Have you ever listened to that nagging feeling that says, "Wait. That isn't right" just before you leave the house, only to double check your bag and realize that you were about to walk out the door without your wallet and house keys? Or maybe a little voice says, "You should go left instead of your usual right today", only to get home and see on the news that you narrowly escaped sitting in two hour long traffic due to a major accident? I call that being in tuned with your internal clock.
For many of us this clock works just fine, for others not so much. I'm no expert. I'm just out here living this thing called life right along side the rest of you. I'm a woman and I'm black while doing it, which makes it quite a bit more difficult than say a white woman, a white man or even a black man doing the same thing (We all struggle though). Yet, no one understands the position that I hold like I do. Add to the mix that I'm a professional woman, with a growing son. This means that people hold me to a different standard than most. I occasionally hit the snooze button due to the advice of what others think I should and shouldn't be doing with MY world.
I'll explain.
It may have started when I was a child...Back when my parents and other adults taught me about Stranger Danger. You know, don't talk to strangers for fear of you getting lured away in an unmarked white van to a land where someone would hold you captive forever until they create a nice skin coat out of you. This advice scared you into staying away from creepy characters outside of your school and home. This was them teaching you how to set your internal alarm. Be cautious they said. It was good advice.
The flip side to this was, those very same people would encourage me to lie about any wrongdoing. "Don't tell anyone what happened in our house yesterday. If you do you'll regret it." This advice deterred you from speaking up when you should if something was wrong. It would turn a bad situation worse, possibly like a child services case being opened and you becoming a foster child quicker than you could say "got'cha". This type of warning was them forcing you to hit the snooze button on your internal clock. Which completely throws anyone off, let alone a child. As you grow, constant mixed signals from The Necessities, friends and foes caution us all to set our alarms or neglect it by hitting snooze.
Where am I going with this?
In the quest of becoming a better me, I had to analyze why I would sometimes hit snooze (aka suppress a nagging feeling). It literally just dawned on me a few years ago that I've been doing it all along. I've been overlooking key steps in protecting myself due to other people's advice for what I should be doing in MY life. It starts out small like what's appropriate to wear to work and slowly spirals into don't divorce that good cheating man, because he doesn't beat you and you have a beautiful home, family, cars, vacations and no one leaves that to be a single mother living in a two bedroom apartment in a dangerous city. You go from tapping the snooze button once to turning off your inner alarm all together. We all know what results in turning off the alarm...either you wake the fuck up or you oversleep like a loser and the day goes from sugar to shit in two seconds flat.
When you get into the practice of resetting your alarm or constantly hitting snooze, you eventually forget to set your clock for key shit. Think doing your laundry before it overflows becoming an all day task to tackle or not paying your bills when you should, resulting in one day coming home to an eviction notice on your door. You know, KEY SHIT! No one wants to be dirty and homeless, especially if you have children.
Have you ever dated or liked someone and things are serious enough that you share pet names and talk intimately, but not enough for you to have a title? Or maybe you've got the title but you are afraid to ask any "tough questions" in fear of turning or pissing your prospect off? Yeah?! Well, I'm going to go ahead and say that you probably need to stop hitting snooze and go with your gut. Ask all the questions you want. You're grown and the only downfall is that you'll land back at square one, which is being stuck with the only person that you trust. YOU!
You're probably wondering how do you force yourself to be disciplined enough to set that alarm and actually listen to it. Well, it's simple. Just do it. If you decide to hit snooze once, be responsible enough to get the heck up next time that alarm goes off. It is far better to make yourself do things that you don't necessarily want to do versus life making things happen to you for not listening to your intuition. Do the dishes and prevent critters from living in your space. Prevent bad credit by heeding those friendly reminders that you get when it's time to make a payment. Keep your antennas up when a friend tells you to be cautious about a mate and prevent future heartache. When that gas light comes on in your car, just stop for gas!
You know what will happen as a result? You will condition your body and mind to wake up with the alarm or just before it. Problems averted. :)