“Anxiety”

Once I purchased my fancy schmancy camera I vowed that I would stop using crappy phone/Instagram shots for my blog, but for this post the picture is relevant. Plus I’m not about to stand in front of the mirror with my professional camera trying to capture a decent angle of my rack.

One thing before I get into the nitty-gritty of this post. If your one of the four males that reads my stuff I’ll be kind and give you a disclaimer here….

I’m going to talk about my PERIOD. Yes that thing that requires tampons! Gasp!

I can just hear the scampering clicks of men desperately trying to get away from this site right now. Why are men so afraid of period talk? I mean it happens to us every month. If your into girls and you ever want a relationship you guys are bound to have a run in with it at least once in your life. It seems like any mention of red tide comes out and all the dudes in the room get all 4th grade and take themselves to their happy place. Grow up ya pussies!

Whoops. Haha. Hey I warned you it was that time of the month. On to my point.

My.Boobs.Are.Killing.Me.

I took that pic the other day after a sweaty gym session and one of my friends commented that my boobs look like soccer balls. You can tell he’s been avidly watching the World Cup. I have always had big ladies so I usually don’t pay any attention to such comments but at second glace they do really look like soccer balls. You would think I had a recent trip to the plastic surgeon or soemthing. This is all due to my period. The last few months it has just been horrendous!!!!! Not that any period is a trip to Disneyland but honestly I’m concerned.

My cramps have been more painful.
My stomach is damn near distended when it bloats.
I’m so exhausted you would think I’m narcoleptic.
Flow is HEA-VY.
My boobs are super sore and HUUUUUUGE!!!

I know what your thinking ladies. That I should quit my whining and get some Midol. Honestly I’m no stranger to tough monthlys being that I became a woman at 12 and they have always been harsh. But is this Endometriosis or something? I know, I know. Go to the doctor.

Blah. I dont wanna.

Music is the lyrical heartbeat of my soul.
My stories are beautifully illustrated with with its sound.
When life gets too hard for truth my words may fail, but the melodies speak the truth that my mouth cannot.
It’s nothing short of amazing when someone speaks that language too.

The world as I have known it has been filled with Black and White.
Impenetrable lines with no chance of changing shade.
Here’s to crossing the line, taking the leap of faith and adding a little Grey.

When you look at that picture what do you see? If you follow this blog at all you may be familiar with that girl. If you just so happened to stumble across my little corner of the world at random today then hello! That image you see above is me… R!LEY COUTURE or as very few know me anymore Raquel Segarra.

The reason I ask you what you see when you look at that picture whether you are familiar with me or not, is because I have been questioning what others see in me quite often lately.  For me that image is deceiving. It covers hurt, anxiety and fear. I suppose in times of turmoil its a natural reaction for me to look inward and criticize. Mind you I was not always this way. Once upon a time I was so very sure that I was such a master of my own universe that the idea of seeing past the end of my own nose was as foreign as the idea of unicorns existing among us. I was confident, arrogant and self serving.  Now before you decide to click away from this post thinking its nothing more than a pity party just bare with me. A point is coming I promise.

In the image you see above the makeup is abundant, the eyelashes are false, and the hair is my go-to clip in weave. Does this make me fake? Or is this just a better representation of what I want my image to be? Be the best self you can be is what all self help gurus tell us right? Looking  even further that girl looks joyous, excited and put together. It is not to say that I am never those things but that picture was taken meres month ago and in this moment I can say that I honestly don’t feel that way. Enter the struggle between all  that is my public persona and my personal life. But one thing I have always enjoyed about the cross pollination between the two is my ability to be open and share to the point of TMI. Someone described me the other day as having a wall. This bothered me to my core. Me, the girl that believes in fairy tales and nine times out of ten over shares has a WALL?

Again…. a noteworthy point is coming.

This season of life has presented me with a set of challenges that I have not yet experienced to this level.  Plainly put my health has not been good. I am scared and have no answers as of yet. I have been trying to put on a brave face and hide it as much as I can from those that solely know my public persona. Its my job to entertain and that has always been my joy. When I am behind a microphone your smile is my sole purpose. Changing your day in a positive way is the goal.

Who am I without that?

But now my brave front seems to be seeping into my real life presenting itself as a wall. Even as I type this I think why is it so hard for me to openly admit that here? That I am human and I may possibly be sick? Here, in this place where I have shared everything. My heartbreaks and my triumphs. My highest and lowest moments. I suppose its because its beyond my control.

Or is it?

Self help gurus also often say that attitude is everything. More than that my faith tells me that all things are possible with God. Told ya I had a point…

Here it is.

I was talking to my sister about this yesterday and after a hour long inspirational conversation she sent me this…

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yKwo-D9UpWA&w=560&h=315]

Oh how I lover her!

If you looked at the length of the video at decided to not watch it all the way through don’t feel bad. Even though my sister sent it to me as a beacon of hope I did the same thing at first. But today, I decided after a day of worry that I would commit to watching it and receiving its message.

I am, that I am…..

When you read that what does it say to you? Have you ever been in love? Really and TRULY been in love? I asked myself that very question and if I’m quite honest the answer may very well be no for me. I have loved and been loved in return but not to that description that you see above.

Love is kind? Love does not envy? Love is patient? Love does not insist in having its own way?

Ay. Talking about starting over at square one with my idea on true amore.

I went back to church on Sunday and as I was walking up the gravel road to the campus (Yes I wore more sensible shoes this time) I started thinking about love. Like what does it really mean? In any situation whether it be a friend, family, lover,  some random person you cross paths with…. What is love really all about? Sure enough God popped up and said hello to me just in the unexpected way he had before in this church. One of the greeters handed me a pamphlet with an infectious grin on her face and inside was this….

HOLY FORREST GUMP MOMENT! “Somethang bite meeeey!” I mean geeeeez! That discussion on sabotage isn’t until next Sunday but you bet your sweet little tush that I will be there!!! That little card was enough to peak my attention even more as to what was filling my heart inside this church’s walls. It describes more of my notion of love than is comfortable for me to admit.

The current service I was attending was all about love and how we should love each other as God wants us to.  Freely and openly and even if we don’t really want to. Normally, or at least I have been guilty of this, we think of love as Valentines day, wedding vows, marriage, Hallmark cards and warm fuzzies. While those are all forms of love I had never put into perspective that real love is different.  its oh o much more that I thought. In love I have been unkind, I have been selfish, I have been jealous. Man that sucks to write and realize that. As many times as I have uttered the words, have I ever been woman enough to do more than just say them? One thought keeps creeping into my mind while I yearn for this one thing in my life that seems to elude me.

To receive love you have to live in love.

Now that to me is a smack you in the face kind of thought. Maybe love isn’t just meant to be solely felt in those three words that we so often throw around without real meaning.  For me its beginning to mean being n love with life.

Being in love wit that unexpected cool breeze during my run when I was letting my mind distract me from how pretty the weather was.

Being in love with how friggin cute my dog is when she gets all spastic and wants to play when I’m in the middle of doing my abs.

Being in love with how many AMAZING friends that have been placed in my life. That have saved my life.

Being in love with my career that I have worked so hard for.

Being in love with my Mommy and how she prays EVERYDAY for my happiness so much that sometimes she sacrifices her own.

Bottom line is that I think, I hope, I PRAY that I’m onto something here. I want to live life in love no matter the circumstance. No matter the road that God is leading me towards. I am not going to be unrealistic and say that all my bitterness and resentment has floated away but I’m workin’ on it. Its been a long time coming so it won’t happen overnight. But this much I can say. I am closer than I was before.

~ LOVE and Hugs and Smiles~ R!LEY COUTURE

This is a tough one for me to write. I’m not really sure about how I can dance around the subject so I’ll just come out with it. Lately I have been truly questioning my faith in GOD. Yes the girl that has a Cross, The Dove Of Peace, and Psalm 27:14 forever inked on her body is unsure as to whether or not GOD is truly listening. It seems as though my life for the past five years…or maybe even longer than that has been littered with heartache. Now I know that my kind of heartache could be considered a day at Disneyland in comparison to what TRUE heartache looks like, but in my selfish world I feel like I have cried a lot of tears.

As I type this my mind starts to run away from me as to why I began writing in the first place. Oh yea, feather-like faith.

I have always believed in GOD because its what I was raised with. Perhaps that’s not entirely true. I believed in God enough to ask him for good things, enough to praise him when good things came around. But never enough to trust him when I was in the dumps. I would always turn to a friend, boyfriend or whatever else I could grasp onto to give me the pep talk that would give me strength for another day. As you can probably tell that hasn’t worked out so well for me.

I’m not going to go into detail about the array of crap that has gone down in my life that most recently brought me to this point because in all honesty its the same shit different day. I’m about to be 32 in a week. Where does this chaos end?

With God? Er… WITH GOD!

I am supposed to say that with gusto and certainty right? I’m ashamed to say but that has been hard for me. I never thought I would admit that for whomever in reading this to see.  But there ya have it.

So tonight something happened. I’m not gonna call it a monumental change in me because I still feel pretty heavy. But something did in fact happen. I decided to go back to church tonight and try out this new one called Crosspoint. Its big with lots of stage trappings, sound systems, and a HUGE amount of people go and worship there. That had me a little timid but I needed to ask God a few things. So I went.

I pull up to the packed parking lot where volunteers are waving the cars to a far away lot in the back. I’m thinking boy did I ever wear the wrong type of shoes for this. Typical me. My mind is suppose to be on God and I’m thinking about my shoes. I start trekking up to the church campus on a gravel road and notice a group of women and their kids getting into a golf cart shuttle. I keep walking thinking there wasn’t going to be room for me, but just then a beautiful lady calls out to me and says “There’s room for one more. Save your shoes!” Well then…that’s my kind of lady! I get in and sort of mindlessly listen to their conversation about how their little girls wanted to sit in the back of the golf cart. The women were joking about how when you grow up and have kids that you have to give up things like Pop Tarts and sitting in the back of the golf cart to let the kids have their fun. I though that was so unselfishly adorable. I often envy people like this lady and  wonder why I can’t be so selfless and take pleasure in small things like Pop Tarts. I haven’t had a Pop Tart in yeeeaaars!

There I go again. Getting off track.

Back to Feather-like Faith. So as the service started it was much of the same for me. The songs were wonderful and uplifting and I started to cry. My eyeballs burst open like Niagara falls anytime I go to church. Something this time was different though. I felt empty, with no connection to where I was and what was happening around me. I figured for sure that even though my faith was fragile that I would get to church and feel it all come upon me like a cleansing wave. Nope. Wasn’t happening and it was scaring the hope right out of me that I couldn’t feel anything but pain. I gave it another song or two and finally sat down among this sea of standing believers and started to pray in the most honest way that I could.

“God are you there?” “God why don’t you love me anymore?” “God why can’t I feel you?” “God please touch me and let me know you are there.” “God I am here waiting for you.”

That’s when some thing that could only be described as a wicked coincidence or God answering me happened. I’m  thinking it has to be the latter.

As I sat there with my head down and my hands clasped together I felt someone hugging me from behind. It was a woman and she was frail but so warm in her embrace that I started to bawl. She held me a little while longer as I tried to catch my breath and whispered in my ear “God put me in that carriage next to you for a reason and it wasn’t because of your shoes.”

WOA. Whaaaaaaaaat? I was stunned, hopeful and blubbering with tears at this point. The lady from the golf cart! I was still trying to process and get a hold of my waterworks when she she said something that I couldn’t quite make out over the singing but I think she said “God wants you to know that he’s here with you.”

This only made me sob harder but she she held onto me and let me weep. The thing is, that even though this was a perfect stranger I held onto her as if my life in that moment depended on it. I dunno perhaps it did. There is something to that. Trusting in a perfect stranger promising me that God has this thing I call life handled. Isn’t faith all about trust?

Another song began and I was able to stand but this angel was’t going to leave my side just yet. She jumped over the row and stood beside me, letting me know that she AND God were still there.  She stayed beside me though the rest of the song and the short service. After the lights came on we talked a bit and she told me her name. Lisa. Which is my Aunts name as well. Lisa told me that if I wanted a family to worship with that I could be part of her family. Tears came in waves again. She hand wrote her number on a little card and told me it was not a cell  but her house number where she could be found 90% of the time. She asked for my number and wrote it on another little card and put it back into her purse that I noticed was filled with Christian books. I then gave her another gripping hug which was returned with the same strength and I said goodbye and that I hoped to hear from her soon. Which I have no doubt that I will.

As for my Feather-like Faith? I can’t say that it is completely restored to where it should be but I will say this. Thank you GOD for small miracles.

~ Hugs and Smiles ~ Raquel Segarra

This has been my mantra the last few days. Or at least I have tried to make it that way. There a days that waking up at 4 am makes for an UBER grumpy R!LEY during the day. It’s almost as if every little errand or chore becomes a huge effort. What? I have to buy toilet paper?  The tub is looking grimy? The garbage needs to be taken out? Car is super dirty? Laundry?  Meh. It can wait until after my nap.

Well. I need to pep it up. Gotta get my “Hut-To-Hut-To” on.

I need to complain less.

I need cherish more.

I need to smile more.

Mind over matter. Mind Over Matter. Mind over matter. Mind over matter.

Say it with me….MIND OVER MATTER.

The other day I was recording something in the studio when I hit a road block. Its like writing block only with your mouth. Yea, mouth block in no fun when its your job to talk. My day was only half over and I felt so deflated. I  just wanted to curl into a ball and nap. This may sound cheesy, but I literally just repeated “Mind Over Matter” to myself and it  was just the self-pep talk that I needed.

Just as a side note, I LOVE my job and could not imagine doing anything else. It’s a part of who I am.  Even if it causes wrinkles and baggy eyelids. 🙂

Even though I have a lot more challenges ahead of me as I step into the next phase of my life and have a husband and hopefully a family of my own, I need to keep am open mind and just breath through it. (Yes people I know it gets worse after you have kids) Everyday that I get through minus the “I don’t wanna attitude” is like a trophy for me.

Mind Over Matter. Mind Over Matter. Mind Over Matter.

~ Hugs and Smiles ~ R!LEYC OUTURE

I saw this and it got me thinking. Well to be honest I have been doing some thinking on the subject of  friendship for a minute and today I feel like opening up about it. When your little you make friends on the playground, and if your lucky you keep them close in some way shape or form for the rest of your life. Or at least that’s what the movies and kid books would have you believe.

Well, I was not that girl that had a lot of childhood friends. I always had one or two besties around but they seemed to recycle every few years. There was never that one rock solid girlfriend to turn to. I know some people that have a handful of people that they can say they have know for X amount of years and are still incredibly close with them. Confession  I am jealous of these people.

In order for this to not be a complete pity party, I will say I have two or three girlfriends that are really close to me. The one I’ve known the longest of these ladies is the ONLY friend I can say that knew me before my name was R!LEY.   And honestly, that is why I completely trust her. She has seen me at my worst, best, and then worst again. She has never judged or told me what to do. She gives me her opinion freely and honestly. She does it in such a way that and I just listen.

I feel like I need to give a disclaimer here. I’m not discounting any of the other close friendships I have acquired over the last few years. I am incredibly grateful for them too. But that’s really not what this rant is about.

When I started planning my wedding there was a few people that I just knew would be there by my side that are just nowhere in sight today. You know what they say…weddings bring out the best and worst in people. I do think it’s a God sent that I have shed these people from my life but it still hurts.

You see, when I make a friend they are usually with me for life. Even if I end up despising them later. There is always something in me that will remember the good in them even if they have wronged me.

Geez this is becoming a pity party rant.

Er, sorry.

Basically what i’m trying to say is that I’m trying to trim the fat in my life before I embark  on a new journey. That journey being becoming a new wife and God willing a mom.

I have shed the “radio friends”.

I have shed the fair weather friends.

I have shed the friends that were a complete caricature of who I really thought they were.

Crappy. But true.

Any advice on this? How do you fully let go of “freinds” that are really frenemies?

~ Hugs and Smiles ~ R!LEY COUTURE