Is it Time for You to Break Out of Your Box?
After six years of teaching middle school English, writer Britni Danielle decided she wanted more.
In her new book, Break Out of Your Box, Britni Danielle details how changing her mindset literally changed her life.
Two years ago, Britni stepped out on faith, traded in her unfulfilling teaching career, and followed her passion. These days she is an in-demand writer whose work has been featured in Essence.com, JET magazine, CLUTCH, GOOD magazine, Hear & Soul, Vibe Vixen, and The Grio, and is dedicated to inspiring others to follow their dreams.
In Break Out of Your Box, Britni shares five steps that will help readers overcome their fears, and finally begin living the life they desire.
Check out an exclusive excerpt of Break Out of Your Box:
**
Langston Hughes once asked, “What happens to a dream deferred?”
He wondered:
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore--
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over--
like a syrupy sweet?
Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.
Or does it explode?
I suspect deferred dreams turn into one very poisonous emotion: unhappiness.
Unhappiness can manifest itself in many ways—weight gain, stress, anger, sadness--and often times we don’t even know what’s going on.
Perhaps you’ve always dreamed of running your own bookstore or penning novels or starting your own bakery or being an artist. And despite your love of books or cupcakes or Romare Bearden lithographs you’ve decided to follow a more sensible and practical career path and pursued accounting or law or teaching despite really, really wanting to do what brings you joy.
Although you may be successful in your chosen field, underneath it all, you’re not really happy.
Sure your closet might be full of red bottoms or your savings account would make Suze Orman proud. But when it’s just you and God in the middle of the night, are you feeling content and satisfied with your life, or does something tug at your heart begging the question, “Is this it?”
Throughout our lives we’ve been programmed to ignore our dreams.
Think about it.
When you were young and someone asked you what you wanted to be when you grew up, you might have said something unconventional like, “I want to be a spy!”
The person probably smiled, but asked again, “No really…what do you want to be?”
At that moment you quickly learned that some dreams just weren’t going to happen.
For many of us, practicality trumps imagination every day of the week and twice on Thursday. But if you really want to be fulfilled and live your most awesome life you must give yourself permission to dream.
At the beginning of this book I asked you to visualize your ideal life.
I asked you not to censor yourself or rule out things that seemed impractical. But I’m willing to bet that many of you found yourself knocking things out of your mind before you even had a chance to enjoy them.
Perhaps you visualized being an in-demand journalist, interviewing celebrities and filing stories from far-flung places like South Africa or Paris. But before you could even picture yourself indulging in a buttery croissant on the Boulevard Saint-Germain you already dismissed the idea as foolish.
“Magazines are dying,” you told yourself.
Or, “Writers don’t make money.”
Or, “I don’t even have a passport!”
Without even knowing it, each of these thoughts killed your dream before it even had a chance to grow.
If you really want to break out of your box and live a life that you love you’ve got to stop limiting yourself and killing your own dreams before they’ve had a chance to take hold.
Trust me, you’ll run into enough people willing to take a hatchet to your goals, so don’t do it for them.
Now if you want to live a totally mediocre, ho-hum life, then by all means, continue being Buffy the Dream Slayer.
But if you want to live an exceptional life full of rewarding and satisfying experiences, then dare to embrace your wildest and craziest dreams. Now.
There is a video of rapper-turned-actor Will Smith on YouTube in which he talks about how he went from West Philadelphia to one of the highest paid actors in Hollywood. While the entire video is worth watching, one thing really struck me.
During the clip, Smith wondered:
When trying to decide what road you want to take in your life, ask yourself this:
Is being mediocre enough?
If not, head over to BritniDanielle.com to grab your free copy of Break Out of Your Box and start changing your life today.
Related:
12 Quotes from Black Women to Motivate You
Franchesca Ramsey: A YouTube Sensation Black Girls Can Believe In
Life is Too Short to Pretend
No comments: