A Complete Psychic Change....

The belief that as an addict, I have to go through a complete psychic change is jarring. Coupled with the fear of not being perfect, it becomes a daily struggle. I find myself thinking day to day that I need to be better. That I need to become something far greater than the person that I am. This may be true. There is something that saves me; It took ten years to become this way, it may take a lifetime to recover. What's more, I have a new found respect for growth over time. Drugs, drinking, and sex got me used to instant gratification. Continually developing myself on a day to day basis has given me something far greater; Self value, and the start of the psychic change necessary to transcend my self destructive behavior.

The journey to reinforcing my lifestyle during my druggie days was a very sad, depressing and lonely one. The guilt and shame, followed by the use of whatever I could get my hands on to either numb emotions, or elevate happiness that I might hold on to for a while longer, became something I dreaded. I knew nothing of reality. When people speak of coping mechanisms, I chose to intoxicate myself. I learned little of anything else, especially anything constructive. Anything to alter my mind state and be away from the world for a bit, that was what I was after on a regular basis. The last seven years of my life have literally been spent on obsessing about using, using, or obsessing about when the next time I was going to use was. This went for drugs, drinking, and sex. Anything else was an annoyance that usually gave me an excuse to do it all over again!

Imagine my relief when I started to have a change of heart and mind. I realized I hurt so many people, including myself. I realized that what I was doing was driving me to insanity. I became suicidal. I hated myself. I hated my family. I disconnected from friends. I couldn't hold a job. I could not achieve anything close to my goals or aspirations. My life was in shambles. I had been homeless and jailed, and all sorts of other things in between. But I had something change. I wanted something more. I wanted to find the person inside of me that screamed for a voice. I could be decent, I may even have the ability to surpass that, I could be beautiful. Now I had had these brief moments where I thought like this, but they were usually drowned out by thoughts of being a monster, of never being able to complete anything I set out to, by self-hatred, self-pity, justification for my behavior (I blamed all of my actions on others; what's accountability?), I could continue to increase this list to infinite. I had every excuse in the book not to change my ways. But what was the reason I wouldn't?

The mind of the addict, as I see it, is a paradox; I wanted success, knowing I would never have it living the way I did, yet I continued to perpetuate a cycle of lunacy. "I can't go on like this," "I must stop this!" "This one more time and then I will begin life!" "Screw it, I'll never be good enough!" "I'm so ashamed of myself..." "Why can't I change?" "I don't want to do this anymore..." "Maybe I can do it even though I live like this!" "What's the use, this is the only thing I'm good for" "I hate everything anyways, this is what I need" "I'll only use when I complete a task!" "F*&^ IT!". All were followed by using one thing or another. How bizarre. Self knowledge of my thought process helped none either. If anything, I felt more ashamed when I knowingly continued even though I had told myself what would happen and planned to defend against it.

The problem was my heart and mind. "When the fear of changing is less the the pain of staying the same, change can happen." One of the wisest women I've met to date said that to me and a few others. My mind was exhausted. My heart was broken. My emotions were wrecked. I decided to face that fear. It started with admittance. I needed to accept the fact that I was the source of my problems. It just had to be done. Next I needed to realize I wasn't the center of the universe, that I couldn't control everything. There was more. The bottom line is there is much work to be done when you're as messed up as I was. The greater realization was that in order to be happy with myself, I needed to continually work toward my "beauty" for the rest of my life. This would not be an easy task, but I decided it would be far better to try and fail, then to continue on the way I was heading.

That was almost six months ago. I'm still completely bonkers. But I am slowly gaining my freedom from that thinking. I have lapses in mental activity, but nowhere near as bad! The most beautiful part of this, no one has to be an addict to become insane. I became that even before I started using. Somethings just make us unhappy, there is a wide range of things that can give us the strength to overcome them.

My only hope is that through the love we should all have for ourselves, we can all become something that surpasses the suffering of this world currently. whether a complete psychic change is necessary, or just a minor adjustment; It is more than possible. Love could be ever present and expressed on such a grand scale. My heart cries not for it's brokenness, but the brokenness of the hearts around me. I feel them. I want them so desperately to find the life force that can bring it the strength to shed light to the world.

So sentimental, yet completely acheivable. Call me utopian, call me an idealist. I call myself a human, and I'm more than willing to give my life for the happiness of others.

And They Told Me I'm Self-Absorbed

Too true. For those that don't know me, or some of the things I have to do day to day for my recovery; I have to go to treatment. Five classes a week, Monday thru Thursday, two hours at a time. Today was a very sobering day (not a play on words). I was told that I had an addiction to being self-absorbed by someone in class. Hit me like a brick. Unfortunately for everyone else, he was right. Fortunately for me, I believed him.

Through some of the things that went on in my early life, I developed a deep fear of rejection, coupled with a deep want for acceptance. At the beginning, it manifested itself in some positive ways; exceedingly good grades and behavior in school, helping around the house, etc. I found that it did not allow me to feel the acceptance that I craved. It did not allow me to feel the love that I so desperately wanted to feel. My main problem in this situation was that I was trying to derive my sense of value in myself from the praise and acceptance of other people. This continued, and still continues, up until this day. Hence the smack in the face today.

My mind has a funny way of lumping words together; Love, acceptance, attention. To a degree, they all mean the same thing to me. This is a very scary thing for an ego-maniacal, self-absorbed person. It places me in a position where I think I need to be the center of attention, hence allowing myself to become self-absorbed. The feelings of others cease to matter to me, all I care about is my own comfort. To continue on from a previous point; After I decided I was not getting the results I needed from positive manifestations of attention-seeking behavior, I found that there was more attention to be found in destructive, negative behavior. I won't go into details on all of the ways it affected my behavior, but I will say that I learned to make people laugh. This was one of my bread and butters. I found that I could make people laugh, I could be goofy, and people would accept me, some even seemed to like me because of that behavior.

I was hooked. I continued to act ion this particular way for as long as I can remember. I believe it started in close to first grade, but became a disruption towards the end of second. This is a deep seeded problem for me. Ask any teacher I've ever had thoughout my entire school career, they will almost assuredly tell you that I was a disruption. I even went to the length of becoming something worse than a clown, I became the trouble-maker. Everyone loves the bad guy, right? In my mind they did. And so the destruction and attention seeking continued.

Today, when this fellow said this to me, and was sincerely upset that I was taking away from his ability to learn, I had two choices; I could get angry, I could throw a fit, tell him to screw off, tell him why he was wrong, or, I could admit the truth and look at myself. I chose the latter. I am self-absorbed. I have a problem. What I believe to be the solution is to start understanding that I do not need to seek attention to gain acceptance, therefore allowing me to understand love is neither of those things. To go even further, I must be okay with myself, love myself, and stop thinking I need the approval of others to find my inner sense of worth. These things are all crutches that I have used to find something no external object, person, or place can give me. Satisfaction comes from within, not from those things outside.

This world is transient, it is passing away, it will not be here forever. Not the car, or the house, or the wife, or husband, or friend or family, the job or the new phone. They will all cease to exist one day. But my soul, my spirit, that is mine forever. If I do not learn to cherish it before my time here is up, I will never find the thing that I seek. I will never be able to truly love myself, therefore preventing me from truly loving those around me. That is all that matters here. That is the only thing that can change me, and consequently, the only thing that could ever change the world. Not a Beatle, but all we need is love.

Ripples of Choice

My word is my own, my action as well,
My behavior a reflection, there are times when I fell.
With words, I can shape, with action, I effect,
With behavior, I manipulate change and infect.

My life is a testament, to what, I know not,
However sour or sordid, I have a chance to be taught.
Shall I bring dark to the light or do the reverse is my struggle,
shall I continue the hurt, or erect new from the rubble.

My heart is the hero, my mind is the culprit,
I have the choice to love others, the world is my pulpit.
As I sing to my brethren, shout praise to my family,
my insanity angers, it screams for calamity.

Left to my own devices, I would have surely started war,
Left with help in crisis, I whispered peaceful roars.
My struggle is too great to fathom, but we shall surely try,
Your love has given me new wings, and I shall learn to fly.




Thank you to all those that have stood by me in the face of despair. For those that believed in me, and still do. I was given love until I could love myself. I only wish everyone could receive that. I am truly grateful to the people that have had a hand in my life, no matter how large or miniscule. I appreciate you all :)

Learning How To Live

For a good while, I have been living life in a way that wasn't really living. I used Drugs and alcohol to numb me from my emotions. Anytime I thought anything was going on that I didn't like, it was time to get intoxicated and forget about it. The insanity of it all was that although I felt better at the time, nothing ever changed, I was simply high or drunk for a brief moment, then back to reality. For a little while anyways. Then the same old routine, back to intoxication, not feeling, then reality. It became very tiresome. Not only that, I felt so hopeless when it came to my life situations. I would never admit that, because I was always "fine", how wrong I was.

This is more about the things I am learning, or have never learned rather. For example; How in the world do you have a relationship with a woman without being selfish and self-centered? How do you handle emotions associated with a relationship? If a problem arises, how do you talk to her without inspiring anger or sadness, and get the situation resolved in a way that both people feel good about? My emotions get out of control! And I start going off the deep end, feeling like I need to use or run away, so many things start going wrong.

I think one of my biggest problems is this; When I started using, everything had to be just like drugs and alcohol. Quick, easy, bring me pleasure, and do exactly what I want it to do every time. People being objects to be manipulated. That has caused me so much stress. I want to care about people, I want to show compassion and love to everyone around me. But sometimes my old thinking comes out and I become angry, or spiteful, or downright hateful. I really dislike that. I have to make daily amends, apologies to people because of some of my actions. I would be lying if I said I didn't have a problem with doing that. I have an ego, and it doesn't like admitting when it is wrong.

I'm starting to learn that people are not there for my amusement and pleasure. I'm learning how to have meaningful relationships. But I do fall short, quite often. And then I have to look at myself and my motives toward the person. Usually they are wrong. But it's all a part of learning how to live. I'm not sure if I ever knew how to love a person for who they were rather than what they could do for me. Even when I was very young, I remember thinking that in order to be loved I had to do something, achieve something. So my idea of loving someone has been skewed for as long as I can remember.

I have a huge problem when it comes to my emotional state. The smallest thing can send me into a whirlwind of emotion that I think the only solution to is getting intoxicated. When I feel overwhelmed, my first thought is that a beer will fix it, or that I need a joint, or whatever other drugs I could do, I want them. That's a problem lol. I'm trying to stay sober, and my first thought in any stressful situation is that I have to use. Luckily I haven't yet, and hopefully I won't anytime soon.

This was kind of a throw up session, but I wanted to get a piece of writing out this week, and this has been my struggle. One day I'll be less insane, on day I'll know a bit better how to live :) Today, I'll just keep learning. 

I love all of you, any feedback would be much appreciated, have a great day :)

This is my heart, I hope you hold it tight PT. II

At the very beginning of this, I must say I am sorry to whomever read the last entry and thought I was completely off my rocker. Somehow I managed to put everyone in a box, and think each person was exactly like me. How absolutely close-minded of me! My intent was not to do anything resembling that. My hope was to convey the means to improve the value of one's self, but I forgot to take into consideration that not everyone in the world acts the way I do. Everyone has unique and specific thoughts that control them. Unfortunately, I didn't take them into consideration. I am sorry for that.

Taking that into consideration, I'm not sure if I possess the ability to be empathetic on such a grand scale! I spend so much time thinking about myself that to put myself in the shoes of so many different people from so many different walks of life, well to be honest, I don't have that ability. My focus will be trying to obtain something that resonates with most people. Something vague enough to ring true with more than one type of person, but direct enough to make an impact.

My feelings on this subject are very heartfelt, hence the title. For so many years, I've felt worthless. My belief was the world would be better off without me. That brought me to horrible places. Suicidal tendencies, drug abuse, criminal behavior, deep depression, hatred, anger, self sabotage, homelessness, the list could be increased. I've been to some of the sadder places of self loathing. So my thoughts on this are probably a little biased.

I would like to start by saying, that list could be completely different from person to person. One could simply have an annoying thought that pops up every once and a while, "I should have done this," and could be to such an extreme that they sit with the barrel of a gun in their mouth, crying, wondering why shouldn't they pull the trigger. There are so many varying degrees of the feelings I'm talking about. There is, however, one thing in common with all of these thoughts; They take away from our happiness. They rob us of the ability to smile throughout the day and feel secure in ourselves. Whether you were reprimanded for something minor, or everyone in your life tells you that you are a horrible person. I don't want anyone to have to develop anything resembling self-hatred. It helps no one, and keeps us in a state of unhappiness.

Anything that comes that comes to mind, rarely or often, that interrupts focus on our present moments and our happiness, should be gotten rid of. This is a very difficult thing to do, and I would be lying if I said I've mastered this process. But I have become better equipped to handle these thoughts, and started to overcome some of my more destructive thinking. For example, instead of thinking that I am worthless and the world would be better off without me, I've decided that I have something to offer to the world, and I can help others. I have value!

Firstly, I would like to talk about resentments. A resentment is something developed when a person feels a wrong has been done to them, and they harbor a hatred toward another person. This creates a rift in the feelings of happiness. It also provides a breeding ground for self hatred. This is due to the fact that when a resentment is formed, sometimes we feel like we have done something wrong. For example, I knew a friend that had been adopted when he was young, very young. He harbored resentment toward his birth parents because they didn't want to take care of him. At the same time he developed a complex that made him feel like he wasn't good enough, and held himself to that standard of worthlessness. Let's look at another case; A woman I know has a problem with her looks. When she was younger, her mother was always harping on her to look this way or that, and she developed a deep resentment toward her mother for that. At the same time developing a complex that lead her to believe that no matter what she did, she would never be pretty. This woman gorgeous, but to her, she cannot see it. This is due to her resentment of her mother, and the development of a self-hating thought, "I'll never be pretty enough." I hope this is showing the power of resentment, and the dual handicaps they present. In my head, I had a boxing ring. In one corner I had a resentment, in the other, a complex developed do to that resentment, or co-occuring with it. They would go rounds with each other and it would do nothing but continually take happiness from me. These resentments could even be developed by one's self. A self-resentment. I had a problem with my weight, and every day I would tell myself I was fat and good for nothing. I resented myself for that. So you see, these can be generated by so many different ways. The answer is to question and get rid of these resentments.
This is not an easy process, but becoming aware that this hurts rather than helps, is a big part of starting to overcome it. There is a common saying on resentments, " Having a resentment toward someone is like drinking a bottle of poison and expecting the other person to die, it just doesn't work." At the end of the day, you're only hurting yourself.

Resentments can be big and small, deep seeded or very minor. But they all have the potential to lead to unhappiness. I want to avoid that. Nobody in this world deserves to feel like they don't deserve happiness. Everyone deserves that feeling. If you're thinking that I must not be talking about you, you're wrong. I don't care what ANYONE has done. Murderer, thief, addict, abuser, or just a normal everyday person with a few feelings of pain due to some kind of self loathing; everyone deserves to feel happiness.

I'm not a monster, and neither is anyone else in the world. We are just human. Just Human beings trying to make it through, and maybe feel happiness along the way.I love you, please love yourself. It makes a world of difference, and consequently, a difference to the world. You're worth it no matter your background and behaviors :)

There are so many things that go in to this topic, So I think I'll be writing for a good long while. Sorry for any typos there might be, I'll write some more soon.


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The Start

Where ever I go, there I am. This was more than a profound statement made today. I heard it from a gal, and instantly my head started swimming. It made so much sense. For the last decade I’ve spent my time running from place to place in search of something better, only to find myself in places and situations that were far worse. There was a glaring flaw in my thinking; I thought that in order to gain something better, I had to start over somewhere new. The problem was that anywhere that I traveled to, or new job I obtained, or new school I attended, or new apartment I rented, or new house that I moved to, I was still there.

It was never the situation I was in. It was me. It was my thinking, my habits, my principals, my morals, my values, my self. I never took the time to look past the surface, and realize that my problems were my own. I played the victim in almost every way imaginable, I fantasized “If only they would do this,” or “I could find happiness if only,” at the base of it all, I was to blame. I had become the master of my own suffering. But I would do nothing to change it, because I was so stuck searching for an alternative externally, when in all actuality, it was the internal that needed the changing.

A full revamp of ideas, of persona, of morals and principals, was needed. This was such a tough pill to swallow. And it sat on my coffee table for over a decade, I simply thought it was someone else’s (and had no problem telling them to take it). Never placing any accountability for the things and problems I experienced in life. The world was at fault, or at least I thought it was. But alas, it was not so. It took homelessness, incarceration, drug and alcohol addiction, loss of family, loss of friends, loss of possessions, and most importantly, a loss of pride, to show me that maybe, just maybe, I had it all wrong. My ego didn’t want to admit that, but like an ego, it needs to be battered and bruised time and time again to understand that it is not perfect. I am not perfect. I am neither a saint, nor a sinner, I simply am. It is my day to day choices that make or break the person I am and want to become. But they are just that; Choices, and they are mine, not any one else’s, to make.

“Everything can be taken from a man or a woman but one thing: the last of human freedoms to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way.”

Viktor Frankl

I never understood this. I continually used the excuse that I was a product of my environment, and continued to view the world in a way that entitled me to act grotesquely. I never could understand that my problems were my own, and that my shortcomings were many.

Today, I am not perfect. I can now admit that and mean it in the same sentence. I have the ability to grow from my ignorance, and become someone that provides love and compassion, strength and hope, empathy and understanding, but most of all; I can accept responsibility and take accountability for my part in this world, in my life, and the lives of other people. I can change, because no matter where I go, there I am.
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