Awakening

Just aaaaaah. I feel like I've been dead for 33 years until now.

It has been an amazing last month. I know. With all you read and heard about the suffering and malady I was going through I'm sure that other things are to be expected. But the truth is that in this time I made a choice I've never made before. Chose the about face and decided instead of burying myself away I would learn to embrace life and chase its experience at every instance I can. And the results...well...I think amazing is the only word to describe it.

Embracing has meant a lot of things. It means not covering myself head to toe in minutiae of distraction. Women can be that for me. Media is another. Two weeks ago I was left with little choice but to push those things out when all connection was lost to them whether I wanted it to be or not. It was in this quiet place that the real storm inside was revealed. An utter downpour of all the hardship and hurts I've faced for nearly my entirely life that just laid there undealt with and festering like a gangrenous wound. But when my soul seemed to scream the loudest that is where I broke. Broke the hold I had on my life and grasped just being. It is in this being...this sense of presence that I've learned happiness is fleeting but I can choose to be content. Content in life is so much more satisfying.

In my contentedness I've become open. Open and free to express, love, take chances, laugh, and so many other things that all you of have seen me do but honestly...everything I've done in life to this point has been for all of you. THIS is all for me. I'm going to be selfish. I'm going to take and maybe not give. Not all the time...not in my nature obviously to not be a good person...but I'm doing life for me now. No relationships. No obsessions with the external distraction. Just a striving and searching inside for all "me" has to offer.

Now I'm finding things I genuinely love. DUBSTEP!!! House music. Trance. The Rave/Dance culture. It just extends from my percussion background and my love of beats and dancing. And I'm dancing. And DJing house parties. Mixing my own music. It is like when I do these things now my soul itself sings because for years I've denied things because of image I uphold, what I want people to believe, and that I was ashamed of certain aspects of my person. Now I've learned that these things are important and of value for a very specific reason. Because it is me and to deny that is to deny what makes me very unique.

Addressing some of you...I'm not returning to church. Not going to lead. EVER. Some of you tell me that that is what you see for me. That with what you saw in the past this is what I'm meant to do. Nope. It isn't. I state again because it seems some of you don't listen: I was acting. I was playing a part. Do I believe most of what I spouted...some of it...very little...but I more often than not was simply just regurgitating things I had already heard. It doesn't mean I don't believe there is a greater power. Simply put I'm spiritual. Always have been. Just can't buy what to me is lies anymore. So many lies.

To be content...not happy. That is always the goal. Happiness is fleeting. And in that mission I'm enjoying people...the energy we share. Other things I have said no too but embracing them in an intelligent and adult way that I don't think I was ready for because of the intense fear and trepidation I constantly put myself under. That means a lot of things so I'll leave out the details. :) Suffice it to say the weight off of my shoulders is huge. When you make the choice to release bonds the walls come down and you find yourself in this space...well...it has to be what life is all about. Just chill...let it be...have the experience because you can. Because I tell you now...all of you...only you hold you back.

Love you all...and I would say I hope you understand but it doesn't matter if you do or not. This is all about me. I'm selfish and that is okay.

J...

To Heather...One Year Almost Gone R.I.P.

We're coming up on a year and well...I need to do this...I still miss her a lot:

Heather...

A lot has happened since you've been gone. Some good. Some bad. But all with the reality that I have to pick up and move on. More than anything I'm completely unsure what that looks like still at this point. I met a great girl and though things didn't work out I'm sure we will be great friends. And I know you would like her. She is a lot like me. She really has been there for me through a lot. I've made a lot of new friends recently actually and each one of them is helping me remember what it is like to live again.

I've been walking a lot again. Makes me think of those nice moonlit nights we used to walk on the beach or the time camping in the bed of your truck. So many times and so many memories. You were always so cold but it didn't bother me. I just pulled you in closer, taking in all of you and that amazing fragrance of you that was never anything you put on. It was just the deep satisfying smell of you...my woman...my baby. I'll take the memory of that green pillow and black bangs flowing over green eyes to the grave with me I'm sure. I miss it.

There are a lot of things I miss. Mostly simple. Mostly little. All seemed so much more when I had 'em. I love that you always made me feel like I belong even when you sometimes didn't understand because our world's were so different. That sometimes Teddy would become the bear but your soft words and soothing hand always brought me right back down. You were one of a handful of people in my life that I felt at home with no matter where I was, and you brought me closest to my feeling of ease all the while beckoning a storm inside. But it is time to move on.

Because I know that is what you would want for me. You loved me like no other when I still struggle living in a world where I think no woman could ever love what I am, but knowing the love that you had for me makes me think that I might just have something to give some lucky woman. And her me too. You give me hope. Help me see I'm not a monster...that I'm soft and lovey and silly and dopey...that it was cute I would make up little songs about you and sing them around the house LOL...and that all these things are good things to be. You made me so little when I struggle so hard to not be my frame but show the world that inside this torrent is something so gentle and real. The last of the true "good guys" you used to say and made "good guys" not seem like such a bad phrase because you knew my goodness would always come back to you.

So I can go on. I can espouse those things I miss about you, or I can do better. I can take your gifts and make them mine because there were so many beyond just you. You gave me vision, made me want to be a better man, and there is no reason that has to stop now. So I would say my gift to you this year is simply this: holding on to the lessons you gave me and the love you shared as a beacon in this dark time. In this knowing that at I'm good enough, worthy, and accepted. I set your smiling face as a light in the gloom and doom. And I set on my heart that you were my baby but now...you are always going to be my angel. I love you Heather...so much that even pulling into this realness makes me ache for you. I hope wherever you are that love knows you too. You were loves gift to me...

J...

Inspired

So today I wake up...

There is still hurt and reality to face but I feel a shifting in dynamics of who I "am" to who I really am. And in that I'm finding freedom, peace, joy, anguish, anger, passion, and so much more. The best thing is I'm finding more and more new people that really are just good people. I've been keeping this all pent up too much. Too afraid that someone else will hurt me. Too scared that it will just be another of the same old song. The truth is that yes...I have a right to grieve...but I do not have the right to be a self-fulfilling prophecy. This has been the reality of my last 3 years and GOD I want to break the cycle. Before this I was heading to such a good place.

But what I've seen in all of this...because I have learned things. I'm pretty fucking awesome. LOL I am. I'm accepted and loved and worth all those things. I don't have all you lovely people in my life and the new ones just joining the ride (Or am I joining their's?) because I'm not worth it. You are all here because you see the truth even if has been hard for me to see behind this veil. I'm ready for whatever I want because the only things holding me back at this point are my fears. Even if I fall flat it doesn't diminish anything about the reality. To live...that is my claim. I haven't lived life since I was doing it mostly on questionable terms. But nothing says I can't grab hold, own it, and taste all this life has to give.

In all of this I'm not lying to myself. I know there is reality that still has to be faced. Loves I've lost along the way. Scars both physical and emotional. I need to work on these things if it is ever my hope that I don't define myself by failed pasts and unrealistically hopeful futures. Things just are. Life is hard. Work is a reality. Illness happens...even major illness. People come and go but we can choose to look at them as chapters in our tale or dwell on some concept of loss. There is a lot and I know I didn't get here and can just change overnight. But accepting that is a big part. I am only the complete sum of what I am moment to moment. The sum of all other time is irrelevant.

Love ya all. I'm feeling a need to move so I need to cut this off. I'll keep you all posted and again...thank you all for your support. Without you all I would not be here. One love all.

J...

To My Friends...If You Are a Real Friend Please Read

Rough day today...

I just want to stay in bed. Have the world leave me alone. Hide away and not face reality. But I have to. As a carbon based lifeform I have a myriad of responsibilities the first of all being meeting with my landlord today to talk finances. Not something I'm ever excited about. And I shouldn't be this way as she has been way awesome, but I'm facing a harsh reality today and not trying to get it to weigh me down: I've failed at being self-sustaining again.

Now at this point I could raise my fists up at the sky screaming, "Why?" I could do that and have a lot. After never getting an answer though I'm thinking its safe to say I'm barking up the wrong tree through that route. I do realize that some of this does come from the path I've blazed in my own life and now...I have to realize that some of this is out of my control. Gah...this is a blog so now complete transparency.

I've told some of you at this point that I've been dealing with bi-polar and OCD for most my life, but have been taking meds and working through the system only for about 5 years now. This to add to my two cancers, massive surgeries, and hep C (that is in remission) is a lot not to add day to day life and everything else in the mix. With bi-polar try adding to all of this and life becomes a guessing game. "Is this a legitimate feeling?" "Am I really in feeling joy or is this just an upswing." Through counseling and medications I've coped pretty well but am now realizing that while my life has not been easy...fact I will say worse than most...my illness has just made this worse. The OCD in my is fairly mild but it is impossible to do life as a bi-polar, perfectionist. The two are diametrically opposed.

I'm trying to get some help on this but know...I know I'm weird right now. I now I'm clinging and needy and all the above. And I know that sometimes I flip at a snap lately and suddenly am pushing you all away. I need this and if you can't handle I understand if you walk away, block me on facebook because your tired of hearing it, or just don't have it in you. I do understand. I hate the way I am. I am working to change it but at 33 I'm just at this point hoping to find means to cope. And not God...no self-help gurus. These are the kinds of paths I know take a lot of work, and despite what some may think I've been working hard to get this under control. I just ask patience. And if I disappear like in the next couple months please understand. This is not my plan for life. I'm just doing the best I can...

j