It is safe to say that I lived in different places. I’ve lived with roommates and I’ve lived with family. I used to live on a farm, which by now is more like something that happened in a different lifetime.

I’ve lived in big places and small. I’ve never lived anywhere outside of New York. I never had the chance to live in the City itself but I did live in Queens when I was very young. I lived there when I was in a relationship during my mid-20’s. There were good and bad about all places but out of all of them, the worst place I ever lived was in the past.

There is something inside of each and every one of us. This is more than blood and bones. This more than the lungs we breathe with and the muscles that help us move. There is a soul within each of us.

There is a principle of life, thoughts, actions, desires and the freedoms we strive for. There is a separable existence to us all, which is more than our body. This is us. This is our true core.

This is the spirit and the seat of our true self, our sentiments, our inner being, and when disembodied, this is the part of us that lives on after our body is laid to rest.

This is life:

You swing and you try. You fall down and you get back up. Even if you fall down 9 times, you get back up 10 isn’t that what they say?
It’s not easy sometimes, right?
But what other choice do we have?
You take the pain. You take the criticism.
You take the bumps and bruises and the frustration that comes with learning your craft and you make your way up from the apprentice to the professional.
You say to yourself, “Something’s gotta give,” which is true.
Something’s gotta give but nothing ever gives when you quit
(or give up).

What I am about to write is true. This is not an easy subject by any means, but yet, the truth of the matter is nothing is ever easy.
We are very simple creatures. Life itself is really simple.

You live. You wake up in the morning. You wash your face and brush your teeth. You eat a little and drink a little and work, sleep, and maneuver through life. You meet the daylight until nightfall comes. This in itself is simple. Rules are simple in a black and white sense. Yet we confuse them with the gray area, which is created by the emotional mind.

In fairness, I never thought I would ever possibly word my history this way. I never thought I would see a mental or emotional challenge as a benefit. However, and in fairness to me and others that experienced similar things, the fact that people can and do recover is an ability that belongs to us all. This is absolutely true. It’s not easy by any stretch. But it’s still true . . .

Below the surface is the truth to us all. Deep beneath the smiles or the things we say, which may seem lighthearted to the rest of the world, and there behind the brave face or the personality we try to portray is a truth that we keep hidden. This is our unspoken voice. These are our thoughts that speak to us. There is a part of us which no one else knows about. This is the part of us that no one else can see. Just us. 

“How can I tell when someone is really willing to change?”

You know where the willingness is when the excuses go away. You’ll know when the negotiations stop.
This is when people are ready.

There is a fantasy that everything in life has to be a certain way. Men are men, and women are women. There is a black and white design, almost like a cookie-cutter recipe, in which, whenever we veer away from the normal or stray from the common path, somehow, there is an idea that life is not supposed to be like this.
For some reason, there are people that associate difference with right or wrong. But why?