The “D” Word

by desing | Faith & Purpose

Do you control life or do you allow your life to control you? You might find yourself reacting to every little thing that happens to you if you don’t exercise this one principal which is the dreaded thing called discipline. You have a choice when it comes to being disciplined, and you either choose the pain of discipline or the pain of regret.

The pain of discipline weighs ounces but the pain of regret weighs tons. You might buy something on your credit card that you know you can’t afford; the instant gratification feels good until you see your credit card statement and now you have to pay back what you bought plus interest. So although you’ve bought those new shoes or you’re going on that European vacation, you’re now pushing yourself further into financial lack.

Or maybe you don’t know how to discipline your emotions so you’ve said something mean and hurtful in an argument with your boyfriend. Once those words come out of your mouth, you can’t take them back and as a result of your lack of discipline in the area of your emotions, you’re now faced with an unnecessary break-up.

I know being disciplined is not fun at first but the rewards that you experience in the end are one thousand times better than the instant gratification you receive by not being disciplined. Who wants to wake up an extra hour earlier to work out? Most people don’t but when you begin to do so and you see the results then your drive to achieve your fitness goal will be intensified.

Discipline is always rewarded. The key to remaining disciplined is consistency and learning to delay your gratification. You have to continuously exercise discipline so that you can become stronger at it. Start by giving yourself realistic goals so that you can grow in confidence. For example, let’s say that you want to pay off 50% of your credit card debt within the next year. One of the first things you can do is not put anything on your credit card that you cannot pay back in full at the end of the month for the next 12 months. Instead of saying that you won’t ever use your credit cards again, you’re exercising discipline to only charge what you can pay back.

Be careful not to get satisfied with incomplete, mediocre results which you’ll be tempted to do when you’ve been consistent for a while and think that you “deserve” a splurge. You might be exercising discipline for a few months and although you haven’t hit your goal, you decide to treat yourself by spending more than you can pay back. You tell yourself that it’s only this one time but it’s only opening the door for you to experience the pain of regret later. Or let’s say you’ve decided to exercise discipline by choosing not to date anyone who doesn’t share the same morals and vision for marriage as you do. You’re doing great for a few months and out of your loneliness, you decide to go back to dating someone that you know you have no business dealing with anymore.

Choose plan A for your life instead of being content with plan B, C, D or even E. What I mean is that you’re in control of experiencing the best that life has to offer you but if you keep making bad decisions, you’re going to experience the pain of plan B and plan C. If what you’re doing right now is jeopardizing your overall success, is it worth it? I don’t think so.

I know you want the best of life and it begins with you.

Take some time over the next few days to determine where you lack discipline in your life. Is it in your finances, emotions, eating habits, time management, or daily routine? Once you determine that, write down your plan to become more disciplined in that area. Maybe you have to eliminate some toxic relationships, put yourself on a budget or start packing your own healthy meals to work – it’s time to grow up and learn to delay your gratification.

I know it’s not easy but even 5-year olds are starting to understand how much more rewarding being disciplined can be! Watch this hilarious video and I promise you that if they can do it, so can you!

XOXO,

Maria I. Melendez
@embraceherlegacy

Controlling Your Fears

by desing | Faith & Purpose

Did you know that fear is the 2^nd most powerful human emotion? I’m so sick of seeing fear hold us back from believing, receiving and seeing the best that life has to offer. Fear is such a liar and loves to come disguised in many ways, in particular, it loves to come disguised as being practical.

Being in bondage to any fear in your life stops today!

There are actually two types of fear. One is external fear which is what we feel when our outside circumstances are threatened – like if you wake up in the middle of the night to hear someone lurking around in your kitchen. Then, there are internal fears which are the imagined fears that play out in your mind. They usually come in form of threats of the future and are presented in our minds as all the negative probabilities that can happen.

After years of working with women, I’ve noticed that common internal fears we face include: fear of rejection, fear of failure, fear of success, fear of pain, and fear of financial distress. These fears love to paint a picture of the worst possible scenarios. Instead of recognizing that these are fear-based thoughts, you fail to respond to your thoughts appropriately and proceed to meditate on the fear while believing it, receiving it and acting out on it.

Don’t feel bad if this is you because most of us have been programmed to think this way. Most of us who are in bondage are usually control-freaks because it’s a form of perceived protection.

Fear attracts negativity into your life because what you focus on, you empower to grow. Faith and fear are essentially the same thing; the only difference is that you believe for the worst in one and the best in the other. It’s the same muscle that you’re using because you have to believe something that you cannot see in this physical, tangible world yet. Instead of choosing to act out of fear, you could have stopped for a moment and chosen faith.

In a world where we like to be instantly gratified, having faith for the best can be such a challenge. Fear and common thinking says, “I won’t believe it until I see it” while faith says, “I believe it so I know I will see it.”

I want you to think about where in your life have you been in bondage to fear? What lies are you listening to in your mind that has held you back from experiencing the life that you deserve? Perhaps you really, really like a new guy that you’re dating but the fear of getting hurt again is holding you back from fully committing. Perhaps you really want to pursue a new career, but the fear of rejection from loved ones is keeping you in bondage to stay in a position that isn’t fulfilling you. Or maybe you want to become an entrepreneur but fear of financial lack and failure has stopped you from trying. If that’s the fear that you’re struggling with, I encourage you to have a “5 to 9” life. You may have a 9 to 5 but what are you doing after work? Are you just going home to watch TV and scroll through social media and wake up tomorrow to do it all over again?  Everyone asks me how I transitioned from employed to entrepreneur and one of the ways I was able to do that was because I worked on my business after work and oftentimes during work.

After you’ve identified what fear has been taking control in your mind, I want you to get a journal, write that fear-based thought down and create a faith-filled, replacement thought. Every time that fear thoughts comes to your mind, replace it with that new faith thought. Speak it out loud if you have to. This is no longer about simply thinking positive, this about you learning to exercise the power of controlling your thoughts and fashioning your thoughts to work for you and no longer against you.

Don’t be so hard on yourself either because it takes research shows that it takes 3 cycles of 21 days to break a bad thought habit. You may want to start on transforming one thought at a time so that you can grow in confidence. I told you that the 2^nd most powerful human emotion is fear, and I know you’re thinking what’s the 1^st one? It’s love! You’re going to have to let the love for your best life to drive the desire to defeat your fears.

You wouldn’t tolerate a liar who always comes to destroy what you’re working on to continue to be in your life would you? So why keep allowing fear to do the same?

You got this!

XOXO,

Maria I. Melendez
@embraceherlegacy

How Do You See Yourself?

by desing | Faith & Purpose

When another woman who is smarter, more attractive and has significantly more money and status than you walks into the room, how do you react? Do you squirm in your seat or do you feel just as confident as you did before she walked into the room?

If your confidence or your security is in being the most educated, most influential or best mom ever, then your self-worth is going to constantly be threatened. Too often we allow the labels of this world to determine how we see ourselves and if what you do or what you have does not meet’s society’s standards of success then you’re deemed inadequate.

That’s a lie from the pit of hell!

Your self-concept is all determined by how you see yourself and how you perceive yourself is determined by how you think of you. If you think that you are not qualified simply because you don’t have the years of education or because you come from the wrong side of the tracks then you have already been defeated in your mind.

So I ask you this question – how you do see yourself?

Too many of us are waiting to achieve a certain level of success in order to feel validated. However, you must think as a champion before you actually become one. Do you believe in your heart that you can be the next CEO of your company? Do you see yourself as capable of fulfilling that role?

Do you see yourself as a woman who can achieve her dreams or are you waiting in the corner for someone to rescue you? It’s time evaluate how you perceive yourself because you are powerful, capable, purpose-driven and able to create a life you desire but you have to believe that about yourself first. Sometimes your success is delayed simply because you don’t have mindset to receive what you desire. Don’t be expected to be blessed with the lifestyle of a millionaire if you have the inferior mindset of a slave.

You can’t be a woman who is threatened by the success of others because there will always be someone who is smarter than you, younger than you, more educated or funnier than you. You have to discover what your identity and self-concept is rooted in. If you think that you were created to simply pay bills and die, then that’s the type of life that you will lead.

You have the right to expect more out of life and that realization comes with discovering who you are and what makes you – you. There’s something spectacular and something extraordinary about you, only you have the gifts and abilities to achieve the purpose that has been predestined over your life. Everything that you have experienced is shaping your outlook on life.

So much power resides inside of you, more power than you can imagine. That power is waiting to be awakened by you. It’s time to start being the powerful woman that you already are. You don’t need to get that promotion, buy that new house, pay off the debt, get married or have a million dollars before you can believe that you’re powerful. Like I said, if your power and your identity is rooted in what you do or have then it’s always going to be threatened and you will never feel permanently secure.

Your circumstances do not define who you are, only you do. My confidence comes from my faith and knowing that only I can do what I was created to do. I used to think that because I wasn’t from the best of neighborhoods and a woman of color that I wasn’t good enough to speak to stadiums of people or achieve the monumental success that I desire but as my self-concept change, my outside circumstances started to change.

I will leave you with this quote from my pastor that resonated with me to change my thinking – “Leaving the ghetto begins in your mind first.”

XOXO,

Maria I. Melendez
@embraceherlegacy 

Do You Know How to Love?

by desing | Faith & Purpose

While filming a special interview over the weekend, I was asked a question that blew my mind which was – what has been my greatest lesson on love? Immediately, I answered that love is not selfish, nor is it prideful and it desires to give instead of always trying to get.

It took me years to learn this because as most women in the realm of dating, I thought I was a great catch because I have all my stuff together on paper. I thought that because I’m educated with a great career, success-driven, kind and can cook a “finger-licking-good” meal that that’s all I needed to be a good woman but just because you’re successful in your career and you have the domestic capabilities that a man would love does mean that you have the capacity to love that man the way that he’s supposed to be loved.

First, your capacity to love anyone else begins in your capacity to love yourself. What you allow in your life is a direct representation of how you feel about yourself because you will attract who you are, not who you pretend to be. The best way to measure the love that you have for yourself is to analyze the thoughts that you have about yourself and how you speak about yourself. If you’re always condemning yourself, focusing on the negative or love talking about your shortcomings and love to put yourself down then it’s time to get it together!

The quality of the relationship that you have with yourself is going to determine the quality of your relationship with others. Not feeling worthy enough or speaking words of defeat begin in your thoughts. If this is something that you’re struggling with then change your thought life now. In order to change the quality of your life, you must change the quality of your thinking. For every negative thought that you have of yourself, cancel that thought out by replacing it with two positive thoughts. So instead of thinking, “I don’t like my legs” – replace that with “I may not love my legs but I do love my hair, my smile, and my unique sense of style.”

Also, if you discover that you don’t like something about yourself then do something about it to change instead of complaining about it. If you don’t like parts of your body, set some fitness and health goals and create your plans to achieve them. If you don’t like the way certain “friends” make you feel, then cut them off. If you don’t like your job, then set up a game plan to get out of there within the next 3-6 months.

Love ain’t always about you either! We always focus on what we can get out of a relationship or what someone else is willing to give us, but real love desires to give at the expense of oneself. Lust desires to get at the expense of others. So while you may not have an issue with loving yourself, you may have an issue with being selfish and self-absorbed. That type of attitude is usually rooted in pride and a prideful attitude has no room to co-exist with real love. Real love puts your selfishness aside and forgives, real love picks up the phone to call someone first in the midst of dissonance, real love is not so easily offended.

Am I preaching to yet? I don’t mean to LOL!

We can focus so much on what we accomplish in our careers and education that we forget to go to work on our inner being. I had to face some ugly parts of my character that I met face-to-face which were unveiled in my relationship. People deserve to receive the best of your love and that can only happen when you make the conscious decision to grow in your character and focus on what you’re giving instead of what you’re getting.

One of your greatest attributes that will define your growth as a woman is going to be your capacity to love yourself and the quality of how you love others. Put childish things behind you and walk in love!

XOXO,

Maria I. Melendez
@embraceherlegacy

Why You’re Not Making a Fortune

by desing | Faith & Purpose

If your job told you that you had to come in 3 hours earlier for the next month because of an extra workload from a new international client, what would you do? Most of us may complain about it at first only to end up doing as we’re told because all of us want to “do a good job.”

Performing well at your job is “supposed” to bring financial security. But sometimes you can work harder and harder at your job and it seems like you’re still not progressing at the pace you expected. You still have the same bills, you’re still in the same income bracket and you still aren’t the millionaire that you’d thought you’d be by now.

Here’s why: “If you work hard on your job, you’ll make a living but if you work hard on yourself, you can make a fortune” – Jim Rohn.

2016 is where the “getting by” lifestyle stops. Your capacity to make more money and experience the prosperity that you desire doesn’t lie in working harder at your job, it’s about working harder on yourself. We’re taught that if we excel in school then we’ll be able to secure a job that will promise us a “happy life” but that’s not the truth. In order for your environment to change, you have to change. In order for you to be successful, you have to become successful within yourself because private practice determines public performance.

When you start to work hard on yourself, you’re increasing your value to the marketplace. Most people graduate from college and think that the learning is over for life. Be someone who is committed to become better every day that you have on this earth. Successful people have successful habits and how successful you’ll become is indicated in your daily routine. This concept of working on yourself is called personal development and there are things you can begin changing now to see the change in your world.

One of those things include having goals that are written down which you review daily.  

Instead of just having some goals in your mind, do better for yourself and write your goals down with deadlines. Make sure that they are specific, measurable, action-oriented and realistic. No longer accept mediocrity in your goal-setting by not being specific because “making more money” or “get in shape” is not a specific goal. You should be able to measure each of your goals. I encourage you to write down your top 10 goals for the next 12 months. Instead of writing down the list and never looking at them again, take time each day to read over your list of goals out loud.  Instead of “make more money”, you should declare -“I’m making my desired income of $70,000 in 2016.” A study showed that only 3% of the population had goals written down which they reviewed daily – all of these people were millionaires.

Another daily habit that you can start to incorporate in your schedule is to wake up early! Take some time in the morning to work on your personal development by perhaps working out before you get your day started or spend some time in prayer. You can use that time to work on your personal goals if you feel that “you don’t have time in the day” – this is a perfect opportunity to make time. If your job asked you to come in earlier, you would. Therefore, wake-up earlier for your success, not your jobs. You can listen to faith-building messages, pack a healthy lunch, work on writing your new book or watch a personal development video series.

Instead of spending your lunch break scrolling through social media, try to read a book that’s going to help you grow in personal development. Did you know that 88% of wealthy people read 30 minutes or more each day?

Average people do average things and live average lifestyles. Success is a lifestyle which includes small daily successes that are followed by large successes so it’s time to switch your habits!

My daily personal development routine includes exercise, prayer, reading a personal development book, reading out my goals out load every morning, speaking out positive and faith-based declarations over my life, listening to messages that will build my faith muscles and I’ve recently included radically decreasing the amount of time I spend on social media. I use that time to meditate and it’s made such a difference for me! I think clearly, I’m focused and I have opportunities coming my way like never before.

So stop going so hard for your job and start going hard for you and embrace the change!

XOXO,

Maria I. Melendez
@embraceherlegacy

Release the Baggage of Worrying

by desing | Faith & Purpose

I’m sure that you’ve probably heard of the saying, “Worrying is like a rocking chair. It gives you something to do but gets you nowhere.” It can be a challenge not to worry about your finances, your job, your future, your family or achieving your goals because you may think that if you’re not worried about it then that means that you don’t care. That’s not true.

As you mature as a woman, especially if you’re a woman who walks in faith, you’re going to realize that there are certain things in this life that you can’t control. Most people who are “control freaks” are usually people who struggle with fear. If you fear not seeing your desired circumstances, you’re going to try everything in your power to have everything work out in your favor. You may try to control your boyfriend, children, co-workers, friends or siblings and although you may have good intentions – that’s not the way to go about seeing the change that you want to see.

You can’t control other people, even though you may love them dearly. You can’t control whether or not you’ll get laid off from your job, you can’t control if it’s going to rain next week, and you can’t control traffic on your way to work. You can’t control when you’re going to get married, you can’t control whether or not you’ll get that new job or when all your life-long dreams will happen.

Trying to control everything around you brings worry because you end up thinking about it over and over again. You start to think of new ways to get your desired outcome when you want it, you’re up at night thinking about it and you keep working harder and harder trying to get that promotion, secure that book deal, get more clients for your business or make your husband change his stubborn ways.

Have you ever noticed that the harder you try at something the worse it may get? And the moment you stop worrying about, is the moment you get what you wanted? Here’s is the secret to that: once you release all those worries that you have and replace them with a confident trust in God, you allow Him to come in and work on your behalf.

I don’t know about you but I’d rather have the creator of the universe and His power do the impossible on my behalf instead of my trying to figure it out all of the time. When I release my faith in God, it brings such a peace that allows me to think clearly and to enjoy my life. You don’t have to have all things going perfectly in your life to enjoy it. God doesn’t want you to worry because you’re His child. Would you want to see your child worrying about something that you knew you had the power to change?

I’m not telling you to lose hope or to let go of your faith or to stop working diligently for what you want because that would be silly! I’m telling you to stop worrying about it. There are several things that I’m believing God to do and restore in my life right now and I noticed that I had a worrying problem so trust me when I say that I know how it feels to worry and it doesn’t feel good.

Something inside of you has to become more powerful than your worrying; for me its faith and trust in God. Sometimes you’ll have to actively go after your peace by speaking out positive declarations or a promise of God every time a thought of worry comes or taking your mind off your problems by helping someone else or doing something nice for yourself.

I believe with every fiber of my being that if you’ve been dealing with an issue (maybe in your family, finances, career or relationships) that God is about to restore your situation seven times better than you were before. That’s the beauty of God! If you lost your job, you’re going to get a better one making more money. If you went through a bad breakup, you’re about to meet the man of your dreams. If your family has been experiencing tension, relationships are going to be miraculously restored. If your business is struggling, you’re going to see an accelerated increase in clients.

The latter days in your life will be better than your former days so make a commitment not to worry and give each and every one of your cares to God because He cares for you. He didn’t bring the pain into your life but He’ll surely use it to work out for your good in the end.

You may not know what the future holds but you know Who holds it. No more worries!

XOXO,

Maria I. Melendez|
@embraceherlegacy

Think Like a Queen

by desing | Faith & Purpose

How you feel (your emotions) are always tied to what you are thinking about. And did you know that thinking toxic thoughts can actually change the physical structure of your brain and influence the DNA that you pass down to the generations to come?

I started reading Dr. Caroline Leaf’s book, Switch On Your Brain and your thoughts are the most crucial key to your success. It’s time to be a thinking queen who is switches your thoughts to work for you and not against you. When you think positive thoughts, it produces positive components in your brain; your brain increases the quality of your thinking and vice versa for negative thoughts.

This scientific fact is proven in the proverb, “As a man thinks in his heart, so is he.” Whatever you’re thinking about is directing how you act and feel which will impact your character and lead you into your destiny.

You don’t have to be a victim to your thoughts because the greatest battlefield in your life is the battlefield of your mind. Fear, worry and doubt all begin in how you think and so does success, prosperity and change. You can’t choose what happens to you but you can choose how you respond to it with the power of your thoughts.

Your past hurts don’t have to define you; you can choose to think like a victim or a victor. Before you can become a millionaire, you have to think like one and you have to believe that you will become a millionaire. Before you become a wife, you have to embrace the thoughts of a wife. Before you have a prosperous career, you must expect to get that promotion and believe that you have the power inside of you to become successful at anything you do.

Your environment and your thoughts are directly associated with various diseases. You have to take control over what you’re choosing to think about. What you’re exposing yourself to also has a direct impact on how you think.

If you can’t see it in your mind, you can’t have it in your hand. Therefore, you have to think thoughts of love, power and of a sound mind because you were not created to fear. The opposite of fear is love. When you focus on being love and God’s eternal love for you, your fear will be crushed. Love is far more powerful than fear!

I want you to become a thinking queen and I want to challenge your thinking capacity. First off, as much as we love social media, take some time off of social media or at least decrease the amount of time you’re spending on it daily. You want to be able to think your own clear thoughts and social media is definitely affecting your ability to think your own powerful thoughts.

Second, filter what you watch and read. You cannot expect to become successful and have God’s favor on your side if you only expose yourself to nonsense that has nothing to do with what you want to achieve. Make it your mission to watch and read things that are going to grow you in character, vision and success.

Finally, take 5-15 minutes every day to have a “thinking like a queen” session. Direct your thoughts to focus on your hopes, dreams and desires manifesting. Turn off all distractions, sit in silence and make your vision real in your mind. I like to focus on God’s promises while I do this so that I don’t limit my thoughts. God is able to do infinitely more than I can imagine and I know that my faith is a key to unlock his power, therefore, I’m learning to go into my “thinking like a queen” sessions without any limits on my thoughts. If you’re sick, focus on being healed. If you’re broke, focus on being in abundance, if you’re lonely, focus on being with someone you love.

You’ll begin to feel differently in your body and your mind when you start to apply these principles. When you wake up in the morning, focus your thoughts on having something good happening to you and then start to declare that for your day. Speak out loud what you want to see, ask God for His favor and expect it to happen!

Hopeful thoughts lead to having an attitude of expectancy. You’re not going to get the job if you don’t expect it, you’re not going to have more than enough money if you don’t expect it, and you’re not going win if you expect to lose.

Being a queen starts with thinking like one.

XOXO,

Maria I. Melendez
@embraceherlegacy