Wednesday, May 30, 2012

Step into the life you are destined to lead~



Step into the life you are destined to lead~
What would you give up in order to allow yourself to have the life promised to you?
What would you give up in order to have the life that is waiting for you?
What would you give up if you knew that your life could be so much better… so much bigger?
Who would you give up in order to have that life?
What would you let go of in order to have it?
If you knew that your life could be better just by walking away from the life that you know - - would you walk away?
YES!
I would walk away. I have walked away.
Is my life so much better now?
Alicia, if you know that your life can be so much better just by walking away from the life that you know, from the life you’ve been living… then WHAT are you waiting for?
Who’s permission are you waiting for?
You have all the protection from the God’s… all the permission you need.
You have all the love… you have everything that you need.
What are you waiting for?
Step into the life you are destined to lead~
Step into the life you are destined to live~
Step into the life you are destined to have~
Step into the life you are destined to love~
Alicia, you are healed and you no longer have anything to fear?
Why are you afraid when I have promised you my kingdom?
Why are you afraid to step into your power and reside here?
As I breathe father… I feel calm… today I am not afraid to step into my power.
Today I walk with the grace and humility that is I—your child.
Today I remember why I am here and why I have been chosen.
Today I step into my power.
Today I allow myself to live in this place.
And so it is! Ache
Step into the life you are destined to lead~

PLEASE HELP ME GET TO VONA ~ MY DEADLINE IS JUNE 6TH.









Tuesday, May 29, 2012

Thank you for restoring me....


Prayer this morning:
Creator, Thank you for this day. Thank you for allowing me to live another day. Thank you for allowing me to be  and live in the fullness of who I am and what I have been called to do.
Today I ask for so much strength.
Today I ask for continued guidance.
Please continue to protect my Courtney, give her clarity and focus so that she may accomplish all she has been called to do.
Please protect all those I know and love, especially protect those I do not know.
As I begin this day I say Thank you for illuminating my soul and restoring me to who I am and have been called to be.
Today my deepest desire is to get to VONA... please send me angels to help me get there.
MAKTUB. Ache. Amen. And so it is.
TO HELP ME GET TO VONA ~ MY DEADLINE IS JUNE 6TH.

Wednesday, May 16, 2012

What I WAS BORN to do ~


For the past six years I have been preparing for this moment. I have been in training. I have been in the trenches. It has been a real life boot camp in every sense of the word through out all of my day-to-day experiences.
Finally, I have arrived to a point where I am being called to take the next step! A step towards completion!
I have been blessed with working on amazing projects: Afrolatinos: The Untaught Story, completing my memoir~ Finding Your Force: AJourney to Love, and my play I WAS BORN.
Rejection is the word I am meditating on today!
Fear of rejection is the very thing that has often paralyzed me. It has kept me from going after the very thing I want. Over the past few years I have received my share of rejection letters so when you receive the opposite sometimes it can be hard to believe. When you receive that acceptance letter your life changes. You come to understand … rephrase… I come to understand that perhaps those things that I believed I wanted for myself weren’t for my highest and greatest good. That what is meant for me will be mine. My destiny!
All that is meant for me… always arrives right on time!
Before leaving for Cuba I decided that this would be the year that I completed my historical fiction novel: The Daughters of the Revolution (which I have been working on since October, 2006).
I decided that I would no longer wait to sit with the characters from my novel and allow them to finish telling me their stories.
So, before my trip I decided that I would try for a writing residency at the University of California, Berkeley.
My intention was NOT to “want it” badly!
My intention was to “GO FOR IT and GET IT” and work hard once I received it!
When I didn’t hear back by the date they said they would notify all applicants I was sure I wasn’t selected.
My trip to Cuba was an amazing experience. I traveled to Matanzas, Santiago de Cuba, and Habana. I connected with a community of intellectuals. Even the most humble people were incredibly well versed on all subjects: human rights, homophobia, education, health care, politics, music, art and literature. My trip to Cuba was filled with so much beauty ~ truly a spiritual experience!
Once the trip ended it was back to real life…
And there it was… sitting in my inbox an email regarding my application.
I have received these kinds of emails before, “Thank you for your submission, we received countless applications and after careful consideration we regret that we are unable to offer you a space…try again next year!”
NOT THIS TIME!
This time it felt different. This time I took a deep breath and hit open email…
Then I read:
 

“I am pleased to inform you that you have been ACCEPTED!!!!!!”
I have been accepted. Not only does this mean that I have been offered a space, but that a panel decided that my story is one that is important! I cannot express how incredibly joy-filled, grateful, humbled and excited I am all at the same time.
This is my moment~
This the place~
This is where the story the DOTR takes form in a completely different way… with focused intention, direction and determination.
I am so grateful to the NYC Latina Writers Group for being the space that I founded and which FOUND me. It was the safe space where I conceived this novel and this is the year my baby will be born!
This is the story I WAS BORN to write! I have always known this!
We are ALL called to do something spectacular with our lives.
I was called to write!
I was born to write!
I am here to serve and I have always understood the great responsibility that comes with that!
I was called to serve through my writing… to serve stories of women with so much beauty, power and strength.
I was called to give birth to stories that would change history and the stories we pass down to our children. And I am calling YOU to help me get there!
In order for me to secure my space at VONA I must pay a $100 deposit by TODAY, May 16th (which I do not have).
In addition to the deposit, I am having a fundraiser to come up with the total cost of attending the writing workshop. The cost for the VONA Writing Workshop is $1350.00, as well as my airfare, which is an additional $500.
I must raise $1,950.00 by June 6th. I am calling out to the universe and my community to help me get there.
Daughters of the Revolution ~ Donation levels:
$500 ~ Valencia: (2) one-on-one writing sessions – total of four hours, in addition to all of the below. (Transportation must be provided)
$250 ~ Natalia: (1) one-on-one writing sessions – total of four hours, in addition to all of the below. (Transportation must be provided)
$100 ~ Elena: Skype call with author~ in addition to all of the below.
$ 50 ~  Xiomara: Signed copy of Finding Your Force a Journey to Love ~ in addition to all of the below.
$ 25 ~  Lucrecia: hand written note from author ~ in addition to all of the below.
$ 10 ~  Lupe: PDF Version of Finding Your Force a Journey to Love ~ in addition to below.
$ 1 ~    Ofelia: your name included in the acknowledgements of published novel Daughters of the Revolution.
Help Alicia get to VONA 2012~







If you’ve read my work or seen me perform you understand how passionate I am about writing. You understand how important this is to me. You understand that ALL that I write is a gift given to me that is to be shared with the world. Please spread the word far and wide and help me get to VONA.
With so much LOVE, PEACE and GRATITUDE!
Alicia
Who are the Daughters of the Revolution? THEY ARE THE WOMEN YOU NEVER SEE COMING!





Monday, May 14, 2012

The BEST thing a mother can give a child~ Celebrating Mother's Day!

The best thing a mother can give a child...
Is allow them to be who they were born to be. 
The best thing a mother can give a child...
Is allow them to have freedom
The best thing a mother can give a child...
is allow them to be independent
The best thing a mother can give a child...
is allow them to shine
The best thing a mother can give a child...
UNCONDITIONAL LOVE... even when when there are conditions
The best thing a mother can give a child...
space and time to grow
The best thing a mother can give a child...
acceptance
The best thing a mother can give a child...
to not get in the way of their BEING-ness
The best thing a mother can give a child...
to not get in the way of their BIGNESS
The best thing a mother can give a child...
to not be frightened of their greatness

I received an email on Mother's Day from a member of my spiritual family... and it has been on my mind ever since... it was an interview with (3) generations of women (Jada Pinkett Smith, Willow Smith and Adrienne Banfield Jones. Let's put aside that she is a celebrity... let's remove all judgement... let's allow ourselves to experience our own story through their eyes.

Thank you Jose for sending me this beautiful conversation it has marked my soul! 

I received a 2nd email today that devastated me... I will share that email at the end of this post...



Jada to her mother



You never got in the way of my BEINGness...  I LOVE THIS!!!


JPS: “How many moms would have chosen LA?”
Her mom ABJ: “That’s because I knew that’s what you were supposed to do.”
JPS: “We can’t be perfect on all levels but that you were intuitive enough to know who I was. Now that’s one of the best things that you can give a child… to not get in the way of the being of a person.”
JPS tells her mom so NO you might not have been that ideal definition of what a “good mother is” but you never got in the way of my beingness and her understanding of the importance in having that.
JPS: “You keep wanting to talk about the pain and resentment… all of that is a given…was their pain? Yeah of course! Was their disappointment? Of course! If you ask me whether I want to harbor on that or find the power in it. I choose power. What I look for is the power in all things. I look for the beauty in all things.”

LINK TO VIDEO: RED TABLE TALKS PART 1

Daughter on Empowerment...

LINK TO VIDEO: RED TABLE TALKS PART 2

Mother on balance... taking care of ourselves... and that following our dreams is somehow being a bad mother... taking care of others at the expense of ourselves...

LINK TO VIDEO: RED TABLE TALKS PART 3

Jada to Willow... if there was one thing you could change about your life?


WILLOW SPEAKS ~ The brilliance of an 11 year old girl~










I loved watching those videos. I enjoyed the interaction between… grandmother and granddaughter… mother and daughter… daughter and mother… each woman wanting to do IT a little different than the last generation… each woman wanting to be as great or better than the generations passed… each woman incredibly brilliant and beautiful… it was the perfect way for me to start my Mother’s Day as my daughter and I got ready for church. 





After being out of the country for the past few weeks spending time in the Dominican Republic and Cuba I returned home just in time to celebrate Mother’s Day with my beautiful daughter. The day was perfect. My daughter took me to church, then lunch, some shopping, she bought me the BEST present ever an IPAD 3rd generation (LOVE HER). We visited my Tia and then had dinner with my daughter’s boyfriend and his family. It was exactly what I wanted… tranquil… slow… I spent it doing exactly what my body called for. I rested… I walked slowly… I thought about nothing… but there was one person that I did think about my dear friend Patricia. I wondered how she was and I wanted to call her but I didn’t have a chance to. I got home early and went to bed around 10pm.
I woke up this morning and the first email I read was from my old boss at BusinessWeek that my dear friend Patricia lost her mother this past Sunday on “Mother’s Day.” I cried for a while but then I realized that there was something incredibly symbolic and beautiful about her leaving this place and returning home on that day… poetic…
The Lord decided it was time for his daughter to come home… and it was on a day that is meant to honor and celebrate all mothers. My dear friend Patricia loved her mother deeply. There was nothing she wouldn’t do for her. My beautiful friend is a wonderful example of what being a good daughter is.  She never left her side. It is with great sadness that I write today… but at the same time tremendous PEACE and JOY! Because I KNOW that Margaret is resting and that she is finally HOME!
Generations of women…
Mothers
Daughters
Sisters….
We have two choices: Carry all the guilt, shame and blame or release all of it and live the lives we are meant to. Tomorrow is never promised all we have is THIS MOMENT!

Find the POWER in all experiences!!! 
May she rest in peace! Happy Mother’s Day Margaret!

The Essence of Me






Some photos just tell the entire story!

This is me in Cuba last Tuesday.... a spiritual experience!!!

I love the message from my Zodiac Chino for today:

May 14 2012 

Trust your feelings. You may be experiencing some strange changes, doubts or insights about your religious or spiritual beliefs are leading you down a new and to you, untraveled path. You may find that your creative talents provide an unexpected spiritual outlet.


Maferefun Olukum!

Ache~