I was putting things away when my mind began to wander into the deep recesses and for the first time in a very long time, I felt compelled to write. I logged in and saw this prompt and believed I had been called today specifically – because I believe I’m closer to having it all right now than I ever have been.
There for a while I was struggling to *only* write and share once a day. I had so much on my mind -none of it felt healthy. The. a change happened and I had writer’s block. The block was because of happiness. Weird.
Over a decade ago I was at financial rock bottom and I had a tooth that needed to be extracted. It was a K9 so it had an immediate impact on my self esteem. I stopped smiling because all I saw was a hole in my mouth. I was ashamed. The following years were wrought with trauma and bad decisions of all sorts – colminating in my wreck on May 22, 2021 which took everything.
I felt as though I’d never recover. For the first time in my life, I had no sense of anything. I was no longer in Marketing. I was no longer a Harley guy. I was a broken body laying in a bed with no direction and no hope.
For almost 3 years, I failed to get out of my own head. I had a wide array of issues that worked against me from every angle. The fact I had gone from perfectly healthy to shattered legs, broken wrist, bursitis in my right shoulder and the pinnacle, severe traumatic brain injury.
I did not know how to get out and even if I did, I had no idea which direction to run. I contemplated suicide as often as I wondered what my next meal was going to be.
Rather than continue with the arduous task of explaining every single issue I was going through, let’s just say the only eventual outlook I saw for myself was suicide… It was just a matter of when and how.
Then a change slowly began to take place. I honored a promise I had made to myself when I had that tooth extracted all those years ago. If I ever had enough money to fix the problem, I wouldn’t hesitate. After ignoring my own promise, I had another tooth in the same area break off a few weeks ago. That was all I needed. It was time to fix everything, no matter what the cost.
After my initial appointment, I felt a change inside me. I was excited. I was gaining back a part of myself I had lost all those years ago. It was cathartic and unexpected.
Once I got home, I made a few other changes. Low and behold, it was as though a light switch had been flipped. Suddenly I’m active and doing things around the house on a regular basis.
I’m learning to cook. I keep the house up. I’m repairing small things that have gone ignored for years. I’ve been dubbed house manager by my s/o and have been given total control over the house.
I had been waiting years to be able to make certain decisions on my own and without being micromanaged or needing multiple family meetings before we arrived at a conclusion to have more discussions.
I was off the leash and free to run… And I have.
In all of this, there was also a realization that I finally accepted. Every time in my life I have been down, I strived to “get back to where I was”. That was my greatest mistake. When you lose everything, that’s a sign you’re not living the life you’re meant to. It could be anything from a marriage to a job. It usually happens when we continue to ignore that voice inside our head that consistently tells us “this isn’t it.”
After accepting that all my previous lives were failed experiments, I stopped trying to get back to those dumpster fires. I simply released everything… and I mean everything. No more haunted memories. No more shame for the terrible choices I’ve made. No more guilt for the lives I’ve destroyed. An end to the resentment of shitty bosses who are literally terrible human beings.
No more poison.
I’m the happiest I’ve ever been *in my life*. I’m at peace. I’ve lost 11 pounds since making these changes. The weight is coming off like melting butter.
Yesterday I had my first mental health test of this new mentality. It was no- holds-barred.
I woke up and couldn’t find my wallet. After an extended search, I located it in the dyer. It had gone through the laundry. I emptied it and had the presence of mind to take a picture of my car registration (something I would not have done in the past)
I went to renew my license tag and spent over an hour at the courthouse. I was told I hadn’t paid property taxes in many years so I owed quite a bit. I went to the office where I paid and afterwards, they realized I hadn’t paid because I’d been out of state. I didn’t owe taxes. They sent me back to the first office. There, my guy had to get my records adjusted to reflect that I didn’t owe anything. He then sent me back to the other office to get a refund and just pay for the tag fee. Once at the other office, I was informed the first office didn’t give me all the necessary paperwork. Rather than send me back, they went to retrieve it. After all was said and done, they realized there was a note in my records from back when I first returned home stating I did not owe taxes -had the first guy looked at the notes, all of that would’ve been avoided. And in order to get my tag, I needed my registration -which I had just taken a picture of.
I then spent half of the day fixing two toilets that had separate issues. One was easy, the other was a real pain in the ass. They were eventually conquered. I moved on to make dinner for myself and a couple family members I volunteered to cook for.
As I peeled the sweet potatoes, I put the skins down the disposal. At one point, it backfilled into the sink. I decided to keep it running so it could work through the clump… It eventually cleared and I finished rinsing out the sink. When I shut the faucet off, I could hear water running. I looked down and water was flowing out from the cabinet like a raging waterfall. I opened the doors to find water and potato skins everywhere. It appeared as though a sweet potato bomb had gone off.
Skins were like hobby glitter – tucked and shoved into every single visible location. Everything that wasn’t sealed was ruined. Cleaning supplies floated around in their totes.
I canceled dinner plans and spent the next hour replacing the drain hose that blew out from the pressure of the disposal and then cleaning the mountain of potato skins from the cabinet.
The day was totaled. I was exhausted – and yet I wasn’t mad. At all. I laughed at the magnitude of the shit show that was my day, but it did not alter my mood the way it once would have.
Happiness doesn’t mean everything always goes according to plan. It means that you understand things are going to go sideways from time to time and that it’s unavoidable. Because of this, there’s no use in allowing it to poison your mind and heart. These hiccups are trivial and insignificant moments in time – As we are in the grand scheme of the universe.
We cannot control the world around us. We can only manage how we respond. The more we fight this inevitable truth, the sadder and angrier we become – and still have not an ounce more of control or influence.
This is an amazing place. It’s not perfect, but there’s more light here than what I’ve ever had at one time. In peace of mind, there is a happiness the world cannot influence -at least not so far.
Off The Rails 