Sometimes you just gotta liberate yourself...

You know, I'm writing this note for myself, because I'm liberating myself. Giving my self permission to feel what I feel; right now, I'm feeling like I'm messing up. I'm probably not - in real life - but in my own brain, I am! At least, I'm fighting thoughts that I am.

I'm interning at ABC News here in NYC, and I get to see inside of worlds that most people do not get to see inside of. I should feel blessed, right? I totally do, but something is weird... There's something blocking my vision. Preventing me, at the moment, to really get in touch with that blessed feeling, with that "Oh my God, I feel the hand of God on my life" feeling. I know that God has his hand on me intellectually, but not emotionally. That's because at the moment, my emotions are screwed. Yes!

So, many people are asking, "Have you seen any famous people?" The answer is "yes," but we're not sipping martinis together. I thought that once I got to ABC, the famous people and the other higher-ups would say upon meeting me, "Oh my gosh, Taurence, you are definitely going to be the next Oprah. Come. Come, Taurence. Let us create a show. Then, we won't even pay you $275 Million a year that Oprah gets. No, Taurence. We'll go ahead and give you the $2.7 Billion. And, people will feel inspired by you. And, they will see God's light by watching your show. Yes, Taurence. Let us make haste."

Well, nobody told me any of that. Not even a hint.

TV is work. Hard work. Never ending, multi-, multi-layered work, where one thing builds off of another, and then that piece builds off of that, and on and on and on, until you have a complete story ready for air. I don't know if I thought that I would skip over that work. I thought I understood that although my eyes are set on a destination, there's a path I have to walk on to get there. I guess I didn't really, really understand that.

I'm in the generation that has always known Oprah as being a person at the top of her game. In my brain, there's never been a time when she was not the "big O." So, I guess in my brain, because I felt drawn to the talk show industry, that there wouldn't be a time when I wouldn't be at the top of my game. Couple that with a personal conviction I have to always strive to be at the top of my game, to always make sure I'm being the best Taurence, to be a success right now without having a mansion, or chauffeurs, or any of the stuff the world thinks makes up a successful person - couple that desire with a seemingly unconscious belief that I didn't have to REALLY work to be what I want to be, and you've got a recipe for delirium with a side of confusion, made to order.

It's really nice having a desire to want to be my personal best. I think God wants that for me. Personal best, meaning I make FULLEST EFFORT when I know I have the ability to do so, in all actions. Personal best, meaning knowing how to cry, knowing how to lament, knowing how to ask for help when I feel I need it, and being 100% PRESENT with those feelings. I consider all of that my personal best. So, I think it's a good thing. But with that, for me, comes the pressure of feeling that whenever I fail, whenever I'm not doing what I know I need to be doing, or when I'm not taking the initiative on things, or not being the Taurence I was born to be - whenever I feel like I'm not being my personal best, I think I've missed the boat. Missed the subway, and it's never coming back. Time to move back home, grow a gut, sit in a recliner in a wife beater and old shorts with dress socks on, and watch TV.

I don't think I need to feel like I need to do that every time I mess up. The walls aren't going to tumble down. It's okay, Taurence. Breathe. Just breathe.

Look at the people who had to work to get where they are:

This is a picture from Oprah's audition tape for "AM Chicago", circa 1983. Comes after nearly 10 years reporting, anchoring, demotion to hosting local talk show. Soon after she got this job, show renamed "The Oprah Winfrey Show," expands to one hour, and goes national.

But Oprah had to gain experience to be considered for the job. YEARS of experience. The hard work it took to get that experience paid off. Billions-fold.

There's a saying plastered on a billboard in Times Square, which reads: " Even Einstein wasn't Einstein in college."

It took years for Einstein to turn up his brilliance, but once he worked to turn up the brilliance dial, he literally changed the way people thought about the universe and how it operated. Hard work did that.

Jim Carrey worked for years as a struggling comedian in small clubs, and as an small bit actor. He didn't make the cut at auditions. He probably messed up more than that. Now look at him. He's an a-list star.

Carrey was a dreamer, like me. He once wrote a $10 Million check to himself when he was broke, dated it years into the future, and kept it in his wallet. There, it deteriorated and deteriorated. He'd drive in Beverly Hills, picturing himself living that type of lifestyle. One day, years later, he made $10 Million from Dumber and Dumber. Hard work paid off.

I'm not at all trying to glorify money and material possessions; I'm saying that it took work for these people to get what they wanted. It takes work to be who the world will know me to be. It does not come automatically. I may have a few talents, I may have great qualities about myself that are God-given, but I have to work to harness those talents and qualities, to be what I want to be in the world.

So, I'm going to work to remember what I just wrote, and I'm going to work to continuously read people's stories, to see that it's a process to get from point 'A' to point 'B'.

Believe me when I say, celebrities are just people who work. Believe me, they work. And if I want to live in a space where I'm on top of my game, where I'm really being my personal best, I've got to remember: People who are successful are people who work. Hard.

No more feeling like the sky is falling when I make a mistake.

In the words of a song the men's choir used to sing at my home church, I've got to "keep my hand on the plow and hold on."

I feel liberated! Let's go!

An invintation to enter in

*From a Facebook Note I wrote a year ago.*

The more I live, the more I see how perception is everything. How you perceive God and life determines the life you will live. I see it in my friends' lives, my life, and in the lives of everyone else around me. How you perceive God and life determines the life you will live. My perception of God and life has evolved radically over the past two years. I've always had trust issues. Since Kindergarten. That trust stemmed over into me not trusting God. Not trusting friends. Not trusting possibility fully. But when I went through friendships that dissolved, or seemed to dissolve, and when I went through the hurt, depression, and confusion that followed, something shifted. I began looking at the next chapter of my life as a new invitation God was giving me. And I began to feel his touch and his nudge.

He was saying, "Enter in."

I went from walking on a incomplete, winding path, a path through a land that I believed contained friends that would never love me as much as I love them, parents that would never be "real" parents, dreaming for the perfect girl and never really seeing her or believing that I could have her now (and of course that sent me into a spiral and whirlwind of confusion), just all kinds of incompleteness--I went from that onto a straight path.

I looked up Matthew 7:13, which says "Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who enter through it." I have heard so many different interpretations of this verse, but I noticed something interesting. I encourage you to study it yourself, but one interpretation I see by looking at the words in Greek is this: "Of thoughts that come into the mind, by means of a straight entrance into any state; for the access or entrance into hell is wide and the way of thinking, feeling, and deciding is spacious that leads to eternal misery in hell, and of thoughts that come into the mind by means of it."

Now, I know that's not a clear word for word definition but that's the English language for you--here's how I interpret it: "Enter into a way of thinking that is straight; There's many, many thoughts that come into the mind that will lead you to feel and make decisions that will lead you into eternal misery." Whether or not this verse is talking about hell after this life or the hell on this earth, you go into each one beginning with a thought that you think, which leads to a feeling, and then leads to you making a decision based on the thought. Don't believe your thoughts will lead you into misery? Take some time to monitor your thoughts. I bet most if not all of your thoughts are thoughts centering around you having a lack of something on some level, if you dig deep enough.

There's nothing in the bible that says we have a lack of anything. We literally have everything. What is everything? EVERYTHING.

What was one thing Jesus was sent to Earth to say? "You have everything in the Father. Change your thinking which leads you to a feeling, which leads you to an unholy decision. A decision based on your belief that you are lacking in something. That you are incomplete. That's the process of sin. Do you know who you are? You are a child of God. Do life My Way. You will realize the Fullness, the completeness, of Life, and have it forever."

I believe that Heaven and Hell is a continuation of our lives here on earth. Follow the process of sin, you move to misery that lasts forever. Follow Jesus' way, and you move into Life Everlasting. There really isn't anything exclusive or us. vs. them in any of Jesus' teaching.

So, I changed my thinking. I began to look at God, life, the entire universe, as compassionate. Loving. I began to trust God. I began to accept my life as it were. When you trust God, when you do what Prov. 3:5-6 says, the entire universe will rise to meet you. Things will just show up right on your plate. Situations become helpful. All situations. "All" means "all". Everything I come across is beneficial and filled with Love. That way of thinking opens me up to a myriad of blessings. Suffering, trials, all of that--they serve to bring you into a reality where you know God. Where you will trust him and feel him, in every footstep along the straight path.

How do I know this? Because it's happening to me.

God showed me that he will always provide people to love me, and for me to love. Always. My friend Ben from LT was the first piece in this new revelation, the first wonderful light. And then I went through more trials, and then entered my best friend Joel, the first of my best guy friends to want me as their best friend as much as I wanted the other guy to be my friend, and to really show that to me in small ways, and big ways -- such an AMAZING thing. I feel like I have those blessings because my sinful thinking has changed and is still changing. My friends have become beautiful lights instead of people I need to give me my sense of self because I thought I had a lack. I trusted in God for people to love me,, meaning I felt how it felt to have them in my life. I experienced as much of that joy I possibly could without actually having close friends there. And they showed up! When you trust in God, the universe will rise to meet you.

A new light shines on my friends that have been alongside me since college. They have become more helpful and more beautiful me. I changed my mind. I repented. I took up His yolk. His rules. His ways. I began to trust. When you trust in God, the universe will rise to meet you.

A new light shines on my career. I've always been a dreamer. I know in every fiber of my being that I will live a big life. Why? Because I'm already living a big life, and I make it my job to make other people feel like their lives are wonderful. He's already given me a big life. The only option is for my life to evolve into something bigger. More grand. I will be faced with more experiences to realize God. Inflow determines outflow. When you have God poring into you, you have to have him poring out of you. That's why you know people who are connected to Him, because of their fruits. Because of what they produce. Great fertilizer, pure water, and untainted food provides large, lustrous, tasty fruit. I trust him even more with my career, and new doors are opening up because of it, because when I trust in God, the universe will rise to meet me.

I still haven't found a girl yet, but I am trusting! I don't necessarily need to read another book about being single or about how God has the perfect mate waiting for me and she will be my help-meet, though those books don't hurt. This is what I need to know: When you trust in God, the universe will rise to meet you.

If you are reading this note, and something inside of you clicks with it, take it as an invitation to enter in. I pray with so much sincerity that you really begin to realize God, and realize that you have no lack. I pray more love into your life. I pray more life into your life. I pray more of God into your life.

Welcome!

Welcome to my blog, "A New Kinda Man." I'm writing about how I'm slowly becoming a man, a new type of man. You ever take a look at some of the men that you know, and think, "I do not want to be like that when I get older?" I think that lots of times, but then I think, "Well, what kinda man do I wanna be?"

The answer: A New Kinda Man.

A man who knows himself.
A man who speaks his mind.
A man of power and a man of grace.
A man who knows how to love.
A man who doesn't judge.

A sexy man.

So, join with me, as I stand up and say, "I am gonna be a New Kinda Man."