I’m not ready to let this journal end, at least not yet. But more importantly
and more for you to understand, this is my reach from a place here in fact,
I have either been held captive or been set free.
In part, my efforts are to explain ideas and thoughts and with hopes
to create a vision or something you can touch or hold and understand, I began
this journey to write my way into your heart and mind,
to help me understand life and, along the way, I hope to help people understand life,
which is currently going on, all around us.
Can’t you see it?
It’s right outside our door . . .
Life ~
First, I want to explain that yes, I know that I can be a bit intense sometimes
and yes, I know that true life can be a bit much sometimes.
I know that Jim Carroll was right when he wrote
“Deadlines are a bitch!”
I know that my ramblings have meaning, or better put; I know how important this is
to me, which is why I come here every day, to share them with you
because without you –
Well, then there’s be no “me.”
If that makes sense . .
I come here to simplify the bullshit complications which take place
in the mind. And yes, I have complications. I have challenges to face. I have
obstacles that I need to overcome and hurdles to leap over so that, at best,
I can finish strong, which is not to say that I’m finished with life
or anything like that. But more, I suppose my need to voice this to you is more
of a position which I need to take. Otherwise, it can become very easy to give in
to the struggles in the mind
Oh, and struggles?
Sure, I know them well.
I’m sure you do too.
We all have them
even the people who say they don’t have any struggles
they have them the most.
But me? I know all about this
We go back a long time, struggles and me. Then again, and I always say this,
but when it comes to struggles or when it comes to lifting something heavy,
I only know what weight feels like in my hands, not yours.
I only know what I see and what I can sense, which means
I know what the color blue looks like to me. I know what the colors red
look like. I know what darkness is and the same goes
for the different variations of light, but like I said, as close as I can relate to you,
or to anyone else for that matter; even still, I only know how these things relate to me,
which is why I learned to stop telling people
what I know about them, their life or their struggles.
Sure, I know what it means to have to overcome.
I know what it means to have to fight back;
and yes, I can say that, in my case, I know what it means to have to
come back against something on a daily basis.
I have my own bag of sins. I have my own specific challenges and unique difficulties
that apply to me yet as hard as I’ve struggled, I only know what the experience
is like to overcome something at my own level.
It is wrong and inaccurate of me to talk about or speak for anyone else on this
because, no matter what, interpretation is never the same and no one in this world is
absolutely or perfectly identical.
I know that there were predictions about me which were unfavorable yet
here I am. I’m still here, still going, in spite of all the times I was told,
“might as well pack it in kid. You’re not good enough for this dream” and still
I’m here because of something my Old Man called stick-to-it-iveness.
I don’t give a shit if you lose
I don’t care if you fail
or, whatever that means . . .
Just . . . Don’t . . . Quit!
You can’t quit.
You just can’t.
Or, maybe this has just become my mantra, to keep me going, I suppose.
Either way,
I’m still writing, I’m still working the angles and, each and every day.
I’m still looking to both create and recreate myself.
Also, I am trying to both educate and re-educate myself
because now that I’m aware of myself,
I’m aware that many of my lessons were taught to me by the wrong teachers
which probably makes the right ones . . .
if you know what I mean
I know what it was like for me to overcome or to defy
the so-called predictions against me; yet, as I say this, I know
that I have never been at the same challenge as someone who was told,
“You’re never going to walk again,” and in their determination to experience
the unthinkable victory of being able to flinch their big toe, just once, just because,
they believed and, therefore, they accomplished.
That’s who I want to be
as in that strong
and as in that dedicated.
I know that we give ourselves these death sentences and say things,
like the word “never”
or assume the outcomes, which I am guilty of; and yes,
I am often guilty of the catastrophes that come with the mind.
I am guilty of believing the worst, possible assumption
and the worst possible scenarios.
I am guilty of having my own, self-fulfilled prophecies and yes,
I am guilty of painting myself in the same corner, over and over again,
and then shaking my fist at the sky asking, “Why, God? Why?”
Meanwhile, I forget to look in the mirror to realize
oh yeah, that’s why
Yes, I know the difference between Park Avenue problems
and Skid Row problems. I know the difference between luxury and necessity.
I understand the difference between real life and supposed life.
I also know the difference between rational and irrational thinking;
and lastly, as well, I know the difference between emotional and intellectual thinking.
Sure, I know this all too well.
And so do you, right?
Ever think yourself into a problem?
Of course you have.
We all do . . .
But that doesn’t stop us from freaking out. That doesn’t stop us
from playing the movies in our head which, by the way, these movies tend to be dramas
which never end well.
But –
that doesn’t stop us from running the narrative in our heads
or considering the worst possible scenarios or thinking that somehow
it’s our job to play the fool. And that somehow, we are going to be the idiot
for allowing ourselves to partake in these extracurricular activities
which we call life.
Even though, intellectually, we know what the word irrational means and even though,
we know these are our thoughts running away from us –
the mind is the trick because the mind does not understand the difference
between past-tense or present.
The mind doesn’t understand the difference between assumptions or actual facts.
All the mind does is move, like a factory, and somewhere in that head of ours
is a little character, gender need not apply here; and there they are
the little character in our head
opening valves and shutting and turning on lights. When this happens,
the guards release the hounds because our mind is sensing a change in our nature;
hence the ideas of danger come to mind;
hence our chemistry changes; hence, the speed of our heart rate picks up;
hence the levels of our assumptions go off the meter
and bring on the flood of our anxieties.
This changes the receptors in our mind, like an electrical junction box, about to blow
and there they are, that little character in our head,
freaking out about the overload in our control room, which we call our brain,
and next, the red alerts go off
and then the receptors in our mind overreact and start to over-produce
to protect ourselves.
This is literally what happens when anxiety gets out of hand.
I don’t know what this is like to anyone else.
I only know what this is like to me.
I know what it’s like when I relive old and unpleasant thoughts
or conversations in my head to the point where I begin to rehearse what was said,
or what I wish I had said in return, and now –
let’s add the rehearsal in the mind of things I plan to say when this comes up in the future
and just like that, WHAMO!
The little character in my head has to deal with the red-alert messages in my mind,
which are only as real as my imagination allows them to be;
and like I said, as smart as we are, the brain does not see things in the light of assumption or truth.
All the brain is trying to do is keep us safe and alive.
All the brain wants to do is keep us protected and in expectation of something awful
or something bad, the brain assumes, “Holy shit!
We must really be in danger if we’re thinking this way!”
So,
Release the hounds!
Get to safety!
Attack preemptively
Fire all missiles
Destroy everything around us
Do something
Do anything because holy shit,
this son of a bitch has put us in danger
(again!)
So . . .
What are my struggles?
What are the things that keep me up at night?
What are the thoughts that defy my best interest and lead me towards
thoughts of self-destruction
or of being unsafe or thoughts that put me in jeopardy?
Well, I can always depend upon Blame.
He’s been with me a long time
Blame and I go back to before I can remember.
And then there’s my old friend, Shame
I’ve know Shame a long time
We’re old pals, Shame and me.
Oh, and let’s not forget Guilt.
He always loves to crash my parties.
And by his side is my old friend Fault.
Ah, Fault, he’s been around forever too
He likes to point fingers and try to find accountability,
just in case it was me who caused all of this sadness or discomfort;
or, just in case my pain came because I am somewhat faulted or insufficient
(or inefficient,) good old Fault likes to hide behind corners
and sneak up in your thinking, just to keep the cesspool turning and hence,
the mind is always going, most often at night when dammit-all-to-hell
all you want to do is sleep . . ..
Also, let’s not forget the biggest and baddest S.O.B. of the nest,
let’s not forget who’s all of these things, put together and almost
as if to be jacked on steroids; in comes my longest and oldest buddy of all the rest-
in comes Regret, to really fuck things up!
In comes Regret who, if given the chance, will infect your thinking
until this is all you’ll ever see, think about, or know.
Regret!
I have these things, which now I assume all of them to be no different
from a cranky child or a bratty little toddler, fussing for attention
and pulling on my pant leg, just letting me know that they’re there
and in need of my focus
I know all about the basic set of emotions and, yes,
you’ve heard me talk about this before. And yes, you’ve heard the way
I was taught to organize them in a memorable little acronym:
FLAPP
This is what I was taught.
These are a way to understand our basic emotions which are as follows
Fear, Loneliness, Anger, Pain, and Pleasure. FLAPP
Only one of these is desirable – and that’s pleasure.
The rest suck!
The rest live in the concern that the one one thing we want,
which is to be pleased, is something fleeting or evading us; and so,
out of concern for our safety and out of concern that our end results
will not develop the way we’d hope for,
the other four emotions (AKA The Four Horsemen)
start to worry and who do they call?
They call their old friends, who I call the five fingers of rejective thinking
And there they are, those fuckers!
Blame, Shame, Guilt, Fault and Regret.
They all come to fuel the fires which build our concern for fear, anger, loneliness,
and certainly pain; but more, they churn the cesspool of thought
which worries that pleasure is never going to be possible –
or, if it is, at best, our pleasure can only be temporary.
I have spent years trying to perfect my voice and working on ways
to explain anxiety and depression. I have spent my life trying to overcome the thoughts
and the hindrance of suicidal ideations
which comes at me as a reminder that of the five basic emotions,
Pleasure is the only desirable one and out of concern that pleasure will never be possible,
my body reacts.
My mind rebels because the shade we see tends to blind us
from the actual light of truth.
Look – This is the best lesson I was given and, essentially,
this is the best lesson to support an understanding of emotional challenges
If I put on a pair of dark gray sunglasses and then I go out and look up at a bright blue sky,
what will the sky look like?
It will look gray, right?
If I have a pair of dark, murky sunglasses and then I go out and look up
at the bright blue sky; the sky will appear dark and murky, correct?
Right, so then, if I took a pair of rosy red sunglasses and looked up
at the same bright blue sky, what would the sky look like?
If I took a pair of bright yellow sunglasses; and I mean a golden yellow,
then I went outside and looked at the bright blue sky with yellow sunglasses;
what color is the sky now?
Think about this for a second.
I have yellow glasses on;
Yellow and blue make, what color?
I look up at a blue sky.
What color is the sky now?
The answer is obviously still blue; however, some people will say.
“Well, yellow and blue make green,” so therefore, the sky must be green
which is true but the sky is still the sky
and the sunglasses are a manipulative shade. Also, the sunglasses are a metaphor,
which explains the shaded colors and the deception of our perception.
Therefore, in order to see clearly, we have to learn to practice mindfulness.
We have to remove our emotional shading and take off the shades
that distract us from the accuracy of life’s true colors.
The game is the mind.
The trick here is to learn how to navigate away from problematic thinking.
Otherwise, if you don’t get rid of this, my old five friends,
will come around for a visit,
like unwanted guests who come uninvited,
Blame, Shame, Guilt, Fault and Regret
will come over and eat you out of house and home –
if you let them.
They will rob you of your life and drain you of your energy
if you let them
Remove the shades of perception
Replace this with mindfulness
Recognize the internal conversations in the mind are just thoughts
and not always fact; and by all means,
beware the five fingers of rejective thinking, Blame, Shame, Guilt, Fault and Regret –
these are the fingers that close and make a fist
which we use to beat ourselves up with –
and keep ourselves sick
Today is a good day.
No matter what, just know it
And also, please know that
I love you
with everything I have because with you
there is no “me”
The Written Addiction 