The Soul Project

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DENEE

Randolph Community Center, Randolph, MA

Daughter, sister, cousin, friend, advisor, motivator. I value faith, honesty and humor. I worry about everything! I worry most about my next moves and achieving what I want to in life. I feel like as a society we don't know how to just sit and do nothing. We always need to be distracted. We don't live in a culture that encourages us to disconnect and I've found myself struggling to manage the "screen time" in my life. I struggle with patience. I hate being late and making others wait on me so I tend to always rush whomever I'm with. I find myself nagging folks if they don't do things on my timeline. I also have very little patience for myself. I don't allow myself many mistakes and am hard on myself. I'm still working on finding a way to manage that. I'm obsessively neat and clean. I worry sometimes that I'll pass these idiosyncrasies onto my future children. I hope that by the time I have kids I'll be able to show them a good balanced life. I went to a private girls high school and it was there when I first felt an economic difference between my classmates and I. While at that school I also realized I was black for the first time and it became very clear that many of my classmates and I lived in different realities. My parents raised me with a strong sense of self and self worth though. I may have felt different at times, but because of how I was raised I always felt good enough. I'd tell a 12 year old me that she is fabulous and to remember that; also to be kinder to those around her because everyone could use some more kindness. To me, success is living a faith based, debt free life that focuses on working to live rather than living to work. Beauty is found in someone who is confident and knows themselves inside and out. I think confidence makes everyone look better. I wish women loved themselves and uplifted each other more. In ten years I hope to be living in my own house, hopefully married with at least one kid and finding the perfect balance between work and home life. I am Denee and I am proud of my faith in God. It has changed how I deal with my circumstances and has made me a better person for myself and others.