The Pit of Despair

The darkness is closing in, becoming one with my being, my soul. My existence is inconsequential and irrelevant. Who would miss me?

These are the thoughts I had in the darkest period of my life. Unfortunately, that period was also supposed to be the “best” period of my life: college. As painful as that period was, as excruciating, lonely, desperate, and depressing as it was, I am glad that I experienced it.

It gave me an excellent opportunity to grow, to examine and learn about myself. To learn things about myself that I might never have known.

The main thing I learned is to never fear failure. My fear of failure compounded itself and went from fear of one thing to another: fear of failing my teachers, failing my friends, failing my family, and lastly failing myself. Failing equalled disappointing in my mind. And so, instead of ever trying, I didn’t bother reaching out or taking risks to achieve what I wanted or achieve my potential in many ways. It got weird sometimes. I feared the humiliation of being late for class, so if I thought I’d be late, I wouldn’t show up. Crazy, I know.

I also learned that faith is a powerful thing. I always trusted in God, no matter how many times I wanted to end it or run away or disappear. If not for my faith, I would not exist today, enjoying a life that is full of joy and happiness and laughter and companionship. I would not have the experience of sharing my life with my parents and brother and sister-in-law and my three beautiful nieces; and my wonderful girlfriend and her two beautiful children that call me “da-da” and “daddy john.”

My faith was rewarded and I learned not only about myself, but about God. God doesn’t give up on us either. He leads us through as long as we trust in Him. He brings us to where He wants us to be, even though we may not even know He’s moving us at all.

My true and closest friends also revealed themselves in my time of darkness. They were the ones who sought me out if they hadn’t heard from me in a while. They helped me recover. They held me accountable. They never gave up on me. For that, I am eternally grateful.

I’d like, someday, to help those who may be where I’ve been.

Acts of Kindness

An act of kindness is never wasted, neither the energy expended nor the time taken.

I believe acts of kindness are like seeds. When one is received, it stays with the person and grows. Sometimes at different speeds, sometimes it may take years, but it will produce something that benefits the recipient. Something as simple as a smile or a polite “Thank You” seems to go a long way in this day and age.

I can remember plenty of times, particularly when interacting with people in service industries, that a smile and a “thank you” brightened their day and made them smile as well. And, in many cases, it was a very visible, authentic change. From a sullen, listless manner to a bright face with a bit of a twinkle in their eye. Those just make my day.

I think it also goes a long way in a community or a society. In the movie “Pay it Forward,” the main premise is that if someone does an act of kindness for you, you repay their act by doing something for someone else, and the chain goes on and on. Of course, the movie, as a matter of definition, uses dramatic, rather large acts of kindness, but I believe that the same applies for smaller acts of kindness.

If I make one person’s day a bit better, there’s a good chance that person will be kinder to others after our meeting. And so the chain begins.

No matter how small, acts of kindness will ripple far and wide from wherever you drop your pebble in the pond.

Happiness

Each of us is responsible for our own happiness or unhappiness. This I truly believe.

Responsibility these days is hard to find. Especially people taking responsibility. Whether it’s a famous person admitting a violation of either law, rules of their sport/profession, or a private individual taking responsibility for their actions against others in their lives, far too often, those in question tend to shift the blame and responsibility to others.

Maybe it’s a product of the last 30 years of psychological evaluation and therapy, particularly in American society, but the cry of “it’s my parent’s fault” or “it’s my significant other’s fault” or whomever is the chosen blame target is becoming not only a tiresome cliche but creating a weaker mindset in the people who make such statements.

I think that it’s important to realize that we are responsible for our own happiness or unhappiness because we all personally make choices that ripple through our lives. Sometimes responsibility is making those choices and knowing that you’ll have to accept the consequences and other times, particularly in the case of unhappiness, it is making a choice about how to react/respond/deal with choices out of your control. That is a lesson I had to learn myself.

My personal mantra for taking responsibility for my own happiness and unhappiness is the Serenity Prayer:

God, grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change;
courage to change the things I can;
and wisdom to know the difference.

Living one day at a time;
Enjoying one moment at a time;
Accepting hardships as the pathway to peace;
Taking, as He did, this sinful world
as it is, not as I would have it;
Trusting that He will make all things right;
if I surrender to His Will;
That I may be reasonably happy in this life
and supremely happy with Him
Forever in the next.

Amen.

-Reinhold Niebuhr

Though this is a Christian prayer, it contains the truth of responsibility for your happiness and trusting that God, nature, the universe, whatever, will take care of the rest, because it is truly beyond our power. At this moment, anyway.

Movies

reprinted from my other blog, from June 26th, 2009:

Ok, I know that some people review movies as a job. That’s no problem, and they’re exempt from this rant.

My main issue here is the repeated bashing or disappointment I see in my friends and family when they see a movie they were highly anticipating.

Maybe I’m simple minded, but very rarely have I seen a movie in the theater where I wished I had not spent the money on the ticket. I have seen a couple of movies on DVD that had the same effect, but, hey, I’m not quibbling about pennies or nickels of my Netflix subscription.

I’m not sure if the problem is the viewer or the studio hype. Granted, studios go all out in hyping their movies, and sadly, sometimes they put all the best moments into the trailer. So when you expect more, there is some disappointment.

On the other hand, I keep my expectations low for all movies these days, because, let’s face the truth: if you’re a fan of a particular comic book, tv show, movie franchise being rebooted, novel, or just about anything that you have previous knowledge of before the movie was ever contemplated, you are setting yourself up for disappointment. Rarely, if ever, do movie producers and directors produce what the fans want. They produce what is most financially feasible and what will bring the greatest return on that investment. The director does his best to relate the story from its original format as best he can without offending anyone (except the fanboys/girls, who, honestly, are the minority of the movie viewing population).

I understand the position that some people take about the integrity of the art on which the movies are based (see the changes from GI Joe cartoon to movie) but let’s keep one thing in mind: it’s a movie! It’s entertainment, an escape, a diversion from your mundane (for most of us) existence that takes you away to another time, place, universe, reality, and let’s you forget your troubles.