This past winter break was definitely bizarre to say the least. I have never been a huge fan of winter break because the only thing that I do is sit at home and binge watch the latest season of some crappy reality TV show while obsessing about how I think I’m getting fat. This past break didn’t seem at all like it was going to be different, I was wrong, it was worse.

I have never had bad juju, I’ve never even heard about bad juju until I had it. I am convinced that the universe somehow has it out for me because this was just ridiculous. I had done everything different; I applied to several seasonal positions, I contacted business owners in my neighborhood to see if anyone would give me something to do. I wanted so desperately to avoid my usual winter break routine. Not only did no one call me back, I had officially ran out of money buying my family Christmas presents. Just an FYI, I spent twenty dollars total on these Christmas presents because Walgreens is the mecca of all great cheap gifts. Because I was now broke I spent a good amount of time hibernating in my friend’s apartment to prevent me from spending any more money. This worked pretty well until I had to go home.

After Christmas I still had no money and no job until I got a phone call from a friend for some catering gig. Could this be? God had answered my prayers! I booked a job for New Year’s Day and I was ecstatic. I turned down all possible New Year’s plans because I didn’t want to be tired on the job. Things started looking up for me but because I am the human form of Murphy’s Law everything that could go wrong, did. I got cancelled on for the job so once again I was jobless and in addition to that I had zero plans for the New Year. Miraculously my sister had convinced my mother to throw a New Year’s party. The party surprisingly went well (this is probably because I didn’t throw it) and everyone that came had fun. I thought “you don’t have bad luck Tiffany, things are working out ok”. God do I hate it when I jinx myself because just when everything seemed like it could go well, everything fell apart again. I had a huge fight with the guy who says he likes me, I couldn’t get a job… I was really over my life.

I had an emotional breakdown, it seemed like nothing could go right for me, I was having trouble in every single sector of my life. I was so desperate to change this spout of bad juju that I was willing to do anything. A friend of mine told me to try this store called Ohm Namaste, they sold charms and herbs and an array of things for people who are into holistic cleansing. I didn’t know too much about holistic cleansing but I was willing to try anything. You could tell me that carrying beans in my pocket would help me and I would have done it.

I went into the store and consulted the sales woman about how to get rid of bad juju and she handed me this dried up cluster of leaves tied together. She told me to burn it and go into the different rooms in my house and pass the smoke around in it. I went home and like a crazy witch doctor I did what this lady told me to do. In addition to the sage I picked up two bracelets, one was a hamsa charm and the other was this new thing chicks are raving about called Lokai. After performing my voodoo I sat there and I looked at my bracelets and realized things could be infinitely worse. I could be dead, I could be homeless, and I could not have the life that I am so blessed to have.

What I learned from all of this is that I have a huge problem letting things go. I hold on to things, I panic very easily, and quite frankly I am dramatic. Through my experience I learned that if the issue isn’t going to affect me in the long run then I should let it roll of my back like water. For everyone thing that went wrong, I have 100 things that went right. I haven’t exactly mastered the ways of the Buddha because being compassionate and letting things go isn’t exactly my forte, but I have come a long way since winter break. The most I can do is keep working on that part of me and if I happen to relapse I always have my sage and charms.