Before I start this let me just say that I’m now perceived as a cocky, arrogant, know it all.<\/p>\n
When I was younger, I was a pushover.\u00a0 My dad was one especially with my mom so I’m guessing thats where I got it.\u00a0 Not to mention I was raised in a house of women with the exception of my little brother, 3 years my junior.\u00a0 So I was raised to be soft and usually put down or disciplined for standing up for myself.\u00a0 Reason being that I’m a black male and any attempt to go against the grain would end with me being locked up.\u00a0 It was like I was this giant king crab but was supposed to stay in my shell and whisper because everybody expects me to be big and evil.\u00a0 This ideology stayed with me for a long time until my son was born.\u00a0 Something clicked in me that made me refuse to play small because there was a little one watching and learning from my every move.\u00a0 And I would not limit him just because I was.\u00a0 In doing so I learned that I am a force of nature when I push myself, just like we all are<\/a>.\u00a0 I has been an awakening for me.\u00a0 Things that other people see as normal are completely new to me.\u00a0 Take simple interactions with people, I used to walk with my head down with the only thought of not bothering anybody and generally just trying to stay out of their way.\u00a0 Now I walk with my head high, usually with a smile on my face and hand out ready to shake hands with the next person I might meet.\u00a0 There is a spring in my step and I realize that nobody around me is better than me and I am due the same respect they are.\u00a0 Now I know reading this that you have to think that I had to be crazy but its just that I was raised not the rock the boat.\u00a0 But now that I’m the captain of the boat, I realize that sometimes you got to rock the boat to get to where you need to be.\u00a0 Now for people who knew me before I grew a backbone are amazed at how I’ve changed and the confidence that I’ve gained.\u00a0 Let me repeat that its just confidence, a newfound confidence in myself that allows me to believe in myself.\u00a0 I haven’t completely killed that other part of myself because it can come in handy when its time to listen, especially to some more experienced and wiser than me.<\/p>\n This confidence has brought me much success but alot of people take it as me being cocky or arrogant.\u00a0 I believe that life is what you make of it and that your words are seeds.\u00a0 And the more I talk about and expect success and good things happening, the more they will happen.\u00a0 I talk about alot of the things I’ve accomplished and are about to do because I am extremely proud of them.\u00a0 But I talk about them about 0.1% of the time compared to how much I brag on my son.\u00a0 Who is the one who planted the seed for my backbone.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Before I start this let me just say that I’m now perceived as a cocky, arrogant, know it all. When I was younger, I was a pushover.\u00a0 My dad was one especially with my mom so I’m guessing thats where I got it.\u00a0 Not to mention I was raised in a house of women with […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[135],"class_list":["post-379","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","tag-ben"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ocbenji.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/379","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ocbenji.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ocbenji.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ocbenji.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ocbenji.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=379"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.ocbenji.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/379\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ocbenji.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=379"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ocbenji.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=379"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ocbenji.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=379"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}