Christel Joëlle - The Blog

FORGIVENESS AND GRATITUDE

10:00:00

My relationship with my mother was one of a difficult kind. At the time that I was a child, so until my 12^th birthday, she was my best friend and we spent a lot of time together.

What I did not realize, was that I was living her life, and not mine. And by the time I grew up, and started to think differently from what she thought, the troubles began.

She tried to match me with lovers she was more fond of than I, or wanted me to be friends with people because they liked her too and she gained some advantages by that. She liked to be adored, especially by younger men, and she tried to push me in circles in which not I but she felt very happy.

I slowly started to act against this, we disagreed, we disagreed more and more when I grew older. She tried to charm my boyfriends and when they did not accept it, she was furious and sent them away. At last it ended up by me walking away from her and finally choosing to stick to my own choices in my own life. I no longer wanted to be a part of hers anymore.

I even emigrated to France to create a very obvious distance between us, feeling very sorry for my father – he was a lovely and wise man – but he understood and already had made his choice many years ago to stick to her side for better and for worse.

The moment she passed away, I could only feel pity for her. She had made her own life so difficult and beside the ongoing love and care of my father, she became a lonely and unsatisfied woman while she could have had a wonderful life.

She was my mother but I did not feel anything when I heard she was not among us anymore. I did not feel the loss of a mother, my mother and it made me very sad.

I started thinking about everything that happened, that led to everything that caused this situation between mother and daughter. What went wrong and when, could I have prevented this or would it mean that I would never have been able to be true to myself. What were my mistakes towards her. And most important: where did the love go?

Of course I blamed myself too, I too made mistakes, but she was such a difficult woman.

My father was a big support. He knew exactly how she was and suffered himself. He had lost all his friends because they did not meet her standards and he recognized my frustration.

When my father passed away, the bond between us was so much stronger. I missed him.

I had learnt from him. In spite of everything, he always remained a very satisfied man who made a lot of compromises with my mother but always stayed truthful towards his true passion (he was a very important man in model-aviation worldwide).

So I visited his grave several times. My mother lies there too but it was my father I visited.

And then, one day, I realized, I saw the situation completely wrong. I realized I had learned a lot from my mother too. In having to act against her, I had gained a lot of self-awareness. I had learned to step up for myself, to create myself, to think for myself, to be able to make my own choices, to grow stronger and become the woman I am now, 30 years later. And I felt so proud about this.

So I went to their grave and I apologized to her, I forgave her and last but not least: I thanked her for being my mother.

It made me a much happier person and I know now that everything and everybody in life has meaning. Even if we do not see it immediately. Let us be grateful for that.

Warm regards,

Esmeralda

Authenticity

Stop Suppressing Your Emotions!

08:00:00

Spiritual Living

SILVER LININGS

10:00:00

Is there anybody who has never heard this saying before? No, I don’t think so. But when you are in the middle of your misery, wandering why all this shit is happening to you, it is very difficult to keep on seeing the silver lining behind it all.

As with everybody, it also happens to me.

Coming home one day, I discovered my bedroom-window broken, shattered by a beer bottle that was lying on my pillow. At moments like this, you feel very vulnerable. That other people can deliberately destroy something that is yours, be able to come uninvited in your sacred area where you think you are safe, is a frightening thought.

The police had to come, the insurance had to be called and of course, the window had to be replaced. But it is a lot of hassle and it takes quite some time before everything is normal again. The consequence was that I had to postpone my planned holiday which made me even more angry and disappointed.

The same week, I discovered that the exhaust pipe of my very loyal Suzuki Jimney, who has never been ill before or refused to work for me in the last 12 years, had become so old and leak that it had to be replaced completely. This was a huge unexpected financial set-back and did not really help to make me feel better.

And last but not least, the “date” that was planned and of which I was hoping that it would cheer me up a bit, was canceled at the very last moment.

I felt myself sinking in a hole that I recognized from before and of which I know it can be very hard to overcome once you are in it.

I already survived starting my life all over again (as mentioned in another one of my blogs) and was doing quite well, but now I had ended in another period of setbacks instead of leaning on a positive flow of which I thought I finally deserved it.

This was the negative mood I was in and I realized I had to do something about it. So I went for a long walk with my dog, near the waterside of the canal. The sun was shining on its surface, the temperature was lovely and I sat in the grass, watching the large cargo ships go by. The whole setting was so peaceful that it immediately changed my mindset and I realized that the expenses on my car where not so much if you have in mind that in 12 years I never had any expenses paid for this car at all!

The broken window of my bedroom was a great opportunity to replace the cheap single glass into insulation glass, which was already my plan but it never came to that. Now I had to.

And the fact that I had to cancel my holiday made that my “date” could take place one week later.

So everything turned out to be okay at the end. Something I absolutely did not realize when I was in the middle of it.

Every negative experience seems to have a positive tribute in the end and it is a challenge to try to look at it that way. If you succeed, your life will be so much happier.

Good luck!

Warm regards,

Esmeralda

Authenticity

An Ode To All The Sparkling Seas

08:00:00

It's almost half an hour ago I opened this page, wondering what I will write about... spirituality, wellness, art, beauty, or a how to... ... But honestly, none of it all matter right now. Because I want to thank you, for reading and staying open minded.

I want to write this, directly from the heart to your heart.

Every word that is written here, is a piece of my mind. Something that I have been quiet about for so long. I neglected my thoughts which, as some of you may know, gave me a lot of anxiety. I never really talked about anxiety on this blog... maybe I will, one day.

But since I own my blog, sort of my diary, my journal, I feel freer. And even though we don't have a lot of readers (with that I mean circa.50 pair of eyes every week, wich is already a lot for me) I feel more heard.

If I could just help one person out so that that person feels understood and not alone anymore. I am content.

When I started this blog, I named it "Just Another Sea" and at that time, the name resonated with the way I felt. I was just one of the other persons starting a blog. I am not important, I though. But I wanted a place to be authenticly me because at school, I couldn't...

But things have changed, I am becoming more and more the person that my soul wants me to be. And I blame my past for all the good things it brought me and taught me. And because I am learning to see the world differently, I started to see the name of my blog in a new way, a way that I didn't saw before. I don't feel like I am Just Another blogger, I am important. And for some this may sound selfish, but it isn't to me. I changed the name of my blog to All Sparkling Seas for a reason but at first, I found it a little childish, Sparkling sounded so childish... but am I not childish sometimes (hah A.K.A a lot of time)? I want to keep the child I am inside of me forever! It's just who I am and always will be for the span of this life I am living right now.

The reason I changed the name is that

I feel more and more that we are all connected.

Every Single Being As A Sparkle In Themselves. And together we are all sparkling seas. And every sparkle is important. You Are Important. We Are All Important.

All together we are sparkling seas. Water is connected everywhere around the world. So are we. The sun may not always sparkle on your sea some days, but the clouds and thunder will go away finally and the sun will bring the sparkles back onto your sea and shine its light in your soul.

So I want to thank you, for being you! For giving me the chance to express myself without feeling judged. Thank you for your time!

With lots of love

Christel Joëlle

Personal

DREAMS

10:00:00

Who does not recognize this: you see all your dreams in front of you. You are staring at them, hoping they will turn into reality. And in the meantime you feel so alone.

We all have our dreams, our personal picture of how the world can be a better place for us.

But sometimes, after all the efforts we have already taken, it seems like nothing is going to change and it is hard to stay focused, optimistic and faithfully.

We stand alone, staring at what we would love to see in real life but what never seems to happen.

Some of us are looking for the right partner, the right job, the right friends, the possibility to start your own company, to sell your paintings to an enthousiastic public, to be able to perform a brilliant role without hesitating or doubting yourself, envying all the others who seem to succeed without any struggle.

But is what we see really true? Is your neighbor really happy with that so called successful job or is it just what you see from the out-side. And that big mansion your boss is living in, does he really have the time to enjoy it or has his wife left him recently because there is never any time left to share the good moments.

Nothing is what it seems to be, we are all aware of it but during the hard times you only feel the empty spaces in your own experience.

But when you walk on the beach, and you let the wind blow through your hair, and you see the waves going forward and backward, and the seagulls leaning on the wind, the universe shows you the fact that everything is moving all the time on the rhythm of nature. And the same happens in your life. Sometimes life needs time to figure out when the right moment has arrived to realize that small part of the dream you so eagerly desire.

Because nothing happens when the time is not yet ready. It takes courage to understand and accept this but when you do, it calms you down and make you fall asleep every night with the comforting feeling that everything will be alright in the end.

Warm regards,

Esmeralda