Episode 3: Jamaican Inspiration
I'm not sure why it seems Caribbean natives especially 'yaadies' find inspiration so hard to come by. On a daily basis you can simply take a look at random parents that have young children and you might find more times than often that their facial expressions might be really miserable or they are frequently shouting after them so much so that those same kids even if they are not relatively troublesome or mischievous children start to react immediately. Depending on how aggressive that family setting is, those same kids quickly end up forsaking their childhood or forgetting fun activities that were the order of the day at one point due to the constant bombardment of overbearing third-world frustrations and substituting it for more adult forms of entertainment to vibe to such as hardcore activities like frequenting parties at very young ages especially those world renown Dancehall parties and events.
While living in Jamaica and observing situations like this on a daily basis, it often reveals that many persons look 'overly-serious' as if to say, “Nothing is more stressful than my life”. If that is the case for every Jamaican, what exactly do foreigners see or hear about Jamaica that has them going so crazy over this place?
Travelling brings one of the nicest feelings I can think of when I close my eyes and fantasize about something that interests me… but travelling as a Jamaican??? That energy is off the hook for me! Looking back, I am very grateful that I was frequently blessed with the opportunity to travel overseas mostly to the US especially as a juvenile, and it had always been a wonderful experience but my first trip to Canada was one of the most resonating. Who would have guessed that my greatest adventure of all however, would have been in a country where they don’t even speak English? I will be doing a lot more travelling for the rest of my life... but that adventure in Mexico has definitely certainly made the most defining impact in my life.
That’s where I started to realize that my environment had a lot to do with the way I thought. I felt in charge of my emotions for the first time consciously and I didn’t even want to feel any negativity near me. Everything I ever wanted to do, I was doing plus more. Anybody that found out I was Jamaican would instantly start asking questions as if they were desperate to absorb the energy that they needed all their life that only a Jamaican could give them. Of course it felt good, but it automatically made me wonder... how come everybody else where I came from couldn’t get this same experience? The more I thought about it was the more key lessons began to reveal itself.
Everything that we think about continuously will inevitably become our reality. Eventually, I realized the more negative thoughts ran through my head, the more things would be a drag. It took me a while to learn about my “emotional guidance system” which is a key dictator of my personality and mentality. Anything that I thought about would either make me feel “OK” or “not OK”. To be clearer, a positive mood would indicate that I was frequently thinking about something cool, and a negative vibe would mean I was thinking negatively for a prolonged period of time. So, even though I eventually figured all that part out, how come inspiration was still hard to come by?
We all can use our energy positively. There are so many things in the Caribbean that stand out, that it amazes everybody around the globe. Our music “sell-off”, or dancing “sell-off”, our cuisine, our athletic and sporting prowess, or dialects… our whole culture (this link makes JA'can culture pop out of your monitor or whatever you're reading this blog on) 'sell-off!' and it also seems that the whole world gains unlimited positive energy from us; so why can’t we appreciate ourselves as well?
Don't be no drag!
While living in Jamaica and observing situations like this on a daily basis, it often reveals that many persons look 'overly-serious' as if to say, “Nothing is more stressful than my life”. If that is the case for every Jamaican, what exactly do foreigners see or hear about Jamaica that has them going so crazy over this place?
Travelling brings one of the nicest feelings I can think of when I close my eyes and fantasize about something that interests me… but travelling as a Jamaican??? That energy is off the hook for me! Looking back, I am very grateful that I was frequently blessed with the opportunity to travel overseas mostly to the US especially as a juvenile, and it had always been a wonderful experience but my first trip to Canada was one of the most resonating. Who would have guessed that my greatest adventure of all however, would have been in a country where they don’t even speak English? I will be doing a lot more travelling for the rest of my life... but that adventure in Mexico has definitely certainly made the most defining impact in my life.
That’s where I started to realize that my environment had a lot to do with the way I thought. I felt in charge of my emotions for the first time consciously and I didn’t even want to feel any negativity near me. Everything I ever wanted to do, I was doing plus more. Anybody that found out I was Jamaican would instantly start asking questions as if they were desperate to absorb the energy that they needed all their life that only a Jamaican could give them. Of course it felt good, but it automatically made me wonder... how come everybody else where I came from couldn’t get this same experience? The more I thought about it was the more key lessons began to reveal itself.
Everything that we think about continuously will inevitably become our reality. Eventually, I realized the more negative thoughts ran through my head, the more things would be a drag. It took me a while to learn about my “emotional guidance system” which is a key dictator of my personality and mentality. Anything that I thought about would either make me feel “OK” or “not OK”. To be clearer, a positive mood would indicate that I was frequently thinking about something cool, and a negative vibe would mean I was thinking negatively for a prolonged period of time. So, even though I eventually figured all that part out, how come inspiration was still hard to come by?
We all can use our energy positively. There are so many things in the Caribbean that stand out, that it amazes everybody around the globe. Our music “sell-off”, or dancing “sell-off”, our cuisine, our athletic and sporting prowess, or dialects… our whole culture (this link makes JA'can culture pop out of your monitor or whatever you're reading this blog on) 'sell-off!' and it also seems that the whole world gains unlimited positive energy from us; so why can’t we appreciate ourselves as well?
Don't be no drag!
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