of all of my insecurities, brings me more and more happiness. time has taken me through a rocky journey of passing and failing classes, smiling and frowning over crushes, gaining and losing friends, pledging to an amazing sorority, and finally.. time has lead me to this particular person, filled with so much passion for life and all things that make it wondrous.

time is exciting to me again. i find myself fighting epic battles with my sleep because i don't want any time to go to waste in finding out more and more about you. the time i spend talking to you, i want to slow down. the time i spend away from you, i want to speed up. where's my fast forward button? i want to obliterate this distance between us. i'm slowly letting go of all of those regrets i gained over my entire twenty years of life; not just saying i have no regrets because it brought me to where i am today, made me who i am today, but actually believing it.. actually believing it has made me and continues to make me into a better person and lead me to you. whether we flourish into the best of friends or the best of lovers is completely unknown to me but regardless of where time takes us, i know it only leads to bigger, better, brighter, and beautiful things. so i'll look back to today and the days prior with an exceptionally large smile on my face, hold my head up, and prepare for the goodness that tomorrow brings. a future with the most diverse, crazy, and sometimes irritating yet equally phenomenal friendships. a future with prosperity, success, and triumph. the chance to hold your hand as if it'll be the last thing i ever do.. a future with you.

live. laugh. LOVE.

love .. what a subject. i don't really know how to even start this. i want to say that love's a funny thing to me so i guess i will. it makes me laugh. i've always been a caring person, probably too caring for my own good most times, and i've always been a strong advocate for this precious little four letter word. i feel as though when it comes to love, a person can never come half-assed (excuse my french). love, to me, can never be just a half way thing. i'm sure you've experienced how ridiculously hurtful it is to love someone and not have him or her love you in return. i have and it isn't a nice feeling to have, probably the worst after that gruesome feeling i get when i come home and find out someone has ate that last piece of pizza i've been looking forward to eating all day. when i find myself brave enough to take that plunge, i expect that person to take it with me.. no ifs, ands, or buts about it. when i find myself that deep in love, the last thing on my mind is the thought of that person not feeling the same way. i mean.. we've both been on that journey leading towards it together. life isn't perfect, people aren't perfect. there's always that time where someone chews my heart out and spits it back out at me.

my mom sat me down once and while i'm not sure how we even got to the topic of broken hearts, i'm glad it had somehow come up. she took a piece of notebook paper and held it out in front of me. this is how the rest of the conversation went:

mom: "when you break a person's heart, it's like balling up this piece of paper.."
[she balls it up in her hand]
mom: "over time, all of the pain tends to fade little by little.."
[she slowly smooths out the entire piece of paper]
mom: "but no matter what, it is never, ever the same."
[she puts emphasis on the fact that the piece of paper, even if it's no longer balled up, is and will always stay wrinkled]

i told this story to a friend of mine and he said "i'll iron it" and i kindly pointed out that "the iron burns." if i'm ever careful about anything, it's tending to a person's heart. i've had my broken quite a few times and i vowed to try my hardest not to bring that feeling onto another person. when it comes to love, i've learned that i, first and foremost, MUST be patient. love is something that you can never rush. it's scary and what do people do when they're scared.. or MOST people do (:D)? they run and hide! personally, i'm at the point in my life where i don't want to get into a relationship with someone i don't see myself marrying. sure, i'm only twenty and i have a lot more to learn but i don't see the point of being with someone i wouldn't want to marry. relationships, serious ones, last for years. patience; i have to take time out to really get to know a person inside and out. i have to learn all of their good and bad qualities. i'm very cautious and careful, if i can help it, i don't let the bad outweigh the good and if they do, that person's not the right one for me. i won't let myself fall for the whole "i love you but i don't want to ruin our friendship." to me, there's no such thing. if you love me, you'll take that next step with me. you won't take it if you really just don't love me "in that way." trust and loyalty are two very, very important things to me when it comes to friendships and most importantly in relationships. i used to not believe in long distance relationships but i'm older, more mature, etc. etc. if i truly love someone, distance is nothing but a speed bump. getting over it is slow but i still get over it and continue on my merry way, that way to a better relationship.. back into the arms of the person i've invested good time into, who doesn't complete me but compliments me, who i let call me retarded, ridiculous, and random (because i am), who grows each and every day just as i do, who makes mistakes but undoubtedly always holds my best interest at heart because i hold his best interest at heart as well. a man who doesn't compare me to other females because he understands no two people are ever the same and if there was ever anything to compare to, he shouldn't be with me but with her.

i could go on but i have to find somewhere to stop. i can always find another day to continue, find another way of expressing my feelings on love and relationships. i tried to stay as far away from using "you" as possible because i understand that not everyone will agree with what i have to say, not everyone will have gone through what i have and in the end, everyone will form and/or has already formed their own unique definition of l o v e. if i've somehow made an impact on you from writing this, i go to sleep happy. if i've helped you, my mission has been accomplished.. if i've touched you, you have blessed me. it's a blessing to know i've touched a person, made him or her feel good, put a smile on his or her face, the works. smile, it's contagious :).