Keeping It Real...

CAUTION: The following post may contain triggers for some people, so rather than issue an advisory notice, this is a general caution.

Hey bro's!

I originally made a start on this post only moments ago, but I since scrapped it and decided to take a vastly different approach because I just felt that words were falling onto the page aimlessly.

I must admit that this is certainly liberating for me, writing on a blog like this and you would not believe the amount of problems I've been able to get a new perspective on, simply by writing down my thoughts exactly as they come to me on here...

I hope that you also are getting something from this because I admit, from early on in my life I was never really one to draw attention to myself, being preferably in the background like a cog in the machine than anything more than that. Then God showed up and proved to me that my purpose is for a higher calling and that there was definitely more to life than living one day after another with no hope for anything better.

I want to take a few moments of your time to talk about an issue that's quite close to my heart lately because it's something I spent most of my life working on.

Wearing a Mask Hides Your True Identity

Yes, I know, the idea of masks and all that is akin to superheroes etc. but what I'm looking at is how easy it is for us to create one based on our own experiences and the way people have treated us in the past.

I became a pastmaster at that, thus creating for myself an identity that depended upon: -

• people's acceptance of me; and
• feeling like I was an outcast if I didn't fit in

I remember a few years back on what was then TNA Impact Wrestling (ED - as opposed to just Impact Wrestling now), it was your classic two characters feuding storyline only this time it was the Charismatic Enigma Jeff Hardy battling against the then founder-owner of TNA, Jeff Jarrett. It had come to a point where he was confronted by Karen Jarrett, who prior to this herself, had been involved in a storyline involving her ex-husband, Kurt Angle and his feud with Jarrett.

Jeff (ED - that's Hardy, not Jarrett folks!) around that time had it said about him by Taz, the commentator, that he was "not from this dimension", that he "danced to another drumbeat", only for he himself to add that he was "more than human"...

That is when it finally hit home for me...

I don't have to fit in and neither do any of you amazing people!

It's that old song again...

"I wish that I knew what I know now, when I was younger"

Crikey, if I'd have known I'd be quoting Rod Stewart, I might have better prepared, lol!

But anyways, that's besides the point, because it became a matter of fact that I did that to not only fit in, but it got so bad that eventually the mask splintered, fell away and I drew away from so many people and social occasions.

Why? Because wearing the mask was just too much effort around shallow people that at the time seemed more interested in you not for who you were but what they wanted from you and if you didn't make the grade... SHUM! Outcast!

The problems in behaving like that, meant that I steered clear of the crowds when in school and when out of school, spent most of it at home either having done homework, or on my computer creating distractions from this so-called life. Crucially, I suppose I missed out on plenty of experiences because I would have rather stayed by myself and I see now, having spent years building up the façade, that was not the best way to go about life.

What that had actually done was the opposite, instead of letting them into my life more, it actually created a shielding effect that I used to draw people near push people away and keep them at arms length.

The Mask Slips & Falls

Anyway, the fact that we can often get further in life if we stop pandering to what other people want and start living up to who we are, is fundamentally what finally emerged after many years of striving to fit in and be part of the crowd.

Only I took it too far and in pushing them away, aside from friends, it isolated me from other potential friends because I thought they either would not understand me, or could not relate to what I've gone through.

Isolation.

It's a powerful thing in both controlled and uncontrolled measures because one can leave you with the time and space to breathe and just be yourself and the other can leave you feeling alone, depressed and out on the ledge of a very tall cliff ready to fall into the abyss.

I've spent enough of myself and my time in the latter environment to know the damage it's not only caused but has done to my psyche because I've left it uncontrolled for so long that it in large part has become a part of who I am.

So to be made aware of this throughout my recent and most severe bout of depression that I've faced is relieving because it helps explain why I am who I am today and what effects this could cause going forward.

One thing I'm determined not to do now, is let that be my driving force going forward, because I will not spend my time isolating myself from those who are closest to me and that's my family, my !Audacious family & my friends.

Final Thought

This is clearly a lot I've needed to get off my chest and I'm just glad I can do it before it becomes any more toxic than it already is because bottling it up is all bad and you get like Angry Grandpa, lol, jk!

Do you see why now I've become more and more passionate about people seeking the help they need when they need it and not suffering through it alone? I'm walking the fine line myself and we're only on this planet once over in our lifetimes and beyond that, well, we're along time dead.

I hope you've stuck with this because at the rate these are increasing, I'm going to have to start turning to v-logs to get my point across!

But then, if I wasn't a dedicated blogger and have been now for over 220 posts, then I would have stopped a long time ago.

Everyone has something to say, you've just got to stop and listen every once in a while!

Peace off!