Suicide Too

Same subject, new post. What do you say to someone that has admitted to you that this is a serious thought for them? First, you say nothing. You listen, you listen a lot. It’ll be hard. They may say things that hurt your feelings, but they’re hurting far worse than any feelings they can touch in you. Unless you too are suicidal, in that case, you know what they’re going through and can probably actually help each other.

This part is critical to stopping the actual event. If the person you’re talking to doesn’t feel that you’re listening, or doesn’t believe you care, or doesn’t think you can even understand, he/she may just brush off the seriousness of the issue so you go away. This doesn’t mean they will kill themselves right away, but it does mean you failed at stopping, and reversing, the thought process that might lead to them doing so. You need to listen to understand. Don’t just say “I understand” even if you really do, but show you understand by asking questions, or repeating what they said, or giving them your full attention even when they sit and cry for long periods. What is most helpful for the suicidal person is being that someone that actually cares about what ever is hurting them. They often want to die because they’ve lost hope of achieving something important to them: maybe they lost their ‘One true love’, or they have lost their dream job. Sometimes a lot of smaller failures/losses add up to lost hope for happiness, and other times they feel like their life has been miserable for so long that simply failing to get out of bed or take a shower can push a person passed the point of wanting to continue living. Understand what that thing means to them and help them grieve for it if necessary. The key is to pay attention to what they say and try to understand their pain.

Second, you tell them how much you care. Be sincere here. They won’t believe it anyway, so if you can’t back up your statements with actions, then don’t say them. If all you can do is listen to them and be present with them when your schedule allows, then say that and leave it there. If you can drop everything and answer the phone anytime, day or night, and they might need that, then offer it, but be prepared for them to actually call you at work or in the middle of the night.

Third, help them find help. Most people who are talking about suicide have already looked for help, but found none that made a difference. They may need to you to help them search for services or even do the search for them yourself. Simply suggesting the same things you’ve heard may not be enough, but do it anyway. Although those services seem easy to find on the surface, the suicidal person may have already tried some of them and found them unhelpful. Again, only offer to help them with this if you have the time and ability to do so.

My Experience

When I’ve felt like taking my own life, it has been at times when I don’t see any hope at all or the hope I do see requires me to do something I don’t think I’m capable of; in other words, it seems like false hope. And that hope isn’t always about my own future. Sometimes the thing I want most is for my kids to succeed in a world that has defeated me. Sometimes my hope is based on the world at large finding better ways to help people in need.

When I see the greater world around me making decisions that seem to me to feed fear or increase the separation between those who have and those who have not, I sometimes feel like just ending my life because, at those times specifically, it’s my belief that I will need the skills of a compassionate person to teach me how to reach my goals. In a world full of fear and selfishness, I’m not likely to find someone like that, so my hope in a future where I’m not living in poverty dies – and I want to die with it.

Sometimes I see my kids struggling to survive, but only managing to wriggle themselves deeper into life’s quicksand. I don’t see anyone with the ability to help show enough compassion to support them through the tough spots. That makes me want to die and end the possibility to create more children that I would fail to give the tools they need to thrive. I feel like a failure as a father and as a human being at those times. I just want to stop giving false hope to my kids and hope they can find someone that can truly offer them the support and training they need in order to get through this miserable life.

The darkest times come when I lose hope of finding the help I need to figure out what the hell is wrong with my brain or my life patterns. Most of the time, I spend my time trying to escape my life through video games, deep, philosophical conversations, socialising with like minded people, sleeping, or just doing a lap or two around a local mall to feel connected to the world around me. What am I escaping? My beliefs that I don’t have enough employable skills, that I will never be able to support myself, that I raised my kids without teaching them anything useful, that I can never be lovable, that I will never be a writer who makes any money writing. I spend the vast majority of my time escaping these beliefs. Eventually, I lose hope of ever finding a counsellor, or psych, or other professional that can help me identify the problem and offer realistic solutions. Since I have spent over 40 years trying to find those solutions on my own without making much ground, most of my hope lies in finding professional help. When that professional help has failed me time and again from a double handful of sources, I lose hope of ever having a life with dignity or self respect. When I lose that hope, I want to die.

The things that have stopped me from killing myself fall into two categories:

First there are those I love or feel love from. Those include many of the members of the dance club I’m a part of, many of the members of the writers’ group I joined over a year ago now, my kids, a few friends not from the dance club or writers’ group, and, more distantly, my family of origin. When I want to take my own life, I think of these people. I believe some of them truly do love me, even if they have no ability to help me. Others I love deeply and don’t want to hurt them.

Second, are the people who see the signs and respond. They are some of the people from the first group, the ones who are lucky enough to have made contact with me when I’m feeling suicidal. Not everyone I talked to during these times has responded. I don’t know if that is because they didn’t see the signs, or because they didn’t think they could help, or maybe it was because they saw the signs but didn’t care enough to help. But the people that did see the signs and responded kindly, have literally saved my life on a few occasions. Most of them just connected with me and listened. They heard my hurt. They understood my pain. They cared about my problems. Mostly, they just talked and listened when I needed them most to do so.

Suicide, for me, isn’t a disconnection from people. It isn’t because I don’t think anybody cares. I know they do. For me, I sometimes want to kill myself so I stop taking up resources without giving anything useful back to the world. I want to stop wasting time, money, and space on myself when I don’t believe I will ever have anything to contribute. But, I stay connected, I talk to people that care about me, and I stay alive.

If This Is You

If you’ve been thinking about suicide yourself, please ignore the negativity attached to the words or actions associated with it and seek the help of those around you.  At very least, talk to them. Tell them you are hurting. Tell them why, if you can. Reach out to those services I talked about earlier. There is probably a suicide prevention phone number in your area. If you phone any psychologist, psychiatrist, mental health agency, or 911 and tell them you are considering suicide, they’re obligated to help.

Think about the people you are leaving behind. They may not seem like they care, but they do, I promise. They might not have the time, money, or emotional ability to give you what you need, but they do care. You will hurt them. You might be OK with hurting some of them – that might be one of your motivations – but consider the others that you don’t want to hurt. There are always innocent people effected by someone killing themselves.

Most of all you should talk to anybody that will listen. Start with those closest to you. Talk to your family and close friends, but don’t stop there. I’ve built some very close friendships telling casual acquaintances about my desire to end my own life. I’ve found people that can help in meaningful ways by talking to someone I don’t know very well or just met.

If This Is Someone You Know

It’s worth repeating here what I said at the start. If someone has admitted to you that they are considering killing themselves, you need to stop what you’re doing and listen. If they’re reaching out to you, they haven’t quite given up yet. But that doesn’t mean they’re only seeking attention either. People talk about suicide for a variety of reasons; one of the most common reasons someone might tell you they want to die is because they are hoping you can give them a reason not to.

Many people use this as a manipulation tool to get what they want from you. If you assume that everyone that talks about suicide is only manipulating you, though, you will miss your chance to save a life. The key to the difference is listening. Someone who is truly suicidal will cherish the connection that comes from talking to someone. If they’re simply talking about dying to get something they want, talking won’t be enough.  You should be able to see the difference easily, most people can.

If talking to them seems to calm them a little (it probably won’t make the thought go away all together), then they’re serious about wanting your input. Most of the time, listening to them share their pain and failures is enough to reduce the urgency and buy some more time. Build the connection with them. Be the one they can trust with their deepest hurts. Don’t judge them or give them advice. If you want to help more than just by listening, it requires that you take some action on their behalf. Discuss it with them first to make sure it is something they are open and willing to accept. It is not helpful to just sit back and offer advice, no matter how insightful or brilliant. If all you can give them is time, then listen. If you can give them more, offer to do something with them or for them. Honestly, the more someone does something with me or for me, the more connected I feel, and the less hopeless I feel. Connection prevents suicide.

Some of the things you can do for them or with them is find professional help. Someone who is talking about wanting to die needs more than just a friend, they need to be assessed by a professional. Even is they’re only trying to get attention, they need help. Both, people who really do want to die, and those who use it to manipulate others will be helped by seeking professional help.

What It Means

Suicide is always a serious subject. The more we can connect with people in our lives, the more secure and stable our emotional and mental states will be. The more people we connect with, the higher the chances that we can help when someone talks about killing themselves. Our ability to listen and respond compassionately can save a life. Unconditionally loving someone that talks about suicide will give us the right mindset to be open to what they really need.

When we get to a place in our lives that robs us of all hope in our future, or takes away the one thing we have waited our whole life to get, those are the times we need most to reach out to anyone that will listen the way we need them to listen. If you have the courage to take your own life and leave hurt and pain in your wake, use that courage to share your story. Someone out there will hear it and want to help. Just keep sharing it until you find somebody that you connect with. Share it with that person. Sharing makes it better, believe me.

 

If you or someone you know is considering suicide please call: 911. Also, if this or any article I have written touches you and makes you want to talk, drop me a line and join the conversation.

Personal Energy

Personal energy is a commodity just like electricity or gasoline. It needs to be managed in much the same way. Sometimes it can be bought or sold. You may give or receive it as a gift. Personal energy is harder to measure. It takes an awareness of oneself that most people don’t have. Those who have that understanding of themselves will tell you that their energy levels become more manageable as they become more self aware.

I have discovered four kinds of personal energy within myself. This doesn’t mean there aren’t others or that my list is universal for all people. It’s my experience. They are: mental energy, emotional energy, physical energy, and social energy. Mental energy is my ability to focus or concentrate on something. I expend emotional energy to process my feelings and reactions to things. Physical energy is self explanatory, it’s the energy I use to make my body do things. Social is about community. It’s what connects me to others. I expend social energy to build, strengthen, and let go of connections to people.

My Experience

For most of my life, I believed I was broken because I couldn’t understand why sometimes I could do an activity for hours and other days I had virtually no interest in participating in it. Other times I would be invited to some kind of function, but the idea of going made me feel exhausted, yet I would often spend hours doing something else instead. When these things happened, it caused me to examine my motivations or believe there was something wrong with me. It almost always caused me and those around me to view me as selfish.

What I didn’t know is that my life contains various kinds of energy. Each one influences the others, but regenerating one does not increase the rest. Each needs to be nurtured and managed individually. I’ve tried for many years to heal my physical body. And at one point, I realized I needed to work on my mental health too. I didn’t learn how to improve both at the same time until very recently. When I did learn that us guys need to give as much attention to our mental health as our physical, I started to see that I had other kinds of energy that didn’t come under those two categories.

I first learned about social energy in a book about ADD. In it he talks about a person’s need for human interaction and relationships and how that leads many people to search for those things in some type of faith based life style. He says that social energy isn’t a mythical energy that originates from some mysterious deity or all powerful force, but it comes from within ourselves and from positive relationships. It’s the energy we use to decide when and how to interact with other people. We spend it on enriching the lives of those around us. Managing it is about learning to limit our interactions that consume our social energy, spending more time with others that feed and regenerate our energy, and being by ourselves to let it slowly regenerate on its own.

Emotional energy is one that I had a tough time believing in. Even once I was convinced of its authenticity, it took me too long to understand its relevance to my masculinity. I consume it by feeling both positive and negative emotions. I’ve discovered that my depression was a result of an empty tank of this kind energy. Emotional energy is the strangest of all the energy pools because it’s built by feeling emotions, but only by specific ones. Confidence in oneself is the easiest way to increase it. Forgiveness is another way to recover it. The only way I know of to increase your capacity for emotional energy is by loving others unconditionally. Loving others is one of the biggest uses of this energy, but loving someone unconditionally actually increases the size of the pool I can draw from.

Mental energy is one of the fastest growing areas of interest on my Facebook feed right now. A lot of people are learning for the first time that it is separate from physical energy and needs to be managed separately too. This is the brain power that contributes to many of us not being able to sleep at night even when we feel physically exhausted. If I haven’t done much that was mentally challenging that day, I might have a surplus when I try to sleep at night and brain wants to use some of it before it will let me go to sleep. At other times, I have used up my pool of mental energy when there is still a lot of day left. On those days, I like to go out and do something purely social and/or physical; dancing, wondering the mall, or walking my dog are all activities that use less of my mental energy.

Physical energy is one of the easiest for us guys to understand and manage. Not all of us know how to do those things though. Eating healthy and proper exercise are obvious to most of us. But regular checkups aren’t so easy to keep up with. Good rest is also important here. But so are limiting our exposure to addictive substances and practices. Most of us can agree that too much alcohol or street drugs will have harmful effects on our bodies. Did you know that food addictions or consistent use of pornography can too? There are a lot of things to keep in mind if we want to manage our physical energy.

The fun parts for me have been identifying situations that might need more than one kind of energy. Witty jokes require just the right mixture of mental and social energy. Sports use social and physical, sometime with some mental energy thrown into the mix. Sex uses the emotional and physical varieties. Family needs emotional and social. And the hardest for most of us, trying to stop being single uses both social and emotional energy topped off with a good helping of mental energy. I have decided to reserve that last activity for when I have learned to manage all my energy levels adequately.

A good, wholesome, restful sleep will regenerate all my energy pools. I have had 3 different naps while writing this article because I used up a lot of them last weekend. It’s taken me a few days to recover enough of it to finish this project. Now that I’m learning to understand my abilities and limitations surrounding my energy pools, I find my moods far easier to regulate.

If this is you

Maybe you are having difficulty trying to understand why you want to do things sometimes and other times just don’t feel like participating in those same experiences. Learning what kinds of energy you use and in what ways you use them will probably help you manage these things better and give you a greater sense of control in your life. You might have the same types of energy that I have, or you may have other ways to divvy up your pools of energy. The important part, though, is knowing that there are different pools of energy for doing different things in your life. Learn what yours are, and learn to manage them. When you do, you will find yourself better able to do the things you want and avoid the things that suck your energy dry.

If This is Someone You Know

You know that guy that you just can’t figure out what he likes and doesn’t like? There’s a good chance the same thing confuses and frustrates him too. Try understanding that he has different pools of energy to do different things. They might not be the same pools of energy that you see in your life. He might really like hanging out with you at the pool hall, but if he’s had very socially heavy day, he may not feel like it this time. Or maybe he has a pool of energy dedicated to drinking booze. If his boss or a client has just spent the whole day treating him to various fine restaurants and pubs, he may have used up his booze reserves. Whatever the situation, you don’t know what is in his head or how much of which types of energy he has left, so please be kind with your judgments. Hell, he might not even know he has pools of energy. To a lot of guys, the word energy means oil & gas or electricity. Just because he might not understand his own pools, does not mean that he doesn’t have them. In fact, it probably means he’s kind of crappy at managing them in the first place. Give him the space to say yes or no and let him know that either answer is OK. It’ll help him feel like his feelings or at least his decisions matter to you.

What is means

Personal energy comes in all shapes and sizes. It has all kinds of uses. Some of us know what ours are, but most of us don’t. Most guys I know understand the idea of personal energy, but would look at you as though you wore a pink elephant on your nose if you told them he could use one type energy instead of another one. Mine are physical, mental, social, and emotional. Some of you might find my types of energy make sense to you. If they help you understand yourself better and manage the things you want to do and limit the things you can’t do then your world will be a better place for it. The most useful this information has been for me is when I have to explain to someone why I can’t do something I have enjoyed in the past and might still enjoy. I tell them that I want to do those things but I have to manage that type of energy. When I figure out how to do that, I’ll probably return to those activities with gusto. I’m learning new ways of understanding my energy levels every day.

If this or any article on my blog hit a cord with you, drop me a line and join the conversation.

My Faith

Alright, here is my “faith” post. If listening to me talk about my relationship to God isn’t of interest to you, then there is no need for you to read on. For those that want to understand my view of faith, here it is:

Those who know me personally, know that I am a strong believer in the Christian (specifically Catholic) faith. God has been a huge influence throughout my life. Without Him I would not have found the strength to keep my life going before I met my wife. He is the reason I became a writer, and the reason I keep returning to it when I let my life distract me from it. He has guided me (sometimes with an large hammer or an anvil to the brains) along this hard and often lonely path. He has taught me how to write, what to write, and why to write. He is the motivation behind the articles I write.

 

I don’t want people to associate my observations and advice with any specific philosophy or faith. I believe the purpose God has given me is meant for the general population, regardless of their beliefs. And I especially don’t want someone to disregard my suggestions because they believe it depends on having a faith like my own. It doesn’t. I keep my blog posts religiously universal so that all guys that deal with these things can find help, even or especially those that don’t find any relief in faith.

 

My experience

My faith has always been strong. I’ve believed in God even when most of the people in my life didn’t. It’s never depended on things that happened in my life or what myself or others have experienced.

As a child, God was often the only person I could talk to and feel that he cared. Neither of my parents put much importance in God. We never went to church or had God influences, but neither did they teach us that He didn’t exist. They seemed to just let us believe what we wanted. They encouraged us to wait until we were adults to decide what our beliefs should be. I always thought of him as a loving, accepting, and patient kind of person. It probably stemmed from the idea that God was everything that people should and could be if we were able to be perfect. I didn’t often ask him for things. I would simply feel safe and valued because he always knew what was important to me. If I ever did ask him for something, I would usually ask for strength to endure, or the patience to wait for his plan to take effect.

I would sometimes ask for wisdom to understand why other people acted as they did. When I think about that now, I have always had an understanding of the motivations of other people that went beyond that of my peers. I’ve rarely been able to use that gift to my own advantage though. On the rare occasion that I have been able to use that gift, it’s only been in scenarios that benefited that person.

I guess my relationship with God has always been one of a trusted friend who I could share anything with. I don’t tell him things, he already knows everything about my life. Sometimes I get encouragement from him in the form of tiny happy events that are beyond my control. He also gives me feedback when I ask his opinion.

For example: shortly after my wife left, I started to think this could be a great opportunity to pursue my writing more seriously. I asked God to show me in no uncertain terms if he wanted me to be a writer or not. Over the next couple of days, I searched for paid writing opportunities because “God helps those who help themselves”, in other words, He can’t direct my activities if I’m not doing anything for Him to direct. After searching for a couple days, I found an ad asking for someone to help them write something for their real estate website. The ad didn’t give much for details, but I thought “This sounds easy enough, I’ve written marketing materials for many of my employers over the years and they always seemed to like what I did.” I responded to the ad and continued searching for others. A few days later they responded positively by saying they would like me to do a couple sample articles. If it worked out, they would have over 300 they would need me to do for them. I’ll stop the story there, because that is the point I’m trying to make. I asked God to slap me in the face with his answer. I’m kind of dense when it comes to listening to Him. This answer to my response CLEARLY told me that he wanted me to be a writer. Regardless of how the deal turned out, and it didn’t end up coming to any money, I knew for certain that He wanted me to write. The answer was, however, very specific to the question. Over the next few months of trying, and failing, to make a career out of writing marketing materials, I discovered that His answer was “Yes, I want you to write,” but not “Yes, I want you to write marketing materials.”

This is an important point for this story because many people that I tell this story to say, “If God wanted you to write, why aren’t you making any money as a writer?” My answer is always “Because I didn’t ask if I would make money as a writer, only if that is what he wants me to be.” I firmly believe God will look after, even financially, those who follow His plan for them. I wasn’t following His plan. I interpreted His answer in my own way instead of taking it at face value. I assumed He wanted me to follow that particular writing path. Over the next few months, I tried a lot of other writing ventures I thought He wanted me to pursue. When I started to focus on this blog, that’s when a lot of other things in my life have fallen into place. I now have a large support group who have said directly that they won’t let me “live on the streets and eat out of garbage cans.” I’m still not making any money as a writer, but I’m very much at peace with my professional life. Most of my personal life brings me a lot of peace as well. That tells me that I’m closer to following God’s path for me.

 

The other reason I’ve always had a close relationship to God is because He taught me what unconditional love means and how to give it. He showed me that I have a choice. Through reading my bible and through positive reinforcement he showed me that I can resent, hate, and turn away from the people in my life who have hurt me, or I can love them and even forgive them and try to influence how they interact with me. He has given me the ability to use my gift of understanding people’s motivations to improve both my outlook on life and theirs.

For example: there was a customer that frequented the video game store I used to work at. He was loud and offensive every time he came into the store. I figured that he probably felt lonely and powerless in his life. He used a loud and obnoxious personality to give himself a sense of control. He could understand why nobody would want to be in his life if he pissed them off or made them feel uncomfortable. With that idea in mind I began to bond with him. When there were no other customers in the store I would be almost as loud and obnoxious as he was. I shared crude stories to show him I could relate to him on that level. After I judged that I had created some sort of bond with him I sat him down one day and said “Look man, you are rude and loud when there are other customers in the store. I like you and don’t want to have to kick you out so please tone it down when there are other people in here.” He reacted the same way as when other staff members said something similar – he didn’t listen. But, as time went on, I ignored him when he continued his unruly behavior around other customers and joined him when there wasn’t anyone else around to be offended. He began to crave my friendship even when other people were around. Soon, he started to have normal conversations with me in a normal tone of voice when other people were present. I intentionally responded positively to those polite conversations and even went out of my way sometimes to reinforce this new behavior. Of course, when the store was empty except for him and I, we would resume our usual crude interactions. After a while he even lost the desire to be obnoxious during those times too. I had used the gift of understanding that God gave me to influence (not change, he did that himself) this lonely, obnoxious guy into becoming a kind, helpful and considerate gentleman who would help other customers with his legit experience with some of the games he had played, even to the point of discouraging one parent from buying Grand Theft Auto for their under-age child. That had been completely out of character for him just a couple months earlier. By showing him the unconditional love that staff at my store and numerous others had not done, I had given him a reason to let his suppressed compassionate nature shine through. And it did catch the notice of my manager and the managers of 2 other local video game stores that he had been previously banned from.

God used this lessen to teach me that unconditional love is a miracle that can change lives. I have strived to give that kind of love ever since. Recently, I have been able to give that same unconditional love to my wife of 20 years who left me a little over a year ago for her childhood sweetheart. I have been able to help her feel my forgiveness and show her that I support her newfound happiness. It’s been hard much of the time, but when I started to show her this kind of love, most of my stress and hurt has resulted in some amazing healing. And, for me at least, God is the reason that has happened.

 

If this is you

You believe in God too? Awesome, that gives me warm and fuzzy feelings. Do you struggle with how that should come out in your life? There are many ways to let Him show in your everyday life without seeming fake or forced. Some share their faith by quoting scripture. Try the passages that touched you the most or the latest ones you heard from your faith leaders. Others share their views of God as they see Him or as they have been taught about Him. Many also discuss their faith with others within their church or religious groups. Some people choose their friendships based on their religious beliefs. Still others chose people who don’t share their beliefs because they provide them with a contrast with which they can test or strengthen their own faith.  There are others that simply try to live their lives the way they think God wants them to.

These different methods help us to understand and solidify our values and beliefs. Most people I have talked to don’t agree with everything their church teaches. These different activities help to understand the motivations for those beliefs and allows us to make more conscious choices about our own values.

Whatever you do to share your faith, do so through love and kindness because that is why God sent his son to die for us. Jesus changed how we understand God’s laws so that we would stop using it to condemn each other and start using it to love each other better.

 

If this is someone you know

Please understand that everything God teaches his faithful is designed to help them love each other. However, we are all still learning this and what it means, so please be patient with us as we learn to love those around us. If you know a Christian, please don’t teach him that his beliefs are wrong, misguided, or utterly pointless, because doing so doesn’t provide clarity. Quite the opposite. It makes him doubt both his own beliefs and yours. Yet if you can show him the patience and kindness he is trying to learn, he will learn to love and accept others for their own beliefs, even if they aren’t the same as his. Through his own faith growth, he may learn that what he believes is false and change his mind on his own, but if you try to change it for him, all you will accomplish is discord and distrust in all things. By showing him love and kindness, however, he may decide that your beliefs lead to the life he is looking for, or he may learn to enjoy differing points of view to better understand his own values. Goodness breeds goodness and misery loves company. Please help our Christians learn what love means to you.

What it means

The core behind almost every faith in existence is: what does life mean? To me, God means love. He represents every possible way a person can love someone or something. Although some of his teachings are about different laws and ways to obey his commands, the primary reason for those teachings is to show us diverse ways to love each other and him.

It all comes down to love, and for him, it’s unconditional love. He loves everyone one of us regardless of what we do in our lives; it doesn’t even matter if we believe in him or follow his commands, he loves us anyway. Even if we leave him or do things to intentionally hurt him, he loves us and welcomes us into his house. His love is truly unconditional.

It’s the model I strive to learn and live by. I don’t have to preach or even talk about Him to share my message. For me, it comes out in the motivation for sharing my message, not the message itself. I can offer my experience and suggestions to everyone. The articles I write don’t assume a religious connection of any kind (except this article of course). My faith guides my life, but I want to help as many people as I can, regardless of their beliefs.

 

Dear God, thank you for inspiring me to write this article, and for continuing to bring me back to it no matter how much I tried to avoid it and distract myself. You are my greatest friend and the reason I’m alive.

Amen.

 

Please start the conversation. If anything in here gets you thinking or wanting more, just ask. Myself and God are both listening.

If Suicide, Why Not Success

If a guy is willing to give up on everything in his loves to kill himself, why isn’t he willing to give up everything to make major changes to achieve success. The simple answer, of course, is that he has lost all hope. Look at it from a different angle for a minute before you take the next step toward your death. Many of the most successful people in the world (not all, but many for sure) found success in the depths of despair. Would it surprise you to know that it takes the same level of emotions and commitment to throw everything away and start over as it does to throw everything away and kill yourself? I’m not suggesting that you get a divorce, quit your job, and move to a different country. Most of us that have been on the verge of suicide, though, have already lost one or more of those things. Do you remember the saying “when God closes a door, he opens a window”? It sounds like a lot of spiritual BS to me too, but I eventually figured out what they are actually trying to say there. So, you lost something important in your life and it’s tearing you apart, this is the best time to knock off some of those barriers that have been stopping you from pursuing your dreams. What have you got to lose, besides that which you were willing to sacrifice by taking your own life.

 

My experience

Hope. That’s the emotion that ties essentially all suicide cases together. The person lost hope. In most, but not all cases, they lost ALL hope. Sometimes they only lost hope in the one, most important, dream they had. When I lost all hope in seeing any of my dreams come true, I wanted to die. Not to stop the pain, but to stop being a drain on those around me and the world as a whole. I had nothing to offer that others wanted and, by taking up space and resources, I used up the things others could benefit from if I wasn’t selfishly trying to hold onto a dead dream. But it occurred to me that I judged those that chose to help me based on criteria that they couldn’t consider. Through the loss of all that I held dear, I decided that I was worthless and, therefore, anyone who helped me backed a bad bet. Maybe those that chose to take themselves out of my life felt I was a bad bet, but those still investing in me probably saw something else. And for the first time in my life I started to wonder if I myself listened to the wrong people. As soon as the seed of that thought sunk in to my soul, it immediately sprung into a full-grown tree. I had already coached many of my friends through the same thoughts and feelings so I had nurtured and fully developed it. I just hadn’t planted that same idea in my own heart yet. Of course, I had been listening to the wrong people. Many people I had trusted to have my best interests in mind only saw what I needed to fix based on their own agendas. Once they gave up and left, I realised that there were also some that where trying to help me find my own agenda because they truly believed in me.

This is the point where I realised that I’d be willing lose all those people and things I had been holding onto because I thought they saw potential in me. But all they saw was how to fix me by their own standards. Once I let them go and began to focus on what I had left, wonderful things started to happen. At first, I didn’t think I had anything left, but by not having anything left in my life that I cared about, I found an empty space that I could fill with whatever I chose. I started filling up my life with the things and people I had wanted for a long time but never felt I had permission to pursue. I soon found that most of those things were also just junk to fill up my life and lead me down the wrong path. So, I let go of those people and only kept the ones in my life that I felt truly supported me and helped me along the path to my goals. Then I started trying things that I had more recently found an interest in. I threw out those activities and people that didn’t help me forward my other goals. Each time I iterated this way, I kept just a little more of the people and ideas that fed my other goals and eventually ended up with enough positive things in my life that I could find hope.

The key here is to keep anything that helps you forward a positive goal even if you have some goals that you never find support for. For example: I have been keeping the things and people that help me be a better writer and those that want to share positivity and love in the world, but so far nothing I have kept in my life has helped me find any financial security. So, it’s not about keeping the things that give me the one thing I want most but to keep anything that helped me achieve any of my goals.

 

If this is you

You’ve lost hope. Now what? Do you really believe that it can’t get better? Maybe you just don’t care if it can. Maybe what you’ve lost can never be rebuilt or replaced. Death could allow you to let go of the dream, and the false hope. But why do you need death for that? Aren’t they already gone? Isn’t that why you feel this way? All you’re holding onto right now is the grief and loss. But those aren’t tangible and keep slipping through your fingers. That’s supposed to happen. It’s a process. Let it happen. Reach out to those around you: friends and family if you have them. They care and want to help, but most of them just don’t know how. If you don’t find support there, join a group. Any group will do if you can find a connection within it. Try a depression group, a grief group, a church group, a recovery group, or, if your can find one, a hobby group. If one doesn’t work, join a different one, or join a couple. If that starts to wear thin and you still haven’t made much for connections, try online groups or even just listen to audio books or podcasts. What you’re looking for here, isn’t people who will listen to your grief and sorrow, but people you can relate to who you can listen to. If you can listen to their grief and sorrow without judgement or negativity, then you can build connections with them.

Those connections are important because that’s where you will start to see who you actually are instead of what others want you to be. You’ll begin to see characteristics in them that you can relate to. Out of those characteristics, you can sort through and pick out the ones you haven’t felt free to pursue before. With a little development, they can become your new direction and even a source of hope.

This is where the choice becomes important. What are you willing to give up in order to find hope? What are you willing to give up on to consider suicide? Are you willing to give up the expectation that someone will come to your rescue? What about your sadness? Can you let go of those people that expect you to fix yourself based on their own formula? If your answer is yes to these questions, why do you need to die? Letting go of these things will also free you up to pursue hope. The hardest part is keeping your commitment to let go. But the upside of change instead of death? You won’t hurt as many people and those you do hurt are probably the ones you need to let go of anyway. Yes, you might still die. You might lose everything. You might hurt all those same people. You may end up on the street fighting to find food. But you might just find your place in this world. You might find love. You might find the money you need to support yourself. And you might find success. In death, you’ll only find failure.

 

If this is someone you know

First, although it’s true, they are seeking attention, it isn’t that simple. Refusing to give them the attention so they’ll “just grow up” will most assuredly confirm for them that you really don’t care. It will push them further into their depression and closer the real act of suicide. Even if you tell them a million times how much you care, refusing the attention they are seeking will deny those words a hundred times over. They need that attention, and far more than that, they need your love. The true love that lets them vent their hurt, especially the hurt you might have caused. Even the hurt you didn’t cause but they blame on you anyway. They need to know that their hurt counts. That it means something because it does mean something, especially the misplaced blame and anger they have. It means they need help. Help they don’t know where to find. Help they may not believe exists. They need the attention of someone that will listen without judgement. Someone who doesn’t always have the answers, but will stick by them and support them while they search for those answers. Someone who won’t try to “fix” them.

Be the first connection they can trust. It might look like they have other support systems in place, but if they are contemplating suicide, they don’t trust them. Be that connection for them. Build the trust they need to open up about the real hurt. They don’t have to cry to be talking about the real feelings, but if they’re just ‘telling their story’, listen and let them talk, that isn’t the hurtful stuff. Don’t dig for detail and don’t get them to ‘talk about their feelings’. Just listen, respond when its appropriate, and keep the conversation open. It doesn’t happen all at once. In fact, it probably won’t happen in the first sitting. They got to the point of suicide because too many of their ‘friendships’ didn’t turn out to matter at all when they really needed them. Be the guy they can count on. Set your boundaries and stick around for the long haul. At some point, they will start talking about things they like and dislike. That’s the beginning. As they sort through the hurt and pain, they will eventually start to remember the good things. They need to process that pain and they aren’t capable of doing so alone. They will come out of it, and when they do they will begin to see who was still there when they needed them. Be the foundation they build the rest of their life on. Or, if that is too much responsibility, with proper boundaries, you will be the support they need to build their own foundation that won’t depend on you.

 

What it means

When you get to a point in your life that you’ve lost hope and you’re prepared to sacrifice everything and just die, remember there are more than one way to put and end on something. Death is only the most commonly thought of solution. It’s not the best, or even the easiest, solution. I promise that some of those people that haven’t helped or listened to you would still be greatly saddened by your departure. Death is admitting failure. It’s quitting. Maybe that’s ok with you. But, just for a moment, imagine what you could find if all your dreams came true.

If you let go of those same things that suicide removes you from, you can find the freedom to finally pursue those passions and dreams that were out of your reach while you held on to people and things that didn’t support you. By filling your life with the things that support and forward your goals, you begin to create positivity in your life. Eventually the only people you will have in your life are those that help you chase your dreams. As you reach for your stars, you’ll have the support, happiness, and money that you need to reach even further. Do me a favor when you get there: remember that others are still struggling to find hope. Help them see it. Be their last hope if you must, but help them.

If this offered you some hope, or showed you how to offer hope for someone else, drop me a line and open the conversation. I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Sick ‘n’ Tired

What does sick time look like when you are working for yourself? Well, for starters, it looks different than when you are working for someone else. Down time of any sort is unpaid time. Sick time is usually unplanned and varies in it’s length and intensity. Each person has a different sickness tolerance level before they let themselves be sick for a while. For a large portion of us, it’s a momentum killer. If you have been trying very hard to get something going, finally hit a stride and start to feel optimistic about the future then suddenly come down with an energy draining, motivation sucking, doozey of a cold/flu, it will often kill any forward motion you have created. Even when you come out of it and begin to feel normal again, the motivation is usually gone.

These are the moments that separate truly successful people from those that are simply lucky enough to have a great start. The person who is naturally motivated, has a great support system of friends and family, or just never gets sick doesn’t know the real struggle that a depressed person goes through. We have to remind ourselves of the reasons we had for doing our thing in the first place. That becomes harder each time we have a setback because we have already achieved the initial high that comes from starting something new. When that high is no longer able to sustain us, and we haven’t seen the huge success that we secretly wanted but knew we wouldn’t get, that’s what tests our true resolve. That’s when most of us fall short. We don’t quit because it stopped being fun or some other random accusation we usually get from our “kick in the ass” support group. It’s because we have a very hard time picking ourselves up when we get stopped by something beyond our control. It seems like nobody cares anyway so what’s the point. This is the point when we need the most encouragement and usually get it least often.

My Experience

It’s been two weeks since my last post. I wanted to make this a bi-weekly thing, but a fever got in the way of that. At least that is the reason for missing the first post. I had written some of my next post before the one week mark, but I let my cold be the excuse for a second time and forgave myself for missing two in a row. By the time is came to missing the third scheduled time, I had to start admitting to myself that I was letting my goals slip through my selfish, procrastinating fingers. I had rethought about the purpose of my blog and decided on a couple evolutionary changes, but thought and planning are pointless without actually writing anything. The difference this time is two-fold. First, what I’m writing about is something others want to know and I have the experience to share it. And second, it’s something I can write in a day or two and publish to my blog, then I’m done with that piece. It isn’t like my novel that will be years in the making before I can even see the end of the project. I can go from concept to published post in a matter of days, usually a week or two from start to finish. My need for immediate gratification is satisfied.

This blog satisfies my need for instant satisfaction because my goal with it is just to contribute consistently. Of course, I have further goals of eventually supporting myself with my writing, but that is still something I’m working out the details for. The goal here is only to be consistently posting. Essentially, I want to make a habit of writing that no other formula I’ve used has done yet.

It comes down to goal setting. At first my goal with my writing was to write something that the world really wanted to consume in such volumes that it would rocket me to stardom and make me enough money that I would never have to worry about it again. It would support my family, put my kids through college and pay for my retirement while still leaving enough behind that it could do those same things for my kids too. Nothing too greedy. Eventually, reality set in. First, I didn’t actually write that much very often. It’s hard to take the world by storm when the story they really want to read is still in my head. I talked about writing far more than I actually wrote. Then, I had to admit that my writing kind of sucked. While I had moments of pure brilliance, by the time they got from my head to the blank page, they seemed more like slightly better fertilizer than the crap around it. That really killed my motivation pretty hard. It was a few years before I could even find the courage to put my fingers on the keyboard again. Eventually I started hearing that I should break my goals into smaller goals. Then I had to translate that into something other than breaking my novel up into chapters and scenes. I’d already tried that and it didn’t give me enough to keep me going. I struck on the idea of short stories. That helped. I wrote a few and even finished three. But then life got in the way again. Other things needed my time, my wife and I fought about what I did locked up in my little writing closet, and I got sick. In the end, I just couldn’t find the point any more.

When my wife left, I decided to try again, this time as a copy writer doing marketing writing for clients. Again, the goal was to use my writing to earn a living. Although I found many clients that seemed to want to pay me for what I wrote, they all ultimately fell through. By that point, I had joined a writers’ group because I really wanted to find a way to make this into a career. After a bout of depression last fall that nearly killed me for the third time, I iterated again and decided to write more of these articles I’d written over the past few months. This turned out to be a good thing because I could do one in a short time and go on to the next one without having to go back again to the old ones.

I’m back to writing again after two weeks of not posting anything, so this just might be the thing I needed to give me the motivation to restart after stalling. Hopefully, I have made my goals small enough that I can feel like I’m reaching them and keep going. Maybe this is the thing that will get me writing on a regular basis.

If This is You

If you have gotten sick and are having a hard time rebooting and getting back into it, this might be a good time to revisit the reason you are writing in the first place.

Is it the money? Are you making enough to keep going? If not why? Most writers find that money is not motivating enough to keep going. It isn’t usually much, if any, for most of us. If you want to write for money, you need to learn what will actually earn money. Most of what you see online to make a living as a writer is other writers trying to sell you their own success plan. While that may work for you, its far more likely that you will simply end up paying their bills but making nearly nothing yourself. The simple truth is that you need to just write, and write a lot, then write some more, and eventully, you will learn what sells and maybe start to earn a living. It’s a long and dedicated process, but a few have made some money this way.

Is it for recognition? Are friends and family enough? Do they even notice? The writer’s I know don’t get a lot of recognition from their friends and families. A few of them get some from their social media networks, but that’s usually because they’ve put a significant amount of time and energy into cultivating their social media for that purpose. You can get recognition as a writer, but you have to put the effort into finding the people that want to read what you write.

Is it to get a message out there? Do you have an audience? Do you know what they want to hear/learn? The hardest part about this purpose is remembering that your content isn’t for you own entertainment or enlightenment. If you have a message you want to get out there, you need to be sure you find the audience that wants to hear that message and that they haven’t already heard it too many times to care. For example: if you are going to write about climate change, make sure you find an audience that agrees it needs to change and that they haven’t already heard enough to desensitize them to the message. If you are going to write about mental health, find an audience that wants the information you are writing about. Then give them information that is helpful to them.

Is it simply because you have an inner need to write that no amount of TV, Netflix, Facebook, reading, or music will ever satisfy? This is usually the easiest one to restart after a bout of sickness. It almost reboots itself as soon as you can sit up long enough to get the words down. These are the natural writers out there. You don’t have to try, you just write. You aren’t trying to please anyone or get anything from your writing. Your writing is an end of its own. The blank page is where you are most at home. Welcome to it and enjoy the ride.

For each of these reasons and others I neglected to list here, you need to remind yourself why you are writing in the first place. If the reason you have isn’t enough to get you back to the keyboard after a setback, then maybe you need to do a little more soul searching and see if “being a writer” is still in there, or if you just put it in there as a way to reach another goal. Either way, the soul searching should help you find what you are really doing here. If you want to keep the motivation going, you need to find something close to your heart that will kick you back into gear once you get back to your ‘normal’ life.

If This is Someone You Know

You have just nursed your spouse back from the dead and they are driving you mad with all the ideas that keep spilling out of their mouth that used to go onto the blank page. This can be a difficult position for you if you, like most spouses, have been trying to keep the household from falling to pieces as your significant other has taken themselves out of the world to make an attempt at the zombie life style for a while. You may have run out of patience days ago. You probably have issues coming up that is their area of specialty. You just don’t have the energy for their neediness anymore. They’re perfectly fine and you need them to just get their shit together and participate for once. But you know from past experience that if you said anything close to that, it would destroy their fragile ego and cause more pain, fighting and dissention than you can deal with right now.

So, what do you do? You pull out the loving kindness they fell in love with and you gently encourage them to get back to the passion that lets them express their inner self in ways that won’t tax your already short temper. You patiently listen to their dreams and quietly assure their insecurities. You stroke their ego just a little. You bake them some reward cookies; they get one for each chapter/article/short story they finish. You help them reconnect with the other writers that have been asking after their health. You remind them why they wanted to write in the first place. Essentially, you become the super support system that so many writers lack. For so many of us writers, our spouses are the real reason we have felt safe enough to pursue this insane passion in the first place. We count on your grounded reality to keep us from floating away on our dreams.

What is Means

Every writer has different ways of dealing with sickness. The secret to getting back to writing when you are better is to know why you write and caring enough about that thing that you will reboot yourself even when you don’t have the normal motivations that go with starting something new. When you find yourself stopped because of a cold/flu, the proof of your passion is what you do with it once you can function enough to put words in writing again. If you find yourself stalled and can’t restart, it’s time to dig deeper and find what you’re really made of. Is “writer” deep inside you somewhere or just a cool idea that you had when you were drunk one afternoon. If you really want to be a writer, this is the point you prove it. Not to your mom or dad, not to your wife, not to your boss, but to you, the one who won’t be convinced by delusions of grandeur. Nobody will be hurt if you aren’t a writer except your inner writer. If this is what you are, dig it up and get to it. Find a reason, find a way.

If this or any other article in my blog has hit a cord with you, write me and open the discussion. I’d love to hear from you.

Why I Write

Because I have words that don’t belong to me. Some people write because they have an uncontrollable need to. Others need to sort out their thoughts. Still more have experience that others want to take advantage of. I have words I have been loaned to me that are meant for someone else. Every writer has a motivation that is their own, and most of us also have external factors that represent some priority to us. But at the heart of every writer is a purpose bigger than the culmination of us, our paper/computer, and our words. The process of writing takes all those things and creates magic. If a writer takes the time to put words on a page, its because they have something to say that needs literary expression.

I used to spend a large amount of time and energy trying to convince people that I had all the answers, that if they would simply pay attention to what I say they would have happier, more productive lives. Sounds unique, right? Yeah, right. That’s what every arrogant person with an inflated view of their own intelligence in the history of arrogance has done all through history. Then one day I realized that all of the wisdom that has survived the ages and has had an influence on our world was written down, not told to whoever could be strapped to a chair across from the wisdom provider. Once I began writing stuff down, I found I no longer had the need to verbally spew my ‘wisdom’ at everyone I met. After one of my gems got on the page, that particular piece of insight no longer wanted to attack unsuspecting bystanders. And the side effect? It’s all there for anyone that actually wants to hear (or read) my ultimate wisdom, forever-ish.

Another format my writing used to take was the stories I would share in social situations where I felt someone else was getting social recognition or coolness factor when they shared their experiences. I would often have a story that I thought related to theirs, but of course, I would add a few interesting details to make my story just a little more impressive than theirs. Sometimes, my truth would be better than their stories. For some reason, though, I never put as much passion or emphasis on my true experiences. They just didn’t seem as cool. Again, as with advice, once I started telling stories on paper, my need to impress others with my creativity in person lessened. I still use my creativity on people, but now its usually in the form of bad dad jokes.

I don’t write to make people listen to me, or to impress people by my creative genius anymore. I tried that for 15 years and kept failing over and over again. I couldn’t even convince myself of my own brilliance; it’s no wonder why people weren’t falling over each other to hear my words of wisdom, or getting in fist fights to hear my story telling. Now, I write about my real experiences. I include the good, the bad, and the ugly. And I try to finish my blog posts with the lessons I learned and how those lessons might help someone else. With the fiction I write, I try to tell stories that have a point of view that isn’t common or isn’t well understood. I’d rather tell the story of the evil wizard or the terrorizing dragon than the night in shining armor.

My blog posts, as you might get if you’ve read my front page, are about reasons and ways to love all the different people in your life. Although I have no training or education in this field, I’ve discovered a huge gap in the self-help/self-improvement market when it comes to men that didn’t start with any advantages. I have seen and read hundreds of articles for, by, and about all kinds of women’s issues. That makes me super happy because women have historically gotten a raw deal for generations, and in many places on the planet, they still are. But when it comes to men, the only stories I hear are “from rags to riches”, or far more commonly “from riches to rags to riches”. The problem I have with almost all of those stories is that almost exclusively those guys had some type of advantage over the rest of us: they either had an education (even if they never used it, they still got to go to college/university), they had a drive/determination that isn’t common among most of us, or they had a support group that kept them going when they wanted to quit. I haven’t heard any advice for guys that start with nothing, don’t believe they can do anything, and don’t have anyone that believes in them. So, I have felt for years that guys like me, and I’ve know a large number of others like me, are basically screwed. I’ve been going to counselling for 5 years and they haven’t done anything to help me in any of those areas. In fact, one of my councillors told my wife that she would probably be better off leaving so she did. I’ve been in 12-step programs and was told “trust in ‘God’s’ plan”. I went to priests and pastors of various denominations, all of whom told me the same thing as the 12-step people: it’s not in my control. I went to shrinks who all told me that my head was probably screwed up (they didn’t actually know for sure) so they gave me drugs. Some professionals I went to gave the same advice they give their female clients: work on yourself, let go of the pain and find some reason to believe in yourself.” All I heard in that advice was “your connections to the world are hurting you, go be by yourself and learn to love yourself” In the end, none of them did a dam thing. Everything I heard required me to have some feature or skill I didn’t have and couldn’t learn the way they were teaching it to me. When I started writing down my thoughts in a blog for others to read, that’s when I started understanding what I was missing. I needed someone to believe in me in a way I was incapable of doing. Much like an editor will see my writing from an outside viewpoint and be able point out mistakes I might not catch, a friend can see good qualities in me that I disqualify or completely ignore.

So why do I write? Because I can share my wisdom and creativity with people that want to hear it. And because, by sharing my experiences, other people might learn what it’s actually like to build yourself up from nothing by learning to love those around you. Looking at the positivity around you really will make you a positive person. Take everything negative you see or experience and, once you process the negative feelings, learn to see the silver lining, even if the silver lining surrounds the darkest and worst things you have ever felt. Learn to accept, process, and let go of the negative feelings, then find, grasp for, and hold on to the positive ones, especially in other people. The expression “turn the other cheek” doesn’t mean turn and walk away it’s more like “turn and offer them the other cheek as well.” If you can learn to let the negative feelings have their place, you can then learn to give some space to the job of loving the unlovable and helping the helpless. This is why I write: so others will see what I have learned about loving others and so that other guys can see what it’s like to build yourself up when you don’t have anything to build from.

If the writing bug has you, or if anything else in this article strikes you, comment, or otherwise drop me a line. I’d love to hear from you.

Am I really a writer?

Its been nearly a year now and I still don’t make any money as a writer. I understood when I started that it would take a lot of work to make it. What I over estimated was how much work I would be able to put into it without any reward. It’s been hard to make it on my own, especially since I’ve lost my primary motivation: my wife. She always managed to say or do just the right thing to keep me going.

I decided last April, while I was still employed with a day job but after my wife left, that I wanted to take my writing more seriously and write professionally. I started by discovering what that means and what options I had. Then I looked online for ads looking for writers. I found and answered one. A few days later I got a positive response. I began the process of gathering info and wrote a couple of sample articles for the client. They liked what I wrote and asked for more. It turned out to be a large contract and they seemed willing to pay my fees. Then nothing. Communication just stopped. I haven’t heard from them since.

I’ve had potential clients contact me since then and I’ve also had people refer some to me, but they all ended up the same. In the end, none of them paid me anything. I did get a contract as a content writer for a month or so which gave me some experience (and cash) in that field, but ultimately, it wasn’t for me.

After that I sunk into a deep depression for a few months and the only reason I stayed alive and had any social contact is because my writers’ club had need of my management/technical skills. I had agreed to head the anthology committee for last year and the deadline for publication was the end of October. A couple of the more prominent club members made efforts to keep me focused. Quite honestly, on those nights when I wanted to just die or fade out of existence, it was my commitment to the club’s anthology that was the swaying factor. In my case, volunteering really did save my life.

The long road back out of that dark place started the evening in December that I read my own story at the book launch our club had at a local business. Standing in front of 25 or so people and reading my first ever published story really made me believe that I could be a writer. So much so that it only took one other person reading (I was the first reader) for me to return to enough of my former confidence to get back up in front of the audience and do the standard speech of thank you’s and accolades to my writing colleagues and the incredible support team that helped me out on that project.

Since then I have continued to write sporadically and search for my place as a writer. It’s still a long hard battle and the only rewards I have gotten so far are praise from the other writers in the writers’ group. (I must acknowledge here that I was employed as a content writer for a month and I have also been helping a friend with his paperwork for pay for over two years, but I wouldn’t have tried either of those without someone else first approaching me with the idea.) I have a website now and another one I’m still working on. I’m closer and closer to having all the tools that I need. The experience I’m gaining is tremendous so I know I’m still early in the game. But I get more confidence everyday as a writer and every week I write more and more. It’s coming, it’s something I think I can do, and it’s something I love. Here’s to doing what I love even if it means I end up living on the streets and eating out of garbage cans. But most of all, here’s to life, love, and all the friends I’ve made along the way.

If you want to talk about this or any other articles I have written, drop me a line and start the conversation.

My Story

This is related to my professional depression series in a couple shared topics, but I’m writing from a more personal point of view this time. It’s been a long time since I’ve written a blog post of any kind and I’ve let my social media slip also. I’d like to blame my professional procrastination for that, but I need to start taking personal responsibility for my successes or lack thereof in all aspects of my life. This has both a dual purpose and a dual benefit. It forces me to address the shared weaknesses in the different things I do. Taking responsibility also prevents me from blaming others or just claiming powerlessness.  Owning my successes requires me to believe that I can succeed regardless of the bad things that happen. And it means that the good things aren’t the result of some random event or the unpredictable generosity of others, but instead they are a result of plans and intentions I have personally had a hand in. 

When my wife left, she took with her far more than my heart. In fact, I don’t often think about feeling lonely without her. I mostly think about how much I miss the things she did to keep my life in order. I miss how she used her strengths to cover my weaknesses and, by doing so, allowed me to reach for the stars in ways I’ve never dream I could. Now I see those same stars and wonder how I ever thought I deserved to aim that high. She made me feel like I could do anything. Now I strain to keep going each day, and most days I lose that fight. It’s not her fault I struggle, she didn’t hurt me in some traumatic way that caused some debilitating condition in me. I had the debilitating condition long before I knew her. I need to own that and do something about it myself; learn to reach for those stars again.

My son told me the other day that he hasn’t shared his plans for his future with me because they don’t include me. He plans to move out when he can and never look back. He wants neither me nor his mom in his future because we are toxic for him and he wants to be rid of our toxicity. While this hurts in some way, I do believe he is right. I have been talking about suicide so much this past year it can’t be good for him. I haven’t followed through with any of my crazy income schemes and he doesn’t want to have to support me once he does get on his own and starts paying his own way. So, my last connection to my family is severed once he manages to move out. That isn’t my decision to make so I don’t get to take ownership of his decisions. This isn’t my stuff.

My shrink doesn’t even know how to categorize my issues. He believes I show some signs of depression but I’m missing some other key symptoms, same with ADHD, dependant personality disorder, anxiety, and a few other conditions we have discussed. He even said that he believed others in my life would likely just call me lazy. He’s right, they have, many of them. Even though he doesn’t know how to classify my problems, he isn’t shy about trying me on yet another “new” drug. Do you have any idea how frustrating it is to go to the professionals and have them tell you they don’t know what to do? Where do I turn now? What am I supposed to do now?

Before you answer that with all kinds of new and wonderful ideas, please understand one thing about me. I have a very limited capacity to “do” anything for myself. Each day I must decide if I should shower, clean up around the house, do a little writing, maybe look for other work, pay a bill or two, interact with my son in some way, or act on some piece of advice I heard or read about. Some days I don’t have the energy to do anything at all. Other days I can do one of the things on that list. Maybe once or twice a month I can two or three things off that list. On those days, I feel like I can maybe be normal for a day. But it never lasts. So, before you give me another great idea you’ve used/heard about, please consider what on that list I should give up doing to act on your advice. You might also notice that there is nothing on that list that includes any way to earn a living. I don’t. That is what lays at the heart of my subterranean self esteem. I can’t even manage the struggle of daily life let alone spend energy I don’t have to find a way to earn a living. The once or twice I have felt financially adequate since she left, I have had a lot more productive days and have been far more likely to accomplish my own goals. So, that’s another thing I need to take possession of and deal with myself. I need to take those rare productive days and prioritize my needs so that I can address the most urgent ones and the ones that could potentially earn me a living. The rest, unfortunately get ignored the vast majority of the time.

Owning my own story means that I am the reason so many good things have happened in the last 12 months as well. If I went back in time and told 15-year-old me that I would have a bigger social network than some celebrities, younger me would probably guffaw sarcastically and ignore older me. If I added that the kid who was laughed at during his grade 9 prom for showing a girl how to 2-step and swore never to dance again would one day be known for being one of the best dancers for a specific dance style (not 2-step), younger me would probably yell at me for lying. That same kid never finished an essay or book report in school, but now pursues a career as a writer. None of those things happened because I had a supportive “woman behind the man” success story. She didn’t trust me to have any privacy to write. She didn’t think I could ever make a living from it. She wouldn’t let me learn to dance my way because she always wanted to look like the couple that could master all types of dance, but I never got that good at them while she was around. And neither of us had many friends because of trust issues on both sides of the relationship. So, all those are things I have accomplished since she left a year ago. Taking responsibility for my actions means that I can’t pass off credit for those things to random chance or someone else’s generosity. I did those things and only I can do more things to add to that success.

Another bonus to taking ownership of my life myself is that I can decide what direction I go from this point forward. I don’t have to limit my options to those that offer the most security or the best possible payout. I get to pursue the things that spark my interest and passions. I have the freedom to fail and fall as often as I need to without fear of who I will hurt along the way. I can learn the lessons and take the advice I think are most useful to me and leave the rest alone. There is no limit to how low I can go before I can’t get back up again because I am the only dependant I must provide for. If I can find food, I can stay alive. If I can stay alive long enough, I will eventually figure out how to make a living. If I can find a way to look after my financial needs, I will have little to worry about.

The key to my financial security is finding enough energy to follow my dreams. I have several dreams that can earn me a living. I just need to find the energy every day to forward those dreams. They are my dreams and only I can pursue them with success. I must own them and chase them. Here’s to the chase.

Taking ownership of my own stuff has had one side benefit I would have never predicted. I couldn’t figure why I had a large pool of energy for some things and a tiny pool of energy for other things. It seems, after looking back at this past year, that I have two separate pools of energy. One is for doing things for others with little personal benefit. The other is for doing things for personal benefit with little benefit for others. I seem to have a tiny pool of energy to do things for myself, but a much larger pool to do things for others. Maybe there is a way to use that to provide for my financial needs. I mean if I do things to help others in a tangible and trackable way, there might be a way to get compensated for that. Since that seems to be my bigger pool of energy, maybe I can draw on that.

Depression, for me, is just as personal as it is professional. Please message me to start a conversation about this or anything you need to talk about. I’ll do my best to listen. Thanx.

 

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Connection

Tim Horton’s is my favorite place to write. I get just enough ‘people watching to feel connected, yet the people I see don’t want to directly interact (most of the time). I find it very hard to write in complete solitude. It’s much easier for me to write if I feel like I’m writing for someone other than just me. So this, like so much of my writing, is for you dear reader. My connection this time is a fellow writer from my writers’ group. He has graciously agreed to let me share his writing time. Although this isn’t the first time him and I have done so, this is probably the most productive one yet. We have sat in near silence for 10 minutes now without feeling like something should be said.

Enough avoiding the question. Its been three months since I wrote the last one of these. I’m even having a really tough time writing this one. That first paragraph went quickly, but these last couple sentences took three times longer to write just because I’m distracting myself (and my writing partner). What is it stopping me from writing? I don’t have a definite answer, but I can invent all kinds of things that are wrong with me that could explain it. I know, however, that those excuses are just more ways to tear myself down and justify my self loathing.

I’ve discovered recently that I don’t need “a good kick in the ass” like most people offer as the best solution. For me, that usually ends up with me feeling even more worthless and disconnected. What I need is someone that truly believes in me and positively encourages me along the way. I’ve been told “I’m not going to babysit you” or “you’re not a child anymore” or “you just need to do it” and other things of similar themes. What all those points of view neglect is that many people (maybe most people?) aren’t motivated by ‘self driven determination’ or ‘thrive under pressure’. Many of us need the encouragement that comes from positive, short term motivation. Some of us even need it on a pretty constant basis. Hence, I sit in Timmy’s feeling connected. That way I get more writing done.

It occurs to me that this might need more explanation. My depression is based on my feelings of worthlessness. That means there is no point to writing for myself. I’m simply not worth it. (remember this is how I feel in my heart. I know in my brain it isn’t true) What this means is that I need to feel like I’m writing for someone else, like someone needs to read what I have to say. So I sit here in a coffee shop because it makes me feel connected to the world around me and lets me believe that someone out there needs to hear my story. Sure, there are more distractions here than at home, but there is also more motivation to write. If, like now, I’m lucky enough to have someone to sit with as I write, then I’m in the perfect mindset to be most productive. I feel the strongest connection and have the strongest reason to write. I feel like someone wants what I have.

This is the reason I have the best success in jobs where I’m a part of a team that works together as opposed to teams where each member works alone toward a common goal. If I’m working hand in hand with one or more co-workers, I’m far more likely to shine. I usually even end up leading these teams because my strongest skills are highlighted. The teams where each member has different tasks to complete in order to contribute to the goals of the team are situations where I am less likely to succeed because I am still working alone and self discipline is more important for success. In those scenarios I have a hard time staying on task and I’m far more likely to let my team down. My depression is based mostly on my professional failures. As a writer, if I don’t write I’m not much of a writer. Academically, I understand that my depression affects my success as a writer, and my success as a writer affects my depression. So I know it’s a vicious circle. The only way I can think of to break the cycle is to find enough connection to motivate myself to write.

Although writing is essentially a solo venture, I have a story to tell that won’t stay inside much longer. But in order to get that story out, I need to find a way to write it. So here I sit, in Tim Horton’s, trying to hold onto my connection to the world around me, and fighting to get a few words on the page. To those out there who also evaluate yourself on your career success, I hope you find my words helpful. Drop me a message and we can discuss this at more detail.

Attention Deficit Disorder – Complications vs Uniqueness

Attention Deficit Disorder in adults is a real thing. Know why I know this? Because my Psych told me the other day that I have it and gave me a good book to read on the subject of ADD: Driven to Distraction by Edward M. Hallowell and John J. Ratey. It deals with ADD in a broad scope so some of the things in it don’t apply to me. They talk about kids with ADD for example, and both adults and children with ADHD, both of these don’t apply to me. I didn’t have ADHD as a kid either according to their description of it. But the stuff about adults with ADD nails it right on the head for me. I fit about 92% of the profile for an adult with ADD (the 92% is an estimation but I don’t like round numbers so that’s what you get, it’s an ADD thing). Here are my personal observations on the subject only slightly influenced by the things I read in the book I just mentioned.

ADD & Depression

Depression is one of the most common side effects of ADD in adults. It turns out that people who are constantly misunderstood, misdiagnosed, and mistreated by all the peers and authority figures in their lives are more likely to suffer from depression. Go figure, hey? Apparently most people have a driving need to be accepted by their fellow man (or woman as the case may be). It wouldn’t surprise me to hear that depression is more often a side effect of some other mental disorder than a stand alone condition.

On the flip side, adults with ADD are some of the most resilient people you will ever meet. If we have fought this losing battle long enough to finally feel understood for the first time, we will stop at nothing to reach for the stars. There is a large list of famous people with ADD who’ve done just that. Richard Branson, and Jim Carey are just a couple of big name examples of what we can accomplish if we learn to use our unusual thought patterns to our advantage.

Intermission

OK, I admit there was a two-hour gap between the last three sentences as I researched “famous people that have ADD”. But on the plus side, other than actually finding famous people that share my brilliance, I also discovered that I share a middle name with both Jim Carey and Buzz Aldrin and that’s pretty cool. Wow, tangent. I’m going to leave that in here because this is, after all, an article about ADD.

ADD & Memory

Another common side effect of people with ADD is memory loss. We tend to forget important appointments, grocery lists, and especially “what did I come downstairs for?” The theory, as it was explained to me, goes something like this: memory loss itself probably has nothing to do with ADD. As a matter of fact, if you ask any spouse of someone with ADD, we have an amazing capacity to remember details that baffle most people but I can’t remember to zip up my fly most days. The problem comes in when everything that is input to our brain first has to get filtered through our ADD screening process. And that looks a little like this: information enters my brain, ADD filter looks at the input and measures its importance based on its relevance to whatever random thought is occupying the computing parts of my brain at that exact second, input gets stored in memory based on that rating and linked to that reference.

Here is an example: input is: I discover that my car is low on gas and I have a long trip to make tomorrow afternoon, I decide that I should fill the car with gas on the way home from my appointment today in preparation. ADD screens that information and rates against the details of the appointment I’m about to go into and decides that, in relation to my appointment, my car running low on gas will have little to no impact, so my ADD relegates the car needing gas to a low priority memory slot. Needless to say, although I remember no less than six times before leaving for that trip, I didn’t remember on the way home and it didn’t occur to me when it was convenient to go get gas. So I leave on my trip and remember I need gas exactly halfway between two gas stations when the gas light comes on in my dash board. At this point its down to luck as to whether that distance is small enough that I can make it to a gas station.

I have run out of gas as an in-town delivery driver because my ADD brain didn’t give enough priority to my needing to gas up my car. It was really hard to explain to my boss why I ran out of gas waiting for the next call in the parking lot of a liquor store across the street from a gas station. “I forgot to get gas” just sounds a little lame at that point, but I did exactly that once and had to wait an hour for roadside assistance.

Problem solving and learning

We tend to approach things differently than others. Doing things “the way it’s always been done” doesn’t work for us, so we tend to try a lot of other ways to get the same result. And for those of us that weren’t diagnosed with ADD until we were adults, we usually had to try other ways without the blessings of our parents, employers, or spouses. This is what often makes us feel so alone. I risk doing it wrong a hundred ways before I do it right, but it also means that when I get it right, I can teach the right way to others because I have done all the possible wrong ways and even invented a few that nobody else thought about. I’ve gotten used to just trying to figure things out myself because what works for other people doesn’t work for me. It also means that I’ve gotten used to doing something every wrong way before I figure out the right way. Even trying to copy other ADD people doesn’t work very often because our set of “what works” is rarely similar enough to use the same approach. Most of us find that persistence is the key to success and trying any hair-brained idea might just be our next success story.

The Good Stuff

A couple of other quick notes about the up side of ADD. Dr. Hallowell says in his book that people with ADD tend to be smarter and more creative than the average because we’ve had to cultivate those two traits in order to cope with our inability to copy the success plans of others. From my experience with those that I know who have ADD, he is right. Everyone I know with ADD is either self employed or has the freedom to do his or her job any which way they want as long as it doesn’t hurt the company or the clients. As entrepreneurs, we tend to have the ability to wear all the hats required to be successful. Our biggest problem with this concept is that most of us have never learned to trust our own abilities because of how much failure we have had and how unreliable our own brains have been. Those of us who do succeed typically have found a system that keeps our days reasonably predictable while leaving enough room for distractions.

What Should I Do Now?

The secret to living with ADD is two things in a nutshell. Scheduling myself enough to reduce the risks of ‘forgetting’ something. And having someone I can trust to help me understand my limitations and see my opportunities. According to the doctors that wrote the book I mentioned at the start of the article and my own psych, these two things are far more successful in dealing with ADD than drugs have ever been. My short term plan is to work on the scheduling part. The “someone I can trust” is, at the moment, my counsellors and my psychiatrist. I hope to have a life coach or accountability partner that I can talk to everyday who will help me figure out a useful plan for my life and keep me on a growing and learning pattern. I may still need drugs too, but I will need to build a strong routine with someone that can keep encouraging me to stay with it.

I hope you’ve learned something here and I’d love to hear from you about your experiences with ADD and/or depression. Comment or drop me a line and we can share our stories.