I know that we’ve talked about this before but again, with all the classes we take in school and with all the education we go through to prepare us for life, whether this is during our mandatory years of grade school until high school, or in college, the most important lessons are not taught in classrooms.
But they should be . . .
I have said this to you in different presentations. I have spoken about this in one-on-one conversations and in table-top meetings. And I question this myself – Why?
Why isn’t there a mandatory class called Happiness 101. There is no introduction to achievement classes or classes that teach us how to enjoy life, or how to create more, to laugh more or how to dance more.
Yet—
As smart as we are or as high as we may be on the social food chain and regardless of how decorated the wall can be in a professional’s office, and there can degrees from all the finest schools and diplomas, doctorates, certificates and other notes of honor, but none of these classes taught them how to be happy.
I am a fan of what I do, which is this.
This thing right here, between you and I.
I love this.
I have been coming to this place in my head every morning before I start my day.
I do this because I need to find my way. I need to understand what brings me peace or takes it away.
I need to see what happiness is because I don’t know what happiness is like to someone else.
I’m not sure that if given the opportunity to see through someone else’s eyes, I would understand or recognize the same things as they do or find myself attracted to the same lights or colors.
I know what life looks like to me. As for happiness or love or whatever it is that blows my hair back, I only know life as it applies to me.
However, I do know that we all have the need to be comfortable. We all want to be happy. We want to find our place in the circle. We want to know where we fit, without question or without any doubts, and of course, we all want this without an ounce of insecurity.
I am here for a reason.
First, I come here to kill the loneliness which is something that I battle with. I am here to let go of the words in my head, which is why I write this way, openly, and streaming, as if to disregard the common laws of grammar or the critics and the criticisms of anyone because—and to put this as plainly as I can—none of this is written for anyone else but us.
This is why I have become such a fan of this platform.
I use this to help me counteract the challenges I face, which means that I allow the words to fall from my mind. I let them go.
I place them out here, for us to review, because this has become not only lifesaving but empowering.
I remember reading a quote from Charles Bukowski.
“My dear, find what you love and let it kill you.”
(Remember this?)
I love this quote.
However, I have an alternate idea about this, which I have shared before.
Find what you love and let this bring you back to life.
Let this feed you.
Let this be your fuel or your source and should anything attempt to alter or change your path, look at what you love or think about your dreams and passions. Think about the life you have and the life you want and when you do, think about the way this looks to you.
Do this as often as you can.
Envision this.
Let yourself see this as if to be like an out of body experience, live and in-person, and then have this tease you. Let this whet your appetite.
Let this make you hungry to the point where nothing else could satisfy your appetite—and then, like a predator, I want you to stalk your prey and seek this out and track this down. When the time comes and without regard for your next encounter with food—attack this and eat as if this is your last and final meal.
Do not be afraid to be ferocious.
No one ever told me to look at life this way.
Or maybe they did . . .
Maybe there was too much of a gap in age and I swore they were too old to understand.
Maybe I was too distant from this mindset, or maybe I was in a state of disbelief that passion could save my life or that I was worthy of a greater good.
I offer this here but before I continue, I have to confirm that I do not know or understand what it means to be a kid in today’s culture.
Perhaps I can understand different aspects. I can understand having needs and wants and desires. I can relate to this the same as I can relate to wanting to belong.
I can relate to the idea of wanting to fit and to be comfortable in my own skin. However, age has allowed me the opportunity to venture off on my own which has taught me to be unafraid of my own company, or that it’s okay to not have plans on a Saturday night. I’m not really missing anything. I’m fine.
No, really.
I am.
I confirm that my generation was raised with different challenges.
I grew up before the internet. There were no cell phones and certainly (or should I say fortunately) I grew up before there was video evidence of everything like there is now.
I grew up with different music and different television shows, which is something I feel bad about.
No, really. This is terrible.
I feel bad for kids today because they do not have the same shows we had.
They don’t have the same joys or the simple things that we had.
But to them, I’m sure that no differently than I saw my Father, The Old Man, and his generation, today’s generation looks at me as old or that my youth was spent in a time of outdated and antiquated items, which or obsolete now—as in gone forever.
I feel bad that kids today do not have record stores or that they’ll never know about the value of going to a record store to buy an album.
They won’t know about going into their room after they bought this, to listen to the music, back and forth, until the lyrics are memorized and the music has formed a certain memory that your mind can play, even if the music is off.
I am sorry that kids today do not have the same cartoons that we had.
But again, I digress.
I go off in tangents. But to redirect my point, I offer this because things like the music store or the Saturday morning cartoons, or the twilights in empty parking lots with music wired to my ears while enduring my teenage angst, and for the moment, the everyday world was held at a distance behind me.
Do you understand any of this?
I didn’t have much. But I had this.
I had to find what I loved—so it could fuel me.
What is your passion?
What puts pep in your step?
What gives you the drive to get up and go at the world another day, regardless of what’s happening around you? In the face of adversity, what is your secret?
What keeps you going?
I have met with people who tell me it’s their family.
I’ve been told that music and art is a valid resource to help people keep their drive.
Some people choose exercise.
And me? I choose this (and you).
Some people have nothing at all and somehow, they find the gumption and the guts or the balls to dare the world, one more time, favored or not. Either way, they refuse to give up.
Some people believe their passion is only connected to others.
But I question this.
I question this because by allowing someone else to become so important, what happens if they fail or make a mistake? What happens if there is a falling out or a break in the line and the relationship severs?
Then what?
I refuse to allow a person to become my higher power or to become so important that I neglect or forget about my own value.
I need my own light and color.
I need my own passion – so it can fuel me.
(Get it?)
Not all times are happy times and not all people live happy lives or live under comfortable conditions.
I have been known to say that the product of bullying is more than an insult or the initial moment of intrusion.
No, the real problem with bullying is the aftermath.
This is the ripple effect that disturbs our peace. This is the real insult.
This is like a quiet lake with a picturesque view that is suddenly destroyed by a loud or disruptive force — hence, the clearness of the water has become muddied and murky, and the peacefulness of the moment has suffered a violation, which is a theft of a moment that can never be regained.
Let this be known:
There are all kinds of bullies out there.
All thieves too
and all thefts can be irretrievable.
(If we allow them to be.)
Here’s the real bitch….
Although we are supposedly the dominant of the species and regardless of how we have advanced or despite our dominance, we still overthink. We overanalyze things more than any other species on the planet.
We think too much.
There’s no other way to say it.
We play the movies out in our head which can often lead us to thinking about the impending doom or the worst possible outcomes.
Consider this:
If an animal experiences a moment of flight or fight and runs to safety, the animal runs away until they find themselves in a safe place—however, after they find safety, the animal is not thinking about the insult of being chased or disturbed. They are not thinking about the fear of being hurt. No, the animal goes back to doing whatever that animal usually does.
But not us.
We are not like other animals.
We think about the insults that took place. We have pride and ego. We dissect what took place and we analyze what happened. By doing so, we keep ourselves in a state of unrest.
Find what you love and let this rescue you.
Find what brings you a smile.
Find what makes you want to jump or run.
Find what brings you peace.
Find whatever you need but please, and make sure of this before you start your search, be sure this is sustainable and long-term because short term or quick fixes will often leave us wanting in the end.
I used to love to take walks to the record store .. . .
I was able to cancel out the background noise of my everyday life.
I still have a deep love for music.
However, my love has evolved for other things as well—and equally, my love and all of its sources have become my fuel to save my own life.
Find what you love.
Let this restore you and build upon this so that wherever you are, you can always work towards ending up where you want to be.
This is what saved my life.
More times than I can count . . .
So, tell me –
What’s saving yours?
The Written Addiction 