"Life is beautiful but people are crazy." - Charles Osgood

First I must say, I am a Charles Osgood fan. Kinda corny I realize but I am a fan regardless.

I have stated in the past that confession is good for the soul. Confessing my sins to my spouse has freed my mind to pursue corrective measures. But after a conversation with my brother last evening, I am confused about the nature of confession and guilt in general.

In a phone call that lasted almost two hours, I began it with apologizing for what in my mind were the heinous sins committed by me against him when we were kids and into adulthood. What followed was the most in my face confrontation about what I have been putting myself through that I have experienced, ever. To summarize the conversation, it was basically said "I don't know what your talking about". I was stunned! He does not even remember the hospitalization event at all! The only reason I don't question that it happened is because my mother confirmed that it did indeed happen. He has attributed it to being kids and the difference in our ages at the time the events occurred. The only thing he did say was hurtful was my making fun of his weight as kids and that he secretly felt vindicated when I surpassed his weight when in adulthood. I made it a big issue to point out to him his behavior during the last two years of my stay at home with our parents. He pointed out that there were other issues at hand that I didn't realize that was taking place, including his dealing with his own weight and image issues. It was purely coincidence that the change to "normal" occurred when I left and that he had come to terms with his own identity. This realization was very eye opening.

But what he did next was even more stunning. He took the time to help me remember times when as older kids that my friends and I did indeed include him in things. He pointed out the times that I took him to the arcade as an example. I didn't even remember these things until he brought them to the forefront of the conversation.

Why do we make ourselves the bad guys in our own brains? The only reasonable explanation I can come up with is to justify our depression. I have no legitimate reason for my depression, so my mind has created the reason for me. I have created in my head the perfect villain that satisfies all the criteria to explain why I feel the way I do, and that villain is me. By being the bad guy, I have every right to feel cynical, self loathing, and can justify my behaviors toward other people, be it correct or not. As my brother has shown me it is not justified. In the case with my wife and son, it is justified but that situation was at least in part created as a result of already assuming that I am a bad person was a foregone conclusion.

So where does that leave me now??? With a lot to think and pray about. What of my past transgressions are real issues and what are a part of being a kid and young adult? I still feel the need to confess my guilt to those that I have wronged or perceived to have wronged. Is it to cleanse my soul? Or could it be that some part of my buried sub-conscience knows that if enough people tell me I'm being ridiculous that I will begin to see it for myself? Could it be deeper than that still??? What am I really trying to accomplish????? I only know one thing about this for certain. I want to be "normal" or at least to feel normal. I don't even know anymore what the "real me" is. I am tired of being lazy. I am tired of what I have done with my life. And most importantly I am tired of being the bad guy! I AM NOT THAT MAN NOW NOR HAVE I EVER BEEN!!

One more thing my brother gave me insight to that I have promised to put into motion. I need to stop abusing my body and work on setting realistic goals for success. I believe that with what he shared with me last night paired with counseling I am receiving from my pastor, they have both put into words the possible path to being free of my demon. Thank you, gentlemen. I know that you are both correct in your assessments and suggestions.

Now I pray that I have the will and courage to follow through...

"Boredom, anger, sadness, or fear are not 'yours,' not personal. They are conditions of the human mind. They come and go. Nothing that comes and goes is you." - Eckhart Tolle

When does a condition of the human mind become an obsession to the one who bears it? Why does the brain sometimes latch onto feelings of hurt, insecurity, and anger as a drowning man would latch onto a life preserver? How does the healing begin?

Up front, I know that "this too shall pass" is probably one of the most fundamental statements of human life that has ever been uttered in any language. It is the wisdom brought on by just observing the world around us. Given enough time, everything will change. What is bad will be made good, what is stormy will see calm. Conditions of the mind are also subject to this philosophical judgement. But unlike the weather, real change has to conditioned into existence. This is to be my project for my future. I want to leave behind the lazy, selfish person that I have known for my entire life. I want to build a better me from the ashes left behind by the old me.

I am enough of a realist to understand however; that it is not going to be a simple undertaking. Like so many things that are worth doing, time and patience will be my friend. But time is constantly moving forward while patience and I have an estranged relationship at best. Prayer then has become my new best friend.

I made a rather strange revelation today. To gain control of my life and my feelings of guilt and anger, I need to give up that control to God. Confused yet? Let me explain. I have always had the idea that I needed to be in control of all aspects of myself. From what I read, worked or played at to the way I behaved and acted in public. Even so far as to believe that I needed to control my thoughts and emotions. I never quite seemed to get the hang of being in control, though. I am easily distracted and go off task on the slightest whim. I require firm handling from those whom I am responsible to and yet resent their efforts to put me back on task. I can make the most ridged of plans, yet will change my mind at the drop of a hat. In fact, if I dropped a hat I would need to pick it up right then before I became side tracked and never see it again! I would even forget that I owned said hat until someone would ask me about it!! The idea of surrendering myself to God seemed almost like a cop-out. A way to not have to be responsible for my actions because "it was in Gods hands".

I have many short comings that I am not proud of but one thing I am very proud of is my capacity for research. I like understanding a given topic to be best that I can learn it. The caveat is that I really have to want to learn it. I can remember stupid trivia about music and movies and yet I can't remember the names of people I have known for years. I can even answer some trivia questions about a movie I have never seen before if I have seen the trailer! (True story, I once answered correctly a Scene-It question about the movie Repo Man and have not seen it to this day. What makes this weird is that it was some obscure piece of information that I picked up somewhere and it stuck in my head.) I am not someone who wants people to think I know something about everything. If I truly do not know, I will say so. And I don't like to debate. Debating is a useless argument between opposing viewpoints that is not going to swayed or changed by the opposite sides viewpoints. It only serves to spoon-feed the "undecided" so that they don't feel like they need to research the topic of discussion and make an informed decision. We live in a modern age where information is the currency of technology. If you really want to know about something, many sources are at your finger tips. And there goes my hat! See what I mean about distraction?

The point about research was going to be this. After much reading and contemplation, I realized that my concept of surrendering to God was completely faulty. I need control in my life. I needed to be in control of my life. I have proven that I am incapable of maintaining this needed control under my own power. But giving up on absolute control means that I need to be willing to ask for help. God is not going to run my life for me, taking away all my problems and allow me to coast down the road without a care in the world. But God can give me strength and stabilization through prayer and meditation. He has already provided me with a support system through my associations in life from my church to my wife and sons and my parents and brother. If I want to get control of the parts of my life that are out of control, I need to be willing to accept that I need help and not be resentful. God did not make me perfect, but I am told he made me in his image. I am told that he loves me for me, blemish's and all. He is not asking that I be perfect, only that I ask for and accept the gifts he wants to give me.

And that, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, is how the healing begins...

"The Christian life is not a constant high. I have my moments of deep discouragement. I have to go to God in prayer with tears in my eyes, and say, 'O God, forgive me,' or 'Help me.' " - Billy Graham

I found the quote used for today's title to be very enlightening.  I did not imagine that Mr Graham would have these kind of moments. But then I think that he too is human complete with all of the virtues and failings that come as "standard equipment".

I believe that anyone with a conscience has the innate desire to be forgiven of their sins. God has given each of us that chance for forgiveness if we but reach for it. But how does one begin to forgive himself? Can a person be truly forgiven of his sins by God if he can't even forgive himself? Does this man truly seek the forgiveness of his Lord, or has he cut himself off from God because he refuses to let go of the past and accept that which he cannot change?

So many times I have been caught in the trap of "if only I could do things differently". I don't have a time machine or magic powers to go back into the past. Nor have I discovered a rip in the "space-time continuum" that could be my reset button. (This is a reference to the Stephen King novel 11.22.63. If you haven't read it, get it now. You won't be disappointed.) But when you can't change the past, what options are left to you? It's easy to say "what's done is done, just move on". It's another thing altogether to turn it from a good idea to a working reality. Believe me, I have tried.

Forgiveness is an interesting concept. We are taught from a young age that if we wrong others we say "I'm sorry". We are made to do this even if we aren't sorry! As a child, more often than not, what I am sorry for is that I got caught! We are also taught that if someone says that they're sorry or seeks your forgiveness that we must accept it and get on with life. But that too is not so easy. If you took my toy, then gave it back and said you were sorry, I may or may not forgive you immediately. It depends upon how angry I am at the time you gave me your apology. I may say "that's okay" but do I really mean it? Or how about the man who has made deep scars in your life? He becomes remorseful and seeks your forgiveness. Do you immediately say "it's okay"? I suppose that depends upon where you are in the grief process. If you are at peace with what done to create those scars, then true forgiveness is possible. If the wrongs committed against you have left you angry, suffering or bearing a grudge, then not so much.

If I have not stated this before, I need to say it now and if I have, it bears repeating. Confessions to my wife for my sins against her and my family were very liberating. A huge weight seems to be lifted from me and is allowing me to heal. Confession will not fix the mess that I have created however; but it has at least freed me enough to begin the repair process. My eyes are opened, and my mind and heart are working to achieve the best possible outcome. I am no longer afraid to face what I have do to make things right.

My demons of the past are no different in this respect. It could be that the first steps in forgiving ones self is to confront the past and put it to rest. I need time to think and pray about this. For the first time in a long time, the lunatic in my head is starting to quiet down. We both need to think and pray it would seem.

"When we hold back out of laziness, that is when we tie ourselves into knots of boredom." - Walter Annenberg

I once told my mother that I have enough intelligence to be successful, but absolutely no ambition. During this process, I have thought many times about that statement. Though it is true to some degree, it is not completely accurate. A lack of ambition could be altruistic if it means that hard work, intelligence, and diligence is put to work for the betterment of others in self sacrifice.  I find that not to be the case for me. To put it into its simplest terms, I am just lazy.

Merrium Webster's first definition, part A states that ambition is "an ardent desire for rank, fame, or power". This contradicts my statement to my mother because I have "an ardent desire for rank, fame,or power." But when you couple ambition with laziness that is where you find me standing, or probably laying down would be a better descriptor. I honestly didn't know such a combination was possible.  When you put them side by side, they seem to be diametrically opposed to each other. I can honestly tell you that they are not mutually exclusive to each other.

My ambition for success has given me a chest-full of good ideas. Idea's that I could accomplish given the physical resources, proper planning, and time. But all of my ideas are but meteorites of my mind. They race in at great speed, burn white hot as they enter the atmosphere of my conscious mind, then are reduced to ash before ever coming to fruition. 

I am an intelligent person. Not a genius, but no slouch either. I have the ability to be able to retain information by hearing it and be able to have a pretty good recall rate. I aced all of my tests in high school just by sitting in the classroom and reading the accompanying material. I did no homework and still graduated right in the middle of my class. A good friend of mine told me that I have always looked for the easy road to success. Very true words, indeed.

Now what I am faced with is the mind that wants success and the heart of a lazy man. And my mind is rebelling to see what I have accomplished in life when I am capable of so much more. It is time to take control of my laziness and put my mind at rest.

"I will begin with this confession: whatever I have done in the course of my life, whether it be good or evil, has been done freely; I am a free agent." -Giacomo Casanova

The title of today's post is a great place to begin. To begin to understand my disorder, I need to begin to understand myself. For all that I have done, good or ill, I have done so by choice. I am not going to try to say that some evil force has pushed me to do the wrongs that I have done. I am not delusional.  My motivation has always been clear. I have always been about me.

I have always looked out for number one and obtaining what I have believed are my wants and needs, the rest of the world be damned. To acknowledge that about myself is to understand that I hold my desires above the needs of all others in my life. It is to this end that I have committed many wrongs to those who have trusted me the most. I have used my position of trust to get away with some awful things many times in my life. The craving to satisfy my desires has at least in part created the beast with which I now battle. And that fight is not likely to end soon. Just because I have identified what I know to be my greatest failing, that I am selfish, does not mean that the lunatic will now fall silent.

There are many aspects to my personality, this just being one. When you combine this weakness with another dominant personality trait, things can get even more troubling. More on that tomorrow.

“Everyone is a moon, and has a dark side which he never shows to anybody.” ― Mark Twain

Per my last post, I said I would give greater detail about the "bad" man that I am. I use the quotation marks to signify that I understand that I am not a "bad" person. And I believe this most of the time. There are times however that I am consumed by the idea that I am a bad person and beyond any hope of redemption. My soul cries out for absolution that I am convinced I do not deserve. It is this that I wish to focus upon.

I will start with some more history. I am an older brother to Jim, three years my junior. I was not a good friend to him while we were growing up. Putting aside the usual sibling rivalries, I was very mean to him and to a couple of my cousins. Their crime? Being younger, easy targets. They would be feel the brunt of my anger and hurt at the outside world. I could not fight back at those who would pick on me, so I gave to my family the punishment that I felt others needed. 

If these events stopped as I grew older, I could almost (almost being the damning word here) believe that I acted no different than any other child in my circumstances. This is not the case, however. Going into my teens, I made the situation worse by being a total tool to my brother. I constantly treated him as if his very presence were an inconvenience to me. The last few years I was at home, Jim began acting out in his frustration, causing great strife between he and our mother. When I moved out it was as if a great weight had been removed from his shoulders, and he returned to his normal self. The strangest thing about that situation was that it took me several years to realize that I was the catalyst for his behavior problems. Once the catalyst was removed, so was the danger of explosion, metaphorically speaking.

Even in my adulthood, this attitude toward him did not change. There was one event that I recall that my mother called me during the late evening or wee hours of the morning, I don't recall which. My brother needed someone to take him to the hospital. I refused because "I was tired and had to work the next day". Pretty pathetic, right? This was the story of my life back then in a nutshell. It was all about me. It was about what I wanted or didn't want. It was about how I didn't want to be inconvenienced. Or if I did do something, what was I going to get out of it. 

As I've grown older, I have changed. I have experienced a spiritual awakening that has opened my eyes. I have discovered the real joy of giving of self. I have found that sacrifice is its own reward. There does not need to be a pay day, because the act of giving to someone has been uplifting to the one who received the gift. The reward is the knowledge I have made a difference, even if its just a small difference. My joy of faith lies within this passage:

Matthew 25:40 (NIV) “The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’

But somewhere along the way in this journey, there was a split in the road. I don't know where it happened, or when. I just know that my mind divided into two halves. On one half, you have the man that I have become. The man that I want to believe is the real me. The other half seems to be a raving lunatic that is compelled to punish me for the sins of my past while at the same time, not allowing for any hope of redemption. Most days I am the wiser, kinder person. But more and more, the lunatic has had greater sway. And that, ladies and gentleman, is what is scaring me. I feel like I am losing this fight.

That being said, I am now seeking help for my disorder. I am very early in the process so all of these feelings are fresh, raw, and all too real to me. I am saddened by the fact that it took me so long to reach this point and at the expense of those who love me. I only hope that one day I can rebuild the trust that I blatantly destroyed. And I pray that I can put my demons to rest...

Let me be frank with you...

... In my life I have been very blessed. My life has been relatively easy, even when I thought it was hard. My first marriage ended after only seven years under less than pleasant circumstances. When I reflect back on that time I view it more as a lesson in life than an abject failure. I took away lessons on good behavior and bad, as well as actually gaining a sense of self that I did not have going in to the marriage. I learned that I could express my feelings and do it in a positive manner. I learned that it was okay to speak up if I was under fire and that it was okay to stand up for myself. These were skills I did not have going into the marriage and they were learned via the hard way. I truly believe that I grew into being an adult in mind well after becoming an adult in body and it was the experiences of my first marriage that I gathered these skills. Do I regret my first marriage, no. Do I wish it had turned out differently, no. If it had turned out differently, I would not be where I am today.

Now, based upon my previous blog, today is not a good time in my life. Doesn't quite jive, does it? It does if you could see how my brain works. It's not that the failure of my marriage was not a bad experience, it's that I am able to see past the fog of time and see that all in all, I grew up and came away a better person for the experience. At the time it was happening, I was feeling the lowest one could ever feel. The passage of time has allowed me see past the hurt feelings and know that I am a better person for having had the experience.

What I am experiencing now is a completely different animal. Back then it was two people fighting against immaturity and self imposed problems. Today it is a situation where one person has taken a trust that was freely given and abused it without any consideration for consequences. Since I am as yet unsure of the relationship between my sins and my depression, it is unclear to me why I have done the things that I have done. The mental turmoil it has created has definitely fed my depression and even deepened it's hold on my mind. But knowing what I do know hasn't helped me to see figure out the why's. I have effectively taken a wonderful life and marriage and created a world to justify my feelings of self hatred. It's as if I decided that if I don't have a logical reason to be depressed, I'll create one. This was not a conscious decision, mind you, just a possible explanation for the whole mess I find myself. 

One of the most prevalent issue with my depression is that I believe myself to be if not Evil, then a very bad person at least. I will go into better detail about this issue later but for now lets just say that while my thinking mind screams that I am not a bad person, my self conscious mind is convinced that I am and to think differently is to hide from the truth.The way that I keep this thought line from completely taking over and paralyzing me permanently is the realization that if I were truly Evil, why would I care? I have found in my studies in this area that the truly bad people don't even believe the atrocities that they engage in are bad or possibly evil. I only need to point to Adolf Hitler as the perfect example of this thinking. In his mind, he had done everything he did for the good of his people and country. The perfect illusion of "I'm alright, the worlds all wrong" mentality.

More to come later...