MOVE ON, PEOPLE…

Let’s just call out the ‘pink elephant’ and thump this bad boy down on the table that everyone ‘knows’ but few ‘talk about’. Yes, there are those that like to ‘brag’ about it but it’s time to get real about it.

The world boys and girls, isn’t always a safe place. It isn’t always a fun place, and it isn’t always a pleasurable place. Anyone who sold you the bill of goods that ‘you deserve something good’ just for breathing hasn’t really told it to you straight. Also, I think it needs to be said, that we, as human beings, seem to relish in the ‘struggle’…whatever that said ‘struggle’ might be.

I think of the batman movie with the joker, the one with Heath Ledger, rest his soul. He’s in the hospital room of the DA of Gotham, who just had half his face burned off and his girlfriend killed. He’s not a happy man and when he comes face to face with the Joker it’s a pretty explosive scene. One of the thing the joker says is, “ Do I really look like a guy with a plan? You know what I am? I’m a dog chasing cars. I wouldn’t know what to do with one if I caught it! You know, I just… *do* things.”

I really think sometime we are ‘drawn’ to difficult situations and we love to complain about them, AND… best of all… we love to polarize ourselves. We are either the ‘victim’ or the ‘overcomer’. “It’s not my fault my life is so bad,” or “I will over-come, I will do better. When I get knocked down I will get right up, I am the best blah blah blah…”

Admit it, even if you don’t say these things out loud, you think them, and here is the best of them all – we blame someone else. God, your mom, dad, brothers, the lady at McDonald etc…

I’ve talked about choices before, I’ve talked about goals, etc. but let’s just say it, sometimes, things don’t work out the way we want. So… what do you do with it, when it doesn’t work out?

1 – MOVE ON, PEOPLE…

I am the worst for this… and in truth, there are some things I am downright afraid to leave behind. I personally peek behind my curtain and review things like…

My daughter… Haven died in 1997, as you know. It still hurts. It’s still fresh in some ways, but here is one thing I know… I can choose to pick it back up or keep moving. The truth is, sometimes I can’t help myself. Sometimes I get pulled back, like being in a nightmare of getting sucked into whirlpool deep to the ocean depths, or back to memories and events. I just find myself back in PICU (Pediatric Intensive Care Unit) making the decision to let her go… (as if i really had a choice). But other times, I see it coming like a Peterbilt truck, or a freight train, and I can walk away. I used to feel guilty about walking… I used to feel like I was being a bad daddy for not going back, but the truth is… she isn’t the one that is still there… I am. It’s like a ghost or a shadow left behind (with scars) that pulls me back. I see the shadow imprint of her life and death and can’t shake it. Other times, I can…

REGRET…

Let me just say it… you can keep looking back or start looking forward. I think the trick is, don’t keep making the same choices that led you here in the first place. It’s a common quote but “If you always do what you’ve always done, you will always get what you always got” or, “You will miss 100% of the shots you don’t take”. Yep, you are looking at the poster boy of these for sure!

If our lives are SO precious… which they are!

If our lives can count for so much… and they do!

If our lives matter on a scale that every little thing isn’t an accident… yep that’s the truth…

They why choose misery over happiness?

Why choose loss over gain?

Now, don’t get me wrong. I am the WORLDS biggest whiner (just ask my brothers). I whine like a stuck pig when I don’t get my way, but I am just saying this for myself… what if we thought differently about life?

What if we found ways to give what we DO have? We pontificate often of what we could give if we could, but we often don’t talk about giving of what we’ve got?

Does that make sense?

Look no one promised you an easy ride… well except maybe politicians. You can spend your days talking about what you ‘don’t’ have’, or doing with what you do have.

And that… is different for every one of us. In the last few months, I have conducted over 175 interviews either face to face or via the phone. Whew, that’s a lot. It’s a lot of listening, talking, and in truth, a lot of ‘folks that didn’t get the job’ conversations.

What can I give people in interviews? Humor, love, integrity, confidence. I don’t know… I can’t always give them a job. But I can give them the treatment they deserve as human beings.   

But enough about me, where is this going?  I would like you to ask yourself…

What can you give?

Where are you at in life?

Do you see yourself as a victim?

Do you blame everyone else, or do you stand up, like an adult, take stock of your life and move on with what you have?

I am not glamorizing divorce… please read this… but also understand, I waited and prayed for YEARS for things to change, for me to change, for me to give in, for me to stand up, I just waited and prayed and waited. When it was just me… I lived with it and had decided that I would just live with the bed I made… That’s what adults do right? However, when my son arrived, life took a radical turn. I could no longer claim ‘victim’ status and get sympathy for the tough things happening at home… I had to stand up, I had to make a decision(s) and here is the greatest part of all.

The prayers were answered… just nowhere near and how I thought they would get answered. But they were certainly answered. I found, even though I wouldn’t stand up for myself, that when it came to my son, I would burn down every bridge, knock over every sacred cow, and burn the house, if that what it took to protect him. Wow… Jeffery means “peaceful’ by the way…

I just wonder about you? I look at so many of your lives via the window you give me through Facebook, or emails, and I ask myself…

How are you living life? How is your journey down the road going? What are the areas where you have finally had enough and are going to stand up and take ahold of the reins in this area and make a change?

These words might fall on desperate ears (eyes). These words might fall on judgement ears (eyes). But know this, it’s your life to live as best as you know how.

Safe Journeys this week friends.