Doesn’t Remind Me

doesnt-remind-me-of-anything-i-forgive-you

I feel as though I’m at an Apex in my life…. and I’m either going to grab the road with tires hot and sticky from my trials of living life in the fast lane and slide through this elbow in the track in expert fashion… or the ass-end is going to get too squirrely and I’m going to spin out into the wall at a ridiculously high speed.

For those of you who don’t speak the “race car driver lingo”, let me put it to you like this…

I’ve been living life at a very high speed… and “the brightest flame burns quickest”. Lately, I’ve been growing closer to some huge massive change in my life. Is it a career change? or is it a big move to a new place? is it a new love interest in my life?

I’m really… really… REALLY not sure.

Yet… I should be.

There are little reminders all over of my mistakes from the past, as well as my triumphs. Funny though… how a triumph one day, can seem like the most substantial loss you ever felt a few years later. “Sometimes when you win, you really lose.”

I’ve been feeling this… desperation…

This… sense of urgency… to make a move….

Yet I sit stagnant and still. I wish to assess all possibilities and circumstances, I wish to predict every outcome… yet no matter how good (or bad) I am at forecasting, there is just no way of knowing until I actually ACT.

I have not been doing much “acting” lately. That doesn’t mean I’m falling apart, it means that I’m not changing as fast as the world around me.

Today I had an amazing conversation with someone very special to me… someone who at one time I used to despise and hate… not because of who they are, but because of who I was… who we were together…

Have you ever found yourself angry at someone because of something petty or trite? Have you ever felt afraid to get close to someone because you felt “a little TOO close” to them? Have you ever gotten that sensation that you are on a roller coaster without a seat belt and you just have to have faith… and one HELL of a GRIP… to live through it? If you have answered NO to all of the above… then I truly pity you… because as awful, terrible, and painful as it may be…

There is no replacement for LOVE.

I’ve let my heart go before. I’ve given myself unconditionally to a woman that I would die to protect and live my life to serve…

I’ve been in Love… it’s true… more than once… more than twice even…

So what does that say about ME? That I give my heart away to be mangled and trampled upon by women that eat me alive and pummel my fragile heart?

Not exactly…

If I’m able to “let go” of this resistance that keeps me from being TRULY “with” another lover…. then I have conquered my own fears and doubts of trust and commitment.

How is it that I spent most of my childhood and adolescence a lovesick puppy without a clue of the capabilities of women and the extent of their trespasses, yet I longed to find a connection… and comfort…. a level of understanding… Only to grow up, flirting with 30 years old and feeling like I have to graduate back to a level I’ve already experienced before?

I’m really not sure what changes are in store… but I know they are big… HUGE even…

I can tell, because rather than be angry, spiteful and just generally negative about my past relationships… rather than be angry about the cards I’ve been dealt in life…

I forgive them all.

Every trespass against me, every wrongful or hurtful thing… every possible bad thing that has been done to me by those who I love….

I forgive them.

Have I had a “spiritual awakening” or something? I sound a lot like Jesus all the sudden…. right? No… not exactly…

I’ve BEEN a spiritual person pretty much all my life. Maybe it was because of the way my mom and dad spoke of “God” and “a higher power”, or the fact that I spent a lot of time in Southern Baptist and “New Age” Christian Churches growing up… maybe it was all the AA and NA meeting I went to with mom and dad, and on my own. Or maybe… I have TRUST in my SELF to make the right decisions… Any way you want to look at it, I believe in something not just greater than me… but greater than us all.

And I feel that something…. calling on me.

As if beckoning me to stop resisting it… and just let it be…

It’s probably old and tired for anyone left that’s been reading my blogs for the past 5+ years now… but I have a way of taking hindsight, and turning it into foresight.

Such is to be true once again, when I say that having a conversation with the girl I’d shared the most significant amount time of my life with… through horrible tragedies and profound successes… She reminded me of how much she means to me. It’s true, shes in love with someone else, and she’s very happy about it… but you know what? I’m happy for her. I’m happy for the women who found the contentment they needed outside of me.

I really, really am.

I never realized how much I would let my ego consume me and compare myself to these other men… not until I was broken down… and I forced myself to look at what was left after my ego had been shattered into tiny pieces.

I’m not good enough for some women… and I never will be.

I’m not too good for anyone, and never will be.

My ego had ruled most of my life up until about 2006 or so. I finally looked at what REALLY matters… and it’s not whether I’m “better than” this or that guy, if I’m taller, more in shape, smarter, wealthier, better hung, or a better lover… not a single one of those actually MATTER when LOVE is present.

Do you know what it feels like for someone with a massive ego to be dumped for a guy who looks like a model with a nice car and a fat wallet?

I do.

How about what it feels like to be left for a guy who is shorter, out of shape, and broke?

I do.

So… if either outcomes are possible… then… whats the point of feeling animosity towards someone you have never even met?

I tell you… ego is your enemy. Yea, you might be able to get attention and interact with shallow people if you have qualities your ego thrives on… yet these same qualities egos thrive on have NOTHING to do with character.

No matter how fast you are, or rich, or healthy, or any of that… no matter the level you are at, there is someone bigger, better, faster, stronger, etc. It really does NOT matter even if you ARE the very very best either… because there is someone else better at some THING else in which you suck at.

Doesn’t that fact LIBERATE you?

Does it not make you realize that we all not only have a chance at being great, but we ARE great in some way already? To my detriment, I have lived with an egocentric mindset for the majority of my life.

I… just… didn’t know any other way….

I’m from a small town in the “Midwest”, what the hell do I know about “enlightenment” and Egotism?

I just want to have the faster car, more money and a bigger penis!

That’s what life is about! Being the best! right?…

Then why is it so empty when you get to the top?

There is something else… life has so much more to offer than petty conquests of the ego…

“Life is not about what’s ‘Better Than’.” – John Butler

As part of the programming society seems to impose on the masses, having the best looking girl and a nice coat of wax on your sports car while wearing your fancy threads and flashing cash around on a Friday night resembles “success” or a “high value male”.

How much value does this man have when he is getting blow jobs from the hookers and snorting an 8-ball of coke from their ass-crack? All that money, all that potential, all that going for him… and then he winds up being judged as a douchebag.

What a waste, right? Ha… not if that is what makes the guy happy. Who cares what we think about him? He’s living his life the way he wants and he’s enjoying it… right?

Ehhh…. maybe for someone else…
But that’s not really my ideal version of happiness.

Call me old fashioned… but I’d rather have a girl that I could still have a crazy good time with, and yet trust her enough to bare and raise my children (Eventually… Maybe?).

I like examples… so here’s the best one I’ve got.

It was probably about 11 years ago now, my girlfriend at the time, and another couple went out to Red River Gorge in Kentucky for a spontaneous camping trip. It was a crazy wild time, but what made it “awkward” was the girl I was with got out of the car, and immediately noticed my friend bending over. My girls reaction was “Nice Ass!”. Now… I know that’s kind of petty and all… but I had suspicions of her cheating on me for… a while. I had even taken it so far as to break up with her multiple times because I didn’t feel like I could trust her.

I was furious that she would say such a thing in front of me and the girl he was with too! It would have been different if we all had a playful attitude like that.. but… it really wasn’t all the playful. In fact… she sounded extremely convicted in her thoughts of his “nice ass”. It was a combination of things really… the tone of her voice, the company we were in, and the lack of trust I had for her. I was constantly trying to justify staying with her as she would BEG and PLEAD with me, SWEARING that she would never lie to me (again) or cheat on me. I was the only one for her, Blah blah blah….

I did eventually get over it… because despite my feelings of “sour love”, I still managed to have a good time.

It wasn’t until about a year or so later that I found out she WAS cheating on me… with many of my friends… and most of her “friends” too… Once I got to learning about 8 other guys other than me that she had been sleeping with while we were together… I just didn’t care to know about anymore.

Fast-forward…. it’s 2000, and me and my new girl have been together for about 2 years now… we are having fun at a Korn concert, we are standing in our floor seats, and this guy walked by and said hi, and my girlfriend says “Nice Shirt”. It was a band shirt, I can’t even remember the name of the band… but hearing her say that… man… it triggered some serious bullshit. I was FURIOUS! INSTANTLY! why? because she was flirting with him right in from of me like that!!!! What the hell!!!! shes so wrong for doing that! RAAAAAWRRR!!!

Again… fast-forward to 2006, I’m hanging out with my NEW girlfriend, and her room mates had some guys over, one of them had a punk band shirt on, can’t remember who, and my girlfriend at the time says…. “Nice shirt!” and I FLIP THE FUCK OUT like I had done years before. We ended up getting into a huge fight, and I left pissed off and angry.

Now… in the moments, I was angry at all 3 of these girls, because they all gave out random compliments to other guys, which apparently threatened the fidelity of our relationship… because they were wearing such awesome clothes.

Hrm..

Wow…

When you look at it like that… its rather ridiculous.

This example was of me harboring this GARBAGE, this negative energy over something so petty and trite… and then… taking it out on the WRONG women in my life.

The fact that I was an asshole at times doesn’t mean I was always that way, nor was I the only reason for any incompatibilities… but nonetheless, this is one of my many contributing factors…

So why did I feel moved to share this? Because… I still believe in love… and I’m not the only one.

The “Nice Shirt” comments reminded me of something horrible and rotten that happened to me in my past, and I took my pensive aggression out on those very undeserving of it… and for that, I am profoundly apologetic…

Now what I seek… is for something NEW. Something… fresh.

Something that… “Doesn’t Remind Me of Anything” – Chris Cornell

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