Just for the record –
We do have an impact on the world around us.
Life changes and so do we.
I have been saying this for a long time now.
I am not the person I used to be. Then again, none of us are, at least not really.
I am not the same person I used to be nor am I anywhere close to the teenage version of myself. And yes, without any question, I am not the 20-year-old version nor am I anything like that 30 or 40-year-old version either. Even now, I am not the same as I was at this time last year. I am physically different. I am emotionally different and spiritually different as well.
I have experienced ups and downs. I have lived with different types of separations and changes. As for my challenges, no, I cannot say that all of my challenges are the same; however, and consistently, I am a work in progress.
I have fallen down more times than I can count.
My life is an ongoing process which does not stop nor will this ever end – not until my very last breath – and still, I can offer the idea that even then, my life and my changes and my process will still be ongoing.
It would be inaccurate to not believe that we do not have an impact on the world around us.
We do.
Of course, we do.
Everybody does.
We are not all so forgotten, you and I.
No
I can say that we have left an imprint on this world. We have left more than traces of our DNA. We have left a mark, or a footprint in the sand, if you will. It is these marks or indentations left behind that have changed the face of someone’s life.
I know this is true. And there’s peace to be found in this, especially when people lose sight of their own worthiness.
We have overlapped and encountered people, places, and things and whether we realize this or not, we have made an impact on this world. We have caused a movement which leaves a ripple effect beyond our understanding.
For example –
I gave a lecture at a drug rehabilitation facility inside a county jail. I spoke at great lengths about our habits and our mistakes, which always seemed so destined to repeat themselves.
We talked honestly about how we get in our own way.
We talked about the tragic aftermath of self-destruction.
I talked about the deception of our perception, which is a concept that I came to on my own when trying to understand my own misperceptions.
I had to realize how my mind plays tricks sometimes. I needed to find a way to understand my thinking or how this works.
This is how I was able to understand my own life as well as my own recovery.
I talked about this to a roomful of so-called bad or angry men; yet, at the time of my presentation, we are all just people. Nothing more.
I spoke to a roomful of men, all of them nodding with an understanding of truth.
As in, “Our truth.”
We talked like people. Not like a group or a social construct of higher or lower, better or worse.
No.
We talked honestly. Of course, I never thought any of this would go anywhere.
I say this because I was aware of myself and the room that I was in.
I was also aware that at one point, I was a person who sat in those chairs myself and all the while, I had to listen to different speakers and as they went on their long speeches about how to be better or how to live a better life, I thought to myself and slandered them in my head.
More accurately, I damned them all to hell is more honest.
Well, the pandemic came along and all of my programs had to change. I lost touch with all the people who were in groups like this. However, every so often, I see something, like a trace of something on social media – like a young man who was on the verge of self-destruction, jails, institutions and all.
He is married now. A Father to a new child. He is successful in his own rite. If my memory serves, which it often fails, the last time we spoke, this young man mentioned some of the topics we discussed in my groups.
I never thought I would have this kind of impact on anyone –
Then again, this is why the deception of our perception is a bitch!
A big fat one!!
This is proof that whether we are good or bad, indifferent, or otherwise, we are most definitely and more importantly, all capable of having or creating an impact on each other.
This is true.
We do have a lasting effect on people.
I have seen this and as a witness or a bystander, I have to tell you –
It’s pretty impressive.
Like the way the room lightens up when you walk in or when you smile, how the world seems to always smile with you – or when we share food or a meal, or when we share a funny story or something from our childhood that no one else knows about.
All of this is part of that irreversible ripple effect which I was telling you about.
I know that whether I am perfect or not is irrelevant. I cannot say whether I am a good man or if I am in need of improvement.
I suppose we all could be better and we could all use a healthy dose of improvement.
Either way, I know that the sun comes up and then the sun goes down. I know that if it were true that I was unimportant or unmemorable, no one would ever notice me – including you.
But you do notice.
And I notice you too.
Like your absence, let’s say.
I notice this more than anything else in the world because without you, it seems as if the wind ceases to blow and the sun is nothing more than a muted shade of beauty – and without you, the sun is lost from its celebration, like an abandoned beach in uncomfortable seasons – this is the world without you, without the tides, the waves or the crests, which pile high.
And no . . .
I don’t know what my impact is. But that’s why I am here and this is the purpose for all of my journals.
To see myself in your reflection.
To learn more. To be more.
And at the end of the day, to settle all my debts so that when the morning comes, I can be clear. I can see you the way you are to me, which is beautiful as ever – and I can be fresh or without having the damage of yesterday’s presence.
I am, of course, subjective and yes, I am more of a stream of consciousness writer – prose or call it what you will – I am not here for the food and friends.
I’m here for us.
Good times or bad.
And to find peace – even when it seems like peace does not exist.
But it does exist.
I know it does . . .
Like I said, you and I, we do have an impact on the world around us –
Even if it is nothing else but to make the sky jealous –
Trust me, we do have an impact.
The Written Addiction 