Good vs. Evil

When a little baby is born, fairies and princess' start appearing in that home as well as prince's and superhero's and villain and bad guys. The questions to be asked are, Will good always win? Does Evil have to live? Teaching our children that good will always win is an important message, but we never teach our children the full message.

 

Yes, Good will always prevail, but if you have ever watched any fairytale story ever good never prevailed with out a little evil getting in the way. Here is the one message that we seem to be forgetting to teach our children. Evil will always try and win, that is just what evil knows how to do. Good will win in the end, but it will never win without some extremely hard work, dedication, and some sacrifices. Nobody wants to give up something, but sometimes it just might be for the better.

 

Of course as a child everything is a grey area until told otherwise by their parents. In today's society what is good and what is evil can be put in a constant grey area. Now with all the different religions and beliefs and different ways of life, what could be good to one family could be evil(bad) to another.

 

One thing that is a constant good is Love. Love is love, it's warm it's cozy, it's never ending. We preach this happily ever after to our little girls and little boys but we jump to the end where they all live happily ever after. Therefore skipping the hard work and sacrifice's that it took to get to the happily ever after.

 

People sacrificed their lives so that every race would be considered equal. Many brave men and women gave up their lives so that we as a nation could be free. "Real leaders must be ready to sacrifice all for the freedom of their people." Nelson Mandela.

 

So when we teach our children fairytale's and the battle of good vs. evil. Please let's tell them the entire story. That good will prevail, that they may have to sacrifice the things they love the most. We need to teach our children that it good may prevail right away or it may take years and years for good to prevail. Teach them that no matter what their happily ever after may be that it's not magic that got them there. It's through their own hard work and determination and sacrificing that their happily ever after occurred.

 

Here are some quotes that we should teach our children,

 

"Man's goodness is a flame that can be hidden but never extinguished". Nelson Mandela

 

"Inside each of us, there is the seed of both good and evil. It's a constant struggle as to which one will win. And one cannot exist without the other". Eric Burdon

 

"Wisdom we know is the knowledge of good and evil, not the strength to choose between the two". John Cheever

Never Grow Up!!

Love, the glorious four letter word that every grown-up strives for. So many say that it happens when its supposed to happen. I have been chasing after something I thought was love for so long, but what I didn't know was that I wasn't chasing after love, it was the idea. There are so many romance movies out there that set up this idea of what love should be like, what it should look like. I wanted that, and I was willing to do anything for it, I was even willing to loose myself in the process. They say getting older makes you wiser, that's very true, it has come to my attention that I have been searching and fighting for something that wasn't obtainable, it wasn't realistic.

 

What does love mean to me? To me love is pure and genuine and unique to the individual. Love is something that makes your heart beat faster, makes you skip a breath. It could happen instantaneously or it could grow over time. Love means never having to lose yourself while trying to obtain love. This four letter word can mean so many things to so many different people, but no matter who the individual is it holds one name, Love.

 

Here is what I know about this four letter word. I know that no matter what happens in my life, love is something that will knock me off of my feet, even if I know its coming. Here's why, love is not about the person your with it's about you. Love is what happens when your by yourself thinking about a memory that maybe that special someone has shared with you, and you can't help but let out a little giggle. It's not the person you shared that memory with its the moments and memories that you created with that person that made you giggle.

 

I love, love. The heartbeat you had no idea you had, the idea that there is someone out there that you have never even met, that all of the sudden makes you smile uncontrollably.

 

Here is the kicker, Love does not have to be purely romantic, it could be your best friend, a sibling a relative a parent. Not too long ago I met my best friends, and its funny I never thought that I could be so utterly happy and content with not having a boyfriend. I always thought that I had to have a boyfriend, I guess I just need my two best friends. They are the best ladies I have ever met.

 

Love means never having to grow up, its the uncontrollable laughter. The quirkiness of the stupidest joke that no matter what makes you stop and laugh. Of course there is always the part of a scripture in the Bible that fits perfectly, Love is patient, Love is Kind...

JUST BE U....NIQUE!!!

Growing up in the society of today is very daunting, there is all this pressure to slide right in and be perfect. However nobody is perfect and not a single one of us looks or acts the same, I am unique holds a certain truth to it. I had experienced all sorts of peer pressure growing up, to put it simply I was different than all the other children my age, certain things had to be done differently for me, no I didn't get special treatment. Not only do children have to find the right clique to fit into but they are some how supposed to know who they are in the process. I will admit right now, at twenty-four years old, i'm still figuring out who I am. Which only proves the point that age ten, I had absolutely no idea who I was or what I was going to be or where I fit in.

When I was about fifteen or sixteen I stumbled upon something I had no idea was going to change my life forever. That thing that I stumbled upon was dance, I started watching every dance movie I could find, I became obsessed. I was mimicking everything the dancers in the movies were doing. I realized that dance was taking over my life. I had learned to feel again, I had learned to deal with my problems instead of bottling them up and letting the volcano of emotions explode on the first poor unfortunate soul that I had come into contact with.  

Dance taught me so many things, it taught me that, I was never alone. There are so many people out in the world going through the same that I was going through. Suddenly the feeling of loneliness had evaporated, it was as if every time I danced, I felt closer and closer to those just like me. I know it may sound silly, but dance taught me to breathe, dance taught me to listen to focus and just relax.

I will be the first one to say that dance may not be the one thing that "saves" everyone. Everyone has that one thing that is theirs, that one thing that kind of helps them grow up and evolve. That one certain activity that teaches them about themselves. 

The pressure that this world puts on us to be perfect doesn't need to break us or bend us in ways we don't want too. There are many different outlets in which we as humans can find our saving grace, our place where as humans can find out who we truly are without the pressure from the outside world. For me that was my basement, dancing; the person next to me could be in the art studio painting. The guy on the other side of the room, his saving grace could be restoring old cars, it's not the activity that saves us, its ourselves. 

Don't let the world bend or break you down, to where you no longer know who you are. 

JUST BE YOU!!

There is always a beginning...

There is a beginning to every story, my story is no exception. I was in tenth or eleventh grade when I first read a quote by a very influential leader to our nation, no it wasn't a president, it wasn't even a male. Eleanor Roosevelt once said, "The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams". But if one were pair that with Mohandas Gandhi's quote, "Be the change you want to see in the world", then and only then would they realize that they have found the secret to success. To this day when I think of the one quote the other quote pops into my head. My name is Janessa Leonard, I am a very strong-willed and passionate person, that is because I have never forgotten the words of these two influential leaders. Neither Eleanor nor Mohandas had an easy life,  they had everyday struggles just like any normal human being would, but they were never known for those moments, because they took those everyday struggles with a grain of salt.  It wasn’t until they were faced with a fork in the road, that they made a decision that would not only change their life but would also change the life of so many others down the road.

 I may not know what my future holds, nor will I worry about it. The only truth that I know is that my future is bright and my future belongs to me. Whatever I dream about, whatever changes I wish to see, they are beautiful and they mean everything. My future whatever it may hold, holds one concrete truth, that is that justice, honesty and integrity are the three things that I will always fight for. No matter what the stakes are Justice must prevail, honesty must triumph over deviousness, and integrity will never bow down to corruption for as long as I live. The list of things that I will fight for hold many more, but those three are the basis of everything I do, with the help of God's will and guidance.

The world we all live in today is losing its beauty is losing its foundation on which it was built, there is more and more deceitfulness from our nations' leaders than there ever was. Living in a world like this makes me so aggravated and irritated to think about the future. The generations before me gave everything they had so that our lives would be simpler and what is my generation doing for future generations? We are tearing down everything that they once worked so hard for, we are not making our future generations lives easier, we are making it more and more complex.

 Here is what I plan to do, I am going to fight for Justice, Honesty and Integrity. I want to make a difference in this world and I'm not going to be able to do that while hiding behind my fears of what other people think of me. No, I can not keep holding in my opinion, I will not bite my tongue nor will I "suck it up". I'm not fighting for the future of my world, I'm fighting for the future of my future children and their children, and many more generations to come. This world needs more people who are willing to step up and say, my children's future has got to be better than this. To step up and say, this is not how this story ends.

 It is time for those who believe in the beauty of their dreams to make a change and build a better future for following generations. Every story has a beginning but does the story that my generation is writing, does it have a happy ending for the generations yet to come?