While life has handed me a map that led to lemons for most of my life, I spent every waking moment attempting to outrun and outdo my misfortunes.

I lament over the times where things got the best of me. However, it's a new year and a new everything so I'm choosing to highlight and remember a few key things:

1. Horrible things happen to good people and should not navigate the direction of one's life nor should they reduce a person's value.

Let's face it: bad things happen to good people all of the time. I remember when the worst tragedies happened to me and because of it I concluded that God had given up on me after a lifetime of being good and loving Him. I couldn't understand how or why God would let catastrophe occur to his most precious people. I realized that in fact, my judgment about what God allowed to happen was not the issue. God loved me and when disasters struck I blamed Him. I thought He had failed me and I lost hope.

Why had I spent my entire life doing exactly what I believed to be right only to have to suffer? I learned that God doesn't choose to hurt any of us willingly. He puts us through tests and challenges and He has his reasons, oftentimes ones that we will never see or know about. When I finally reached back out to Him, He let me know He was there and also that He loved me. The sadness was that I had given up on Him during terrible ordeals and in essence, He had never given up on me.

I won't ever gauge my pitfalls and blessings as evidence of my devotion to God again. In fact, I think the important lesson here is that faith should remain constant and is even more important when one is harmed. Trusting Him is hard especially when it brings pain, but trust and faith should always endure.

Perhaps, part of my test was learning to seek Him out during turmoil rather than thinking that He had abandoned me like everyone else. He was the only entity that didn't forsake me and because of that, He led me to rescue. That is the beauty of God. He both blesses and curses. He both inspires and challenges and He always loves even when His lessons are painful.

Through the years, I cannot count the number of times my teacher and a man who is a servant for the universe said to me during the worst years of my life,"God loves you." Even when I didn't believe it, he said it, and not to be superficial, but because it was really true.

After he saved my life, he wasn't sure what his role would be in my life and one day he told me. He said that he asked the universe that if he were supposed to look after me that I would show up with a specific color on or that I would style my hair in a certain way.

Low and behold, each time Mr. Z. requested guidance, I showed up in the way that confirmed his position as the man to care for and look after me. I became a ward of the state and he built me up to competence.

God works miracles and reinforces his mysterious messages with proof that goes beyond human comprehension. I remember some mornings just picking out a particular sweater or shirt that I hadn't worn in years or getting the impulse to do something new to my hair. I had no idea that it was divine intervention, but it was. God was working through me in order to make sure I was protected and never injured like I had been ever again. And to this day, I would do anything for Mr. Z because he saved my life and there is no price tag for that salvation. He showed me that I was actually very gifted even though the very culture I had come from labeled me as crazy and bullied every wonderful and unique thing about me. If it weren't for him, I'd have had no choice but to suppress my God-given talents and because of him, I've flourished in my uniqueness.

2. My dreams and aspirations are STILL my dreams and aspirations.

Just because I've experienced hardship doesn't mean my dreams and goals are no longer valid. It made life harder, much harder, but my dreams remained.

I had a choice to give up on them like I once did with God or see that my dreams are still available and able to be achieved. What is even greater is that because of my past experiences I have been prepared for things I never dreamed I would take part in.

Just like my faith, I nor anyone else should give up on their dreams. Rather than feel the loss, I decided to step up to the plate and be an activist in an area that I never thought I'd be selected to represent. Rather than seeing that as, "Why me or poor me," I see that as why I went through some things.

My voice is important and I was picked to help not just a few people but the entire world. That is an honor. I see my role as not self-selected but rather assigned and that endeavor is for me to put humanity before my pride, wishes or desires. I've been called upon and I accept despite the discomfort and hurt. This isn't about me at all; it's about saving and helping millions of people. I see how rare of an enterprise that is and now I understand.

3. I think that focusing on love and positivity plus the beauty and miracles of life is far more constructive than wallowing in pain and the past.

Boy, is it tempting to give up and into negativity. When I went to my mother for help after I was raped and abused and she told me that she wouldn't help because other people would never speak to her again, I was leveled. I thought things like families turning their backs on women who were raped only happened in India and in third world countries, but I was wrong. I also thought my chances of being raped were obsolete once I left college, but I was wrong there too.

There was no stranger who jumped out of a bush and held a knife to me. Rape was fluid, inconspicuous and slippery. A wine glass turned into an inability to move, think, reason or escape. Also, rape drugs do not necessarily black out their victims; some of them numb, paralyze and immobilize.

Rape was nothing like I had imagined and because I was misinformed I had no idea how to fight back or conclude the process. But, how I wished I had blacked out. Rather it was like being under anesthesia with my mind totally aware of what was happening, but physically having no ability to feel or get away. The best clue I had was that when whatever I was given wore off and I was still being viciously assaulted, the pain was immense and now that I could get away it seemed pointless as I had been absolutely pummeled.

I never thought I'd face that especially after a lifetime of being loving and honorable. When I asked my mother to explain, she declined. Therefore I went out into the world alone, unsupported and burning with pain. I was a walking target just asking to be hurt again and it was devastating as well as terrifying. It took a little while but God led me to a new family and that made up for the cruelty of my own.

What I knew when I left her home was that it wasn't that other people would never speak to her again that she needed to worry about, she lost her daughter for good that day, one who would have done anything for her. I'm not like the insensitive sister who reserved her mother's pearls for after death and continuously reminded her mom of that while she was alive like that was all she was good for. I found that distasteful and she didn't seem to mind.

Meanwhile, I'd rather have dinner or lunch with my mother alive than ask her to leave me anything once she died. If anything, I'd want my mother to leave me with hope, security, and love, not material possessions and alas I got neither. I also hope my greedy sister enjoys her pearls.

I don't hate my mother or any of my family members for that matter. I will always love the person who gave me life, but I also know that my life is much better without someone like her in it. I didn't stay and protest how she was wrong, I accepted that painful iota and swallowed it.

I sometimes wonder how she can live with herself and then I acknowledge that as her cross to bear; not mine. I don't wish for her to be hurt or harmed. I accept the inhumanity of her choices and accept that as the end of our relationship. It's not what I wanted and it's alright mom, I forgive you, I just can't have you in my life again and I pray that you understand.

What did I have in common with women in India, South Africa, and third world countries before that? Absolutely nothing. My father worked for mega-evil Monsanto and earned money despite the harm it inflicted on millions. As his offspring, I'd never make that choice. I'd rather my dad had been a poor blue collar worker.

I knew little of poverty, ostracization and brutality before that, but now, as a well-educated white woman, I can relate to millions of women who have no voice in parts of the world I've never seen. That is not bad, but instrumental. Because at least I have the power, influence, resources, education and ability to help those women, men, and children who live worlds away in circumstances that most people of my caliber would never understand or experience.

It's so easy when things look bleak, disappointing or hopeless to turn negative. There is one thing I learned which is that your mind frame after a tragedy is more critical than the tragedy itself. Therefore, I choose to stay positive. I choose not to let the actions of others eliminate me or my love for others.

It certainly isn't easy and a lot of times it feels impossible especially when the outside world wants to judge and refuse to relate. Other people's opinions do not matter, what matters is how I choose to face this life, what I do to overcome my fears and pain and how I turn that grief and heartache into something beautiful.