The Rebirth of Sanity – Phase Four: Finding Your Source

Phase Four is about the realization that life is always happening. But more, this is also about the unseeable facts of life which take place. They happen to everyone, yet most of our pains and the majority of our personal discomforts are absolutely unseeable.
Yet, the world still turns.
I have been told, “Nobody cares.”
I have been told, “Suck it up!” Maybe this is true. Or maybe this is good advice.
I’m not arguing that . . .

Life happens yet time doesn’t stop moving. Not for me or you or for anyone else.
Life keeps happening , regardless if we’re happy or not and whether we need a break or not; the momentum of life is unrelenting.
Whether we have been hit hard financially or if we experienced a personal tragedy, either way, bills still need to be paid. Insurance needs to be up to date. The mortgage or the rent is due.
If it’s not one of these items, it’s another because there’s always something else to deal with.
There’s always something on the list.
There’s always a task or a measure that needs our care or attention. No matter what’s going on with how we feel or whether we’re “up to the task” or not, life is still happening.
I used to punch walls.
Sure, I used to break things.
But to what avail?
I used to yell and scream and try to intimidate the world.
But again, to what avail?
Life still happened and worse, now I had the aftermath of my behavior to go on top of the issues that I was already dealing with.

Whether life is simple to maintain or not is debatable. I’m not here to judge this or anything, or anyone else for that matter. Instead, I’m here to support the rebirth of our sanity and to help us find safety or perhaps a little salvation from the freakouts and the breakdowns we have in our everyday life.
Whether we see the forest from the trees or the light at the end of the tunnel or not, motivation is always around. There’s always hope.
It’s just not always easy to see.

This might not take the shapes or the forms that we understand or motivation might not come in a simple packages that we’d expect – but motivation can be found anywhere.
It’s all around us. It lives and breathes.
It comes when we least expect it and believe it; motivation can be dressed in unexpected ways or through messages from unexpected people. In fact, motivation can even be found behind enemy lines, so-to-speak. Motivation is everywhere.
Motivation can come from rejection or the so-called rejection we experience, because whether we pass or fail or succeed and reach our dreams; motivation is always around.
We just have to look . . .

Motivation is that thing that pulls you in or pushes you forward.
This is something that incites the riot and drives us to “Fight back!” or this can be the thing that inspires you and lifts you up when you’re down.

This can be found in a sight or a story or a tale of someone who came from nothing and they created everything. Maybe this is enough to see something for yourself. Maybe this is enough that causes you to say, “Hey, you know what? I can do that too!”

Motivation can be simple too.
This can be something as simple as the sun coming out after a heavy rain. Even if this only happens for a few minutes, at least this is enough to remind us that it can’t rain forever.
This can be a bird, like the sight of a cardinal when you’re thinking of a loved one who passed away. Or in my case, this can be a butterfly in an unexpected time or place when I was thinking about my Mom.

Motivation is that thing that triggers our movements. This urges decision which results in action and leads us to accomplishments.
Yes, I am motivated.
We all are.
I have found motivation in the worst places. I have found motivation at the worst times and when I was in the worst way. Still, out of nowhere, somehow someone so loving and so kind put their hand on my shoulder . . .
They did this to let me know that “Hey, I’m right here if you need me.”
“You’re not alone.”

Motivation – it’s a great thing.

Motivation, as in that thing that provides depth to your reasons or substance to your purpose and gives your dreams a face or enough thread that you can sew it up and see this now so clearly. In fact, nothing can take the sight away from you.
Or, wait –
Motivation, as in that person, place or thing that somehow straightens you out when the mind is all crooked. And suddenly, you can see now.
You can see clearer than you saw before –
because you’re motivated to see more.

Motivation, as in that thing that keeps you going.
Even when it seems as if all hope is lost; but still, there’s pieces on the board in front of you. Motivation is that thing that reminds you that your game is far from over.

Motivation –

It’s easy to be deceived. It’s easy to be misguided by the ugliness around us, yet no matter what, there’s always something beautiful to see.
It’s easy to be blinded by hate, especially now.
The world grows more divided by the minute.
Politics have become the new god and the new religion.
Everyone’s looking to argue. There’s always a fight.
But there’s always something beautiful too.
It might not be as newsworthy as the scandals on the news
But still . . .
It’s out there. Beauty.
It’s in front of our faces.
It’s right before our eyes.
Always, even in the darkness or in the emotional blindness of our life; it’s out there – something beautiful, like the thought of a face or a moment in time.
Or like the smell of something that reminds us of a springtime in our youth or the beach, like somewhere down behind 100 Lincoln Road, Miami Beach.
(That’s where my Grandma used to stay.)

Beauty, it’s out there, as in the sign of the ugly subsiding to the beauty of two items that were mean to me and made for each other.
Or as in the victory of an underdog who overcomes the odds.
I love those stories.
It’s out there. Something beautiful.
We might have to adjust our sights.
We might need help to see it sometimes.
We might have a hard time seeing this and we might be confused by the contrast of beauty during the ugliness of a sad moment. But rest assured, there is always something beautiful around us.

Safe to say –
I have seen the inside of terrible places. I have been in what I consider the underbelly of the Earth. I’ve been in sewers, in stationhouses, in the back of ambulances and worse, I have been in emergency rooms during the holiday seasons. I’ve seen death, up close and personal. I’ve seen violence too.
I’ve been to funeral homes. I’ve been in the worst kinds of places.
I’ve been to a pediatric cancer wing of a hospital.
Need I say more?

I’ve seen the inside of dumpsters and I’ve had to find myself, running from the sounds of gunshots; meanwhile, life kept moving. I’ve felt the rage of impending doom which kept gaining on me like a train that refused to succumb to the call for me to “STOP IT!”

Beyond this, I recall the sad losses in my life. I recall the sadness of being somewhere that I didn’t belong. I remember sitting in my car, lost as ever, and looking around at the homes in a somewhat, well-to-do neighborhood.
I had a life.
On the surface, I had plenty.
But inside, I had absolutely nothing.

I remember watching the bay window of someone’s home. I was watching this like a television show. Inside there was a family. Inside there was a husband and wife and a child, playing happily. I wondered what this must be like – to live there or to be like them and seem happy.

Moments later, I remember seeing the bay window of a place where I lived which, at the time; nothing seemed like it was mine. I owned nothing and seemingly, it was if I had nothing.
At the time, all I had was the evidence in my head which proved the story of a dream that was forfeited and settled for something of a lesser value.
I believed I was somehow only deserving of a lesser god, or a lesser life which I agreed to and I signed that contract on the day I chose to settle on something instead of hold out for the life I really wanted.
But, at a glance . . .
no one would see this.
At a glance, no one would look at me and read the signs of depression above my head.
I didn’t “look” suicidal.
I didn’t look like I had a thousand emotional scars.
No, these things are unseeable to the naked eye.
No one sees this, at least not at a glance.
But even here –
Even at my worst and even when I was frustrated; even when I wanted to quit the most and even when I saw my life as ugly because I saw myself as weak and unremarkable; and even though I saw nothing redeemable about me or my life; I can say there was something beautiful around me.
There was something beautiful and the purity of this beauty would sting me, like alcohol or disinfectant to a cut or which is why I would avoid the beautiful things.
This is why I allowed myself to succumb and submit to the ugliness. This is why I would stay away from things so pure or so sweet because, to me, the contrast of this was painful. Yet at a glance, no one would look at me and see this.
I never learned how to laugh or how to play or knew that it’s okay to pretend or to believe in The Man on the Moon or in Santa or the Tooth Fairy. I never learned how to believe in wonder or how to enjoy the wonderful features this world has to offer.
I was too afraid to embrace this.

No one could tell by looking at me.
No one could see what was beneath my smile. To me, I wondered how other people could do it.
How do people live? How do people survive?
How do we move forward or get ahead?
How can I do this?
How can I defy these thoughts in my head?
How can I possibly feel better about myself if all that I see in the mirror is ugly?

But at a glance, no one would see this.
At a glance, I put on my brave face.
At a glance, I learned to fake my smiles and play the part.
But inside, I was anything but okay.

I remember thinking “Why?”
Why is life like this?
Why do I feel this way?
Why does all this shit “happen” to me?
Better yet, why do I have to feel anything at all?
Wouldn’t it just be easier if I didn’t care?
But that was it. That was my problem.
I really did care.
In fact, I still do.

I’m telling you this now as a person who had to learn how to see through my ugliness.
The world is a truly an amazing and beautiful place.
I offer this to you as humbly as I can; almost like a child with a gift that would seem otherwise insignificant; but to me; just like that child, this tiny thing I’m offering you is bigger than anything I have in this world.
This might be small and insignificant,
but it’s mine and it’s all that I have.

I know there is beauty here.
I know this because you exist yet l used to resist you.
I used to resist because I was afraid of you.
I was afraid to laugh. I was afraid to be free.
I was afraid to take a chance or believe that yes, this is it!
This moment and this life was made just for me.

I was literally afraid to have fun or to enjoy myself.
I was too afraid to exclaim or scream out, wholeheartedly, and to enjoy. By the way, this is a right that everyone has yet I limited myself.
I segregated myself because what if I laughed and looked foolish?
What if I allowed myself to enjoy a moment or a laugh and then found out that I was the last to get the joke; or worse, that I was the punchline and the joke was on me – then what?
I know people would say not to care what others thought or what they did.
Intellectually, this all made sense but emotionally – not so much.

At a glance, you would never know that this is what I was thinking.
At a glance, you would never see these scars or the roots of my pain.
You’d never see this, not at a glance you wouldn’t. 
You would never know how deep I have to dig to reveal this to you. While I know who you are and I know that “it’s you” still, I’m so scared to mention these truths because now they become real – or even more real because now they’re in print and alive for the whole world to see.

In fairness to my inner turmoil and the child I used to be, I will allow these truths to surface.
Yes, I saw myself as ugly or unsightly.
Yes, I saw myself as unwanted and simple; like a person who could never “be” anything more than the person who I created. I believed that I was stupid, an idiot. I believed that I was emotionally and educationally disabled and working at a disadvantage.
Rather than defy the predictions that did not empower me, I supported them both fully and systematically.
I became the beast which other people (including myself) predicted that I would be.
I never felt free enough to dance because what if I dance and look silly or stupid?
What if I’m not cool?
What if I become vulnerable or susceptible to being bullied again?
What if I smile or let my guard down and the pain comes back again?
How will I defend myself now?
What if I am rejected, the same way that I reject myself?
What if any of these things were so blatant and noticeable?

Then what?
My weaknesses would be seen and my vulnerabilities would be noticeable, which would only lead me to be rejected even further. This means I’d have to hide my thoughts which meant that I would have to fix my grin and keep my brave face.
I’d have to use this like a shield which meant I had to learn to endure pain and eat this like it was food – see?
You can’t hurt me.
I can’t even hurt myself.
By the way, as I kid, I said this out loud while cutting myself in front of a classroom.

That’s why I lived this way. I had to, or so I believed, because when I lived in pain, the threat of oncoming pain is not a thought.
I could understand the rules and the transactions that go on between life and loneliness and pain and depression. This made sense to me. Still, there was always something so pure and so beautiful and so unwilling to submit, which is you. –
I was afraid of you for so long
But not anymore.

I would look at people and wonder how they could smile or how they would be brave enough to dare and have fun or dance. Who cares who’s watching?
Right?
I always wanted to be that brave and that comfortable.
But I never was . . .
The truth is I wanted to die for most of my life.
That’s why these journals are so valuable to me.

I couldn’t look at you too long because you are the light that exposed the dark truths.
You were the exposure of a soul that I had done my best to hide or refuse.
But no, I couldn’t avoid this.
You were the light. You are the purity that would sting like the disinfectant to a cut or scrape.
I lived so inwardly for so long that I had no idea how to get out or how to get away from myself yet at a glance, no one saw this. 

Everyone is going through something.
Everyone is fighting a battle you know nothing about.
Both of these sayings are true.
Everyone is fighting a demon that you know nothing about.
So be kind.
That’s a good one too.
Better yet, the late and great actor and comedian Robin Williams once said, “I think the saddest people always try the hardest to make people happy because they know what it’s like to feel absolutely worthless and they don’t want anyone else to feel that way.”
I think about this and the laughs this man created for the world.
I think about this and wonder if this equaled the depths of his sorrow.
Maybe that would explain his departure . . .

Even here in the sad loss of a great person, there is beauty behind these words. Yes, I write this with full disclosure that I can feel these words. Yes, I know what it means to hurt and, at a glance, no one can see this.
Only me.
I see this.
I saw it.
I felt it and yes, I’ve lived it too.

I have tried to give back.
Or more, I’ve tried to fight back in this so-called war against mental illness.

On Christmas Eve, I was waiting in an emergency room. I was deployed and waiting standby while a young girl was reversed from an overdose.

She was homeless. She was living by the laws of the street and, equally, she was part of the human trade and trafficked to others as a means to pay for her addiction.

You might not have been able to see her in total. But she was there.
She was there beneath the dirty fingernails and behind the seeable damages. She was in there.

She did not look like herself, so-to-speak, but you could tell that she was beautiful.
You could see the little girl she used to be.
She was still there on the inside.
I could see her.
Perhaps at a glance, no one would look at her long enough to move past the judgment that she was a street girl. Perhaps, at a glance, no one would move beyond the obvious smell from her body.
You could tell she was beautiful; but again, the street-life had beaten some of her beauty away.

She was missing teeth. Her eyes were somewhat muted, which is part of the lifestyle and a chemical result of the opiates that flooded her system.
But still, she was “in there.”

At a glance, maybe no one would see this.
Not at a glance, they wouldn’t.

She was someone’s little girl. She was someone’s daughter and sister. And me, aside from the nurse or the doctor, I was the first person to speak with her after the reversal.
They call this a reversal because the medication reverses the opiates. Hence, this is why they called the program an opiate overdose reversal program.

We talked for a while. Not like a specialist to a client or like a coach would or clinician to a patient. No, we talked like two people in a hospital on Christmas Eve. 
There were decorations in the post-midnight scene of an E.R. that was decorated for the season. It was mainly quiet and the hour was getting late.

“You do realize that you’re a Christmas Miracle, right?”
I don’t think anyone ever called her a miracle before, at least not in a believable way or in a way that made sense to her.

I wish you could’ve been there to see the look on her face.
I wish I could share with you the picture I keep in my mind’s eye because quite instantly and miraculously, I swear, it was as if a bright light took over her face.
All it took was a moment of kindness which, to me; all I can say is I can relate to believing in an unkind world and somehow, someone came out of nowhere and shared a minute of kindness with me.
I’ve been in rooms like this too. I know how lonesome it is.
I wanted to replace this with the kindness that was shown to me.

There was a brand new aura about her.
“You’re alive,” I told her. “There’s got to be a reason for this.”
“Please,” I said. “I’m asking you. Don’t let this go to waste.”

No one else in the E.R. was overly kind nor were they too concerned with how she was doing or how she felt. To the staff, she was just another homeless overdose and for the most part, this was just another day at the office. 

The girl and I talked for a while.
We talked like two people.

I often think I am no one in this world, or that I have no say, that I have nothing to offer, and that at best, I am only a cog in a systematic machine that moves in the direction of fate.
Perhaps no one can see this though.
I don’t know what people see when they look at me.
And more, I often find myself in the down-and-out assumption that nothing I ever said or did had any true or apparent value which, of course, intellectually, I know this is untrue.
Emotionally, however, my depression begs to differ.

Forgive the burden, but in this case, I use this moment of beauty at an ugly time with the young women as a shield. I use this as a symbol of hope and inspiration.
I use this because regardless of what she saw and lived through; regardless of the paid rapes or the social stigmas and the infections that she had; this young girl who I had only met once and only spoke to once after; she decided to end her relationship with the needle and got off the street.
She chose treatment.
I was there for that . . .
While I admit her initiation to the so-called club of detox and rehabilitation was unsettled in the beginning, and unfair to say the least, she managed to clean up and change her life.
She told me that she hadn’t spoken to her parents in years.
She was a disappointment to them.
She was the symbolized disease and the infection and the details of her life were seen at the flesh-level. Yet at a glance, this was the only thing people could see.
At least at a glance, this was true.

I was told that the next day on Christmas, the hospital let her call her folks.
I don’t know how well the conversation went. I’m not sure if this was welcomed or not.
But . . .
I’m sure this meant the world to someone even if only for a second.

I have this picture in my mind which I use as motivation.
And it’s her because at the time, I believed that I was mainly useless and that somehow the only reason why I was mildly successful as a recovery specialist was because I was able to “fake it” so-to-speak.
But nothing fake happened that night.
No.

I don’t know this young woman at all.
I do know that years later, I was told that she was doing well.
I love that.
Even here, at death’s door, something beautiful took place.

I swear –
Motivation is the reason we keep going. It’s the reason we create our purpose and find our “why?” as in, why do we want to do something or what makes us want to keep going? 

Years back, I wrote a poem for a woman who lived through an abusive childhood.
She told me her story and, to me, her news was something I couldn’t just leave alone.
At a glance, you would never know about the theft of her childhood.
You would never know about the drinking at home or the abuse she took.
You would never look at her and see the little girl who used to hide in closets or under the bed.
You would never see this.
Not at a glance, you wouldn’t.

I didn’t want her to feel this anymore. I wanted to do something to defend her.
Maybe this was more about me than her.
Maybe I could relate to her story and since no one ever stuck up for me, I wanted to stick up for her.
Even though I knew this was decades too late, I wanted to do something to defend that little girl.

No one ever spoke up for her.
She told me that.
No one ever defended her.
She told me that too.
I could relate to this. I could relate to the unwanted touches or the cruelty of intimate abuse.
I have my own share of this to deal with.

So, I wrote something
I told her, it’s okay. You can come out now.
They’re all gone. No one will ever hurt you like that again.
Not on my watch . . .

She was a tiny little thing. She was a little woman who drove big 18-wheelers too.
She was a hero to me and so, as a friend and to offer my friendship, I promised her a few words which she kept.

At a glance, you’d never see this.
At a glance, you’d never know what she lived through. Perhaps at a glance, you’d never know about me or the pain or the shame that I lived with for most of my life.
You’d never see this.
At least not at a glance you wouldn’t.

I write this to you with utmost respect and with regards to this entry and the rebirth of sanity; please, see me now as I am, undressed and undecorated.
See through the façade and through the tattoos. Hear me, beyond the New York City accent.
See me beyond the man I am and see me as the boy I was and see me as the person who lived and almost died. Yet here I am, still offering myself because I agree with Mr. Williams.
It’s hard to laugh sometimes.
It’s hard to see the beauty which is perhaps why I overcompensate so often to bring a laugh or a smile or to sell the world as if everything’s fine – because quite often, it’s not fine.

This is me and this is my motivation –
It’s you. It’s your bravery. It’s the fact that you’ve stuck with me this far and that you refuse to stop or look away.
I don’t always know my worth. There are times when the quiet demons look to steal their way back into my life.
I don’t know much about math or science. I’ve never been much of a musician and as for cooking, I can make you a meal but it’s doubtful that I’ll be a big-time chef one day.
I’ll never sell out Madison Square Garden, least of all for my singing voice.
I let go of the tough guy scene a long time ago. I gave up on the gangster life and all the male-ego bullshit.
I might not have the keys to the kingdom or the castle (yet) but what I do have is this – my inspiration and my motivation. That’s what pulls me through.
This is my source, which is you because you are a part of me –

I keep this here with me for when I grow lonesome.
Just to remind me that no matter how gloomy things get, you’re here with me. So no matter what, there’s always something beautiful in this world, which means, to me, there’s always something to live for. 

So,
let us begin . . .