Good morning. Good afternoon and good evening everybody. It's your girl Sonya McQueen with it's your life. What are you doing with it?
All right, so I want to talk to you about your quirkiness
Your battle scars or things you do or say that make you unique, right? So
There are things about us that are different than most people or everybody
You know the way our bodies are I don't care how much plastic surgery
Somebody gets they're still
Unique they were uniquely made and a whole bunch of doctors can't make you a cookie cutter
You might look like one, but it doesn't change you from your uniqueness
There are things about myself that
People wouldn't believe but I absolutely did not like about myself all my life
people will compliment and still do
constantly getting complimented on my smile and
So I'll smile just to take a selfie and I look and I'm like what the hell are people talking about or the same thing with my voice
Oh my gosh, your voice is so soothing. You should be doing radio voiceovers. Oh if you could just
Record something for me so I can listen to it over and over again
And I wouldn't even listen to my own podcast because I don't like my voice
Recently I started listening to them, but it doesn't mean I've fallen in love with my voice
I don't exactly see what people hear or hear what people hear
But I am more than grateful to have a voice and to have the ability to speak and have the ability
To have people want to listen to me speak and I appreciate the compliments all the way around
But it's funny that things people seen in me that they appreciate it
I didn't and when you pointed them out it would make me shy away
From that instead of embracing it and growing with it, right? But the older I get the more I appreciate my flaws
so I don't know I'm smiling while I'm saying this but
There are so many things that we tell people we love about them and then they'll
Reply with a negative comment. I am guilty of it. You tell somebody. Oh my gosh, your hair is so beautiful
Oh my gosh, my hair is falling out. It's getting thin. It's wiry
Okay. Oh my goodness. You look so good in that dress. I've gained so much weight. I've got on a girdle
I've got this
Instead of just thank you and I envy my friends who know how to say thank you. I
envy it. I know people who
Flaws and all you give them a compliment and they shine
Almost like I know it but thank you. They don't say that of course, but that's what they display like
They've got that kind of confidence. I
Also know people who know how to fake that confidence and they don't have to we've all got our own
Skeletons our own scars our own downfalls, right? I
Used to say that my stomach looked like a roadmap to Fiji. I wore a size three
all my life I was
Small waisted. I've always had big legs and
Boops, but nothing else to me. No backside really no waist
I had a 22 inch waist 20 between 21 22 until I was 32 when I got sick and
I didn't appreciate that body all I didn't appreciate being a brick house at all
I
Meant it when I said I did not like for guys to pay me attention. I would sometimes
Dress the part where I would get attention like if I was going to the club, but I never paid attention to the fact
Let me dress sexy or let me dress
Seductively or none of that none of that, you know, I'll put on some baggy jeans even back when I was in my 20s
baggy jeans and a
Body suit shirt and some boots in a minute and go out. That was just me
And it embarrassed me when guys would give me compliments or even women give me compliments and it embarrassed me
So here I am now 53. I'm
25 pounds overweight
I got this stomach that looks like a roadmap
I'm getting wrinkles. I'm getting gray hair and
And I'm embracing all of this
I have learned through the years to absolutely love me and what's beautiful is
God has placed people around me that don't see my flaws in all
They don't see them. They only see my heart and the love I display and in my
Appreciation for them and for life and for the Lord and that's what they focus on
Nobody's asked me to see my stomach in a long time. I
Had a lot of surgeries, you know, I had intermeble eating twice
I had exploratory surgery twice
Brush reduction so I have scars I have scars and most of them are in the same
You know, they open up the same places over and over
They didn't do the way they do things now, you know, just go through your belly button or something. I was cut
open like a
double L
So but I was so embarrassed back then, you know, I didn't want anybody to ever see my stomach in this and I would see women
like posing in magazines or
Online or something and they're showing stretch marks or scars and and they have all this confidence and I used to pray for that confidence
because I didn't know how to build myself up and
the crazy thing is nobody was breaking me down but me I
Was the only person breaking me down
I was the only person noticing all my flaws and saying them out loud
Now other people might notice my flaws. I look in the mirror and I'm like, oh my gosh
My pores are so big and I what why do I have these spots here?
And you know, why why this why that why is my gray coming in like this? I don't like this and and why
I'm looking for my imperfections. I'm not looking at my own heart
The way everybody else does I'm looking for my imperfections and then I'm doubting myself for having them. I
Said in the earlier podcast if you don't like something change it and if you can't change it embrace it
It's not gonna change. Why keep beating yourself up or allowing others to beat you up over something that can't change
Simple things now some things you can pray and believe it or not, you'll be delivered from them
I am a living testimony, but there are things you just can't change
You know, you're born with four fingers instead of five and now you're 20 years old and you're still complaining about having four fingers
You haven't gotten over that you 20 years you've been living with that 20 years
Or you allow somebody else to make you feel bad about missing a thing
Come on
You embrace that you embrace that
You know, I'm
I'm ambidextrous and I never really embraced that I wanted to be more of a right-handed person. So I hardly ever
Well, I'm not gonna say I hardly ever use my left hand because I do everything with my left except right
Everything I draw with my left. I throw with my left. I I
My left is my stronger side. I'm a self-paw when I box I box with my left. I'm
I'm definitely a lefty, but I write right with my right
and
I would hate to do stuff with my left hand and people take notice and
I would try my best. Let me go bowling and use my right hand. Let me shoot this pool
Cube with my left my right hand whatever I could do simple things like that drove me crazy
If it brought attention to me, you know, how many ambidextrous people there are in this world
I don't know many my daughters are
But I don't know many
That's something I need to embrace. Yes. I can use my left and my right
I'm stronger on my left with some things and I'm strong on my right with some things
You know, I have one dimple one deep dimple on my left cheek
And I used to wonder what the hell happened to my other dimple. Why do I only have one? Why give me one dimple?
Then my oldest daughter was born with dimples, but her right dimple is much deeper than her left dimple
She's got my other dimple. So I embrace the fact I only have one dimple and then here comes my youngest and
God kissed all over her. This girl has so many beauty marks and dimples. She's got two deep dimples in her cheeks
She's got a dimple in her chin. She's got a double dimple in her cheek
Come on now and then I'm liking she got a beauty mark here a beauty mark there a beauty mark here
She's got a birth. I've got four birthmarks. I think she's got five and I
Now see it as God just kissing all over just a little extra oomph for us. He gave me a dimple. It's a little extra oomph
You know, he gave me a
Beauty mark over my top lip. That's a little extra oomph
That's how I see it now, but I used to not see it like that
Embrace what makes you different even my stomach. I
Will walk around in front of my husband. You're like, okay, that's your husband. You guys have no idea
how long it took me to
Allow my husband to see my stomach. I did not
Want him to ever see my stomach. I just think it's so ugly, you know, but now I don't care
It's skin. It's my skin. So what I've had a lot of surgeries. So what it's still mine
It's mine and it goes with all the rest of this
And I embrace it now cuz guess what I can't change that. I'm not gonna have plastic surgery
I'm not gonna go to no doctor and say hey, I'll pay you $5,000 to remove these scars. That's okay
I've had him since I was in my 20s. I am 53. I embrace them now. They're part of me
They're part of my history. They're part of my story when I get up and talk about being
Dead for several seconds. I can actually say and I have a scar to prove it
You know when I talk about the surgeries I had and
The the things I went through and why I went through them and telling women to protect their bodies and take care of themselves
I have battle scars to show I've been through something y'all
You know these open pores on my face can't do much about them because I'm not buying no one two three four five hundred dollar face cream
To tighten my face. I've had them all my life. I got him from my daddy and he got him from his mama. It's hereditary. Oh well
You know I have this thick hair and it gets heavy
I've talked about this so I generally only let it grow as long as my shoulders and then I cut it all off again and
From the time I cut it off in January to December
It's always back on my shoulders and January I cut it again this past year
I decided not to cut it and now it's on my bra and yes, it's heavy, but I am grateful for thick
Natural hair. I'm not gonna complain. God could change that for me
It could not be heavy and it cannot be thick and it could be gone. I
Gotta embrace this beautiful hair guy gave me
He gave me this I have natural highlights I was telling my friend
yesterday via text that I hate that my highlights are now
Turning to gray lights, but I don't I love my gray highlights
I love my hair and my hair being naturally highlighted people used to swear
I was lying and swear I was getting my hair highlighted and I wasn't and I would get so aggravated and wish my hair was just
One color well
It's about to be one color gray
I'm gonna get that wish
But the thing is y'all embrace what makes you different you got a snort laugh
Don't be embarrassed when you laugh snort laugh. It makes other people laugh
You know you walk with a limp
Make that the best limp walk ever
Embrace your
Beauty no matter what it looks like to other people. It's your beauty from the top of your head to the tip of the toe
You are beautiful and you are wonderfully made
You are beautiful and wonderfully made
Somebody posted a picture of this guy and he looks like he's been burned
But he hasn't been it's just the way he looks
And he had posted a picture of his father I went to his page and
His father had passed away and he posted a picture of his father and his father looked just like him their eyes turned down
On the out instead of up or out they turned down and
Then they have these extra skin in the size of their eyes and they really look like they've been burned and they got
New skin, but apparently he's looked like that all his life. And so is his father
But this guy
Loves himself. Do you hear me and I don't see why he shouldn't I
Don't see what's wrong with him being uniquely made to where he should feel down about
In the reason I'm saying that at all is because somebody asked him what happened to him and nothing happened to him
He was born like that and he looked just like his daddy and to ask him that
was
Very rude and nasty because apparently they didn't know him
And I thought wow people can be so insensitive, but what he did was posted her question
And he responded with a dance and a kiss to his beautiful wife and
It touched me so much. I thought you know what we are all so uniquely and beautifully made
Somebody can look at me my husband calls me gorgeous all the time
But somebody else can look at me and be like, oh my god. What happened to her? She looks horrible
Beauty is definitely in the eyes of the beholder. So what matters most is the way you see yourself
You think I care what anybody thinks when they see my husband you think he cares what anybody thinks when they see me
Everybody should think their kids are the beautifulest kids in the world
Every parent which means everybody should have somebody who thinks they're the beautifulest person in the world or thought it
Y'all don't let other people's opinions and thoughts sway the way you see you
You see yourself with nothing but love and vigor and when you see your smile self flaws and all
Embrace it you got a flaw on your hand kiss it
You know, I have these ugly hands and I've said this oh my gosh my hands are so
ugly
But you know what I
Got my daddy's hands and he had his mama's hands and half my family on my dad's side has these same hands
What they look like is they just look old
You know, I look like I have 70 year old hands. I look like I had 70 year old hands when I was 20
But I never
Was embarrassed about my hands. Isn't that crazy?
I have all this like extra skin around my knuckles and I've never been embarrassed about my hands so much
So did I embrace my hands that I?
Never even got my nails done until two years ago and then I was getting them done
Without cease I just kept getting them done and getting them done and getting them done where it became a regular thing for me
And when my nail tech who'd never had listen this girl cared about me so much
She said Sonia, you know
Women who get their nails done all the time. They're really ruining their nails
Even though you do the dip people think if they do dip or jail, it's better on their nails
It's all bad if you stopped wearing nails right now
It would still take months for your nails to heal and she said maybe you should give your nails a breather and only get
Them done on special occasions. That's her taking money out of her pocket because I got my nails done faithfully
But I listened to her she took the nails off and sure enough for the last two and a half months
My nails will grow a little bit and fall right off their crack and split and all that
But now they're finally growing
healthy
Healthy and maybe for just a minute. I was trying to improve the look at my hand. I don't know
But those nails weren't gonna improve the look of my hands
That was just money I was spending for no reason. Why am I getting my nails done all the time?
Some people get their nails done all the time because that's what they do for themselves and I ain't mad at you
There's absolutely nothing wrong with doing for you
But it wasn't for me. I'm not into that stuff. I'm not into nails. I'm not into weave. I'm not into braids
I'm not into makeup
I'm in the exercise
even with the extra 25 pounds and I love heels and nice clothes and
I won't even wear my nice clothes if I don't have nowhere to go. I'm gonna have on my workout clothes all day
But I'm learning to invest love into Sonia McQueen
I'm learning to invest
Positivity in words of affirmation in words of encouragement and smiles in air kisses to the mirror. I
Got on a friend once who I think is absolutely gorgeous because every time I told her I give her a compliment
She replies with something negative and I got on her about it and it was easy for me to do that whether she liked it or not because
That's me all day
And my husband's got on me and he's like, you know, y'all is talking negatively about yourself
And he couldn't stand it and I didn't even realize I was doing it until he pointed it out
But I did somebody give me a compliment. I replied with a negative negative retort
Almost every time unless they were talking about my shoes. Yes, they are bad. Thank you very much
Yes, they are how many parachutes I got too many and yes, they are nice
That was about it. You can compliment my clothes too, but don't compliment the way I
They fit me or they look on me because I'm gonna say something that oh man if I had a little bit more booty
Oh
If my waist was 22 inches again instead of 28. Oh
If
Always something for now
You can compliment me
I'm gonna say thank you
And I'm gonna mean it. Thank you
And I'm not gonna feel like I have to give you a compliment back
It's okay to sharpen each other
But don't feel like you're obligated to say something because somebody says something to you
It's okay to just say thank you and keep it moving
It is
All right, you guys I hope I encouraged you a little bit today
You know how to find me and please do send me a message
Sonia M at ledbymotivation.com or
ledbymotivation07 at gmail.com have a beautiful day on purpose