The Prison We Build in Our Minds
You are not your past. The prison we build in our minds is real, and there is something I learned here that I never would have understood without first losing my freedom.
Yes, the walls around me are real. Concrete. Cold. Locked doors and counted steps. But the strongest prison I ever lived in wasn’t built with steel or bars. It was built inside my own mind.
For a long time, I was incarcerated by my past.
I replayed my mistakes like a song stuck on repeat. Every wrong choice. Every moment I failed myself or my children. Every decision I wish I could rewrite. I punished myself daily for things I could not undo, convincing myself that regret was the price I had to pay forever.
I would wake up thinking about the mother I should have been yesterday.
The choices I should have made last week.
The road I should have taken years ago.
And while I was living there mentally trapped in yesterday I was missing today entirely. You are not your past.
What I didn’t realize then was this: every time I lived in yesterday, I was quietly destroying tomorrow before it ever had a chance to exist.
So hear me clearly, young queens:
You are not your past.
Read that again. Sit with it. Let it settle.
You are not your past.
Your past is a chapter. A page. Ink that has already dried. But you are not a finished book. You are still being written right now, in this very moment.
And the pen is in your hand.
The Power of the Present Moment
When I say “yesterday has already been written,” I am not telling you to erase your past or pretend it didn’t happen. Your experiences matter. Even the painful ones. Especially the painful ones.
They taught you something. They gave you wisdom. They shaped your awareness.
But here’s the truth that changed my life:
Your past can inform you without defining you.
It only controls your future if you keep handing it the pen.
Today is the pen of tomorrow.
Let that sink in.
Every decision you make today is actively writing the life you’ll wake up to tomorrow.
Every thought you allow to stay in your mind today becomes the belief system you’ll live from later.
Every time you forgive yourself included you loosen the grip of yesterday on your future.
Every boundary you set today protects the woman you’re becoming.
Every dream you dare to name today begins shaping the road ahead.
Every time you choose growth over comfort, courage over fear, hope over shame you are rewriting your story.
And the most beautiful part?
You get to choose.
A Letter to My Younger Self and to You
If I could sit across from the younger version of myself the girl who thought her mistakes defined her, the woman who believed she was too broken to be redeemed I wouldn’t lecture her.
I would hold her face gently and say:
“Baby, you are being way too hard on yourself.”
I see you, young empress. Carrying guilt that was never meant to be a life sentence. Punishing yourself for being human. Believing the lie that because you stumbled, you are disqualified from greatness.
Stop.
Breathe.
Listen to me.
Your mistakes do not disqualify you from your destiny.
Say it again. Louder.
YOUR MISTAKES DO NOT DISQUALIFY YOU FROM YOUR DESTINY.
I am a mother of two, sitting in a place the world labels as failure. And yes I made choices that led me here. Yes I have regrets. Yes there are things I would do differently if time allowed.
But time doesn’t rewind.
What it does do is offer today.
And today, I choose growth.
Today, I choose accountability without self-destruction.
Today, I choose to become the woman my children deserve not by perfection, but by transformation.
Living in the Present: Where Real Power Lives
Here is what incarceration taught me about the present moment:
This is where God works.
Not in yesterday’s shame.
Not in tomorrow’s fear.
But right here. Right now.
When you live stuck in yesterday, you miss today’s blessing.
When you beat yourself up over last week, you miss who God is sending this week.
When you drown in past shame, you can’t hear opportunity knocking.
I call them God-sent opportunities because that’s exactly what they are.
Divine interruptions.
Sacred moments.
Second chances disguised as ordinary days.
But you have to be present to receive them.
Every morning I wake up here, I face a choice.
I can waste today hating yesterday.
Or I can use today to build tomorrow.
I can reread the chapter that’s already written.
Or I can pick up the pen and write something new.
Learn More About: Psychology / Mental Health
Make Memories Worth Remembering
So here is my advice to you, my beautiful empresses:
Live in the present.
Make decisions today that you will be proud of tomorrow.
Create memories that future you will thank you for.
Ask yourself honestly:
Is the way I’m living today aligned with the woman I want to become?
Or am I repeating a chapter that already hurt me?
You have the power to break cycles.
To end generational patterns.
To rewrite narratives that were handed to you broken.
But that power does not live in yesterday.
It only exists now.
Stop punishing yourself for not being perfect. None of us are. We are all evolving. All unfinished. All learning as we go.
What matters isn’t where you’ve been it’s the direction you are choosing today.
You Are the Future
Here is the truth that finally set me free:
You are not your past.
You are the future.
Yesterday is behind you.
Your pain is not ahead of you.
The person you used to be is not who you are becoming.
I chose the name Phoenix Rising for a reason.
A phoenix burns but it does not stay in the ashes.
It rises.
It transforms.
It becomes stronger than it ever was before the fire.
That is you.
Every time you wake up and choose again you rise.
Every time you forgive yourself you rise.
Every time you grow instead of shrink you rise.
This season is not the end of your story.
It is the refining fire.
Remember, you are not your past.
The Pen Is in Your Hand
So right now, in this moment, I want you to make yourself a promise.
Promise yourself you will stop living in yesterday’s prison.
Promise yourself you will stop punishing yourself for surviving.
Promise yourself you will write a tomorrow that reflects who you are becoming not who you used to be.
Yesterday has already been written, empress.
That ink is dry.
That page is turned.
But today?
Today is the pen of tomorrow.
And the pen is in your hand.
What will you write?
A story of healing?
Of growth?
Of redemption?
Of rising?
Or will you keep repeating a chapter that already hurt you?
The choice is yours.
Keep in mind: you are not your past.
I’m sitting here as a young mother who fell, who learned, who is choosing to rise. I’m using this time not as a sentence but as a classroom.
And if I can do that from in here?
Imagine what you can do out there.
Live in the present.
Make it count.
Make it yours.
You are not your past.
You are possibility.
You are hope.
You are a phoenix rising.
Now spread your wings.
Read More: 9 Proven Lessons on Spiritual Growth: A Practical Journey, Not a Destination
