A Year of Solitude

A year in limbo

MIND DUMP TIME. HAPPY BIRTHDAY 'MERICA

One year ago, I made the best decision of my life by removing myself from an abusive relationship. It took some time to come to terms with the decisions I had made. Ultimately, it is far easier to project your life status on someone else than it is to accept the fact that you have the power to make every choice in front of you.

There is no hole so deep that can prevent you from climbing out. You always hold the card of being able to walk away, and it is powerful. Being in a shitty relationship is infinitely more lonely than being alone. If you are suffering from a current or past relationship, accept the choices you have made, then make another to improve your situation. Hating someone for a wrong they have done to you is like letting them live rent free in your brain. And as cliche as it sounds, time heals all wounds (although sometimes not in the ways you may expect or have hoped for).

I've tried therapy. I've tried mind quests. I've tried sleeping around (logic here: if I can push out the old with the new, that would be greeeat. Fucking retard sauce). The only real method for healing I have found that works consistently is love. Loving your family. Loving friends and strangers. Loving yourself and what you are becoming.

Over the past year, I have collected quotes (below) from various sources that embody this theme. They have all helped me in one way or another.

Fear is the mind killer. Love is the answer. Get stronger.

 “Life will break you. Nobody can protect you from that, and living alone won’t either, for solitude will also break you with its yearning. You have to love. You have to feel. It is the reason you are here on earth. You are here to risk your heart. You are here to be swallowed up. And when it happens that you are broken, or betrayed, or left, or hurt, or death brushes near, let yourself sit by an apple tree and listen to the apples falling all around you in heaps, wasting their sweetness. Tell yourself you tasted as many as you could.”

—        Louise Erdrich

The greatest gift you can ever give yourself is the undying belief that you are worthy. Someone who doesn't value their own self worth cannot fully accept anything gifted to them, or anything earned.

If you do not believe you are worthy of someones love, you will never experience it. If you do not believe you are worthy of adoration, you will never receive it. If you do not believe you are worthy of being strong you will never know it.

Inhale and grok the belief that you are worthy of things both gifted and earned. Without this, you will never understand the value of who you are, what you are capable of, or appreciate the fruits of your labor.

Now go, and win the fucking day.

- Paul Carter

“The problem, often not discovered until late in life, is that when you look for things in life like love, meaning, motivation, it implies they are sitting behind a tree or under a rock. The most successful people in life recognize, that in life they create their own love, they manufacture their own meaning, they generate their own motivation. For me, I am driven by two main philosophies, know more today about the world than I knew yesterday. And lessen the suffering of others. You'd be surprised how far that gets you."

- Neil deGrasse Tyson

Live your motherfucking life. Get your hustle on. Understand people are gonna hate you regardless. Get that out of your head, that fantasy world where people ain't hating on you. You gotta be grateful. You need haters. What the fuck you complaining about? What the fuck do you think a haters job is? To fucking hate. So let them do their damn job. If there are any haters in here right now that don't have anybody to hate on, feel free to hate on me.

So I wanted to write this, because it came up in a conversation I had tonight and I thought it was really insightful about what happens in relationships a lot of times.

Generally you find someone you like, you do the things you need to do in order to woo them, romance them, tell them all the things you need to tell them to quell their fears, etc. You massage their needs.

As your feelings grow, and you fall in love with someone, many times people become fearful of losing that person. So their behavior changes. They become jealous or fight over petty shit, and then you wonder what happened along the way that caused all of that good shit to end.

It's really simple. Wooing someone, chasing someone, trying to "get" something that you want so badly has a very positive connotation with it. You want that, so your actions and desires are manipulated by a very positive energy.

Once you have "it" and develop deep feelings for it, the mortal side of us realizes we can lose it. And losing something has a very negative connotation with it. So we change how we act with that person, and the things we do with them. We check their cell phone messages or Facebook, we want them to stop hanging around certain friends, etc. Where before, those things didn't matter, because you wanted that person to be happy, so you did the things to make them happy. But once you become invested, you are driven by fear, not happiness. So the way you treat them is much much different. And eventually.....you lose them. And you wonder where you went wrong.

If you want a relationship to last, never stop wooing that person. Always remember that they need certain fears quelled at times, and to be made to feel like the king, or the queen. It's hard because we sometimes feel like our own selfish wants and needs to be fulfilled first, but if you actually make sure the others persons needs are, you'll find yours get fulfilled as well.

My lunesta is kicking in now so nothing after this would be good. Like sex with foxes on bicycles.

- Paul Carter 

"I'm too busy..." is code word that he/she is not interested in you. This is an easy let down as not to hurt your feelings.

People always ALWAYS make time for the people that are important to them, or that they have a romantic interest in. Don't hang on to people who don't deem you important enough in their life to make time for you.

Mainly, because it makes you look desperate. And desperation is a stinky cologne.

Let go, make choices, and appreciate.........

- Paul Carter

To a woman who said that Facebook pages like "Fap Nation" have a detrimental effect on a woman's self worth, I wrote........

"Self worth is defied by your SELF. In other words, this can only bother a woman if she chooses to let it bother her. No different than a man could say all those women that fawn over Brad Pitt or Channing Tatum decrease a mans self worth. You get to define your own self worth. If you let a fan page on Facebook destroy your self worth or self esteem then you have issues that need serious attention."

I write about this a lot. Love YOU like no one else can. Even if you aren't what you want to be physically or emotionally right now, love the shit out of yourself. It doesn't mean to rest on your laurels, and it is NOT an excuse to be lazy, procrastinate, not have goals, and not strive to fulfill your potential.

What it does mean is, LOVE the worker in you. Love the hunter in you. Love the warrior or queen in you. These things will never come to the surface if you keep them buried under self loathing, self pity, and despair. The person you want to see in the mirror isn't going to manifest itself if you don't learn how to love the things that will give birth to that.

Don't look at someone else, or something else and covet that. Admire it for what it is, appreciate it for what it is worth, and then come to an understanding that it has no bearing on you, who will love you, and how you need to love yourself in order to grow.

I hate when people say shit like that because there isn't anything in the world you should base your self worth on that you have no control over. If a woman has a great ass, don't hate. Appreciate. And then LOVE the things you need to do in order to have a great ass of your own. This applies to everything you want to accomplish in life.

Love it, and it will love you back.

I've written a lot about struggles. At times waxed poetically about relationships, life, love, hardships, and such.

I've endured plenty of my own. So have you. So have we all.

I've made promises that I've broken, and kept ones I never should have made.

I've drained my emotional well dry at times, trying to quench the thirst of people who couldn't drink enough.

I've abandoned my own code in order to please those who could not be pleased.

Eventually, you realize how badly you've lost your way, and looking in the mirror becomes a painful reminder of that.

"How did I get here?" can be the hardest question you may ever ask yourself.

There can only be one answer. Ever.

The choices I made.

The next choice is whether or not to let the tide take you under, or rise to the fucking occasion.......

Choose.

- Paul Carter

One of the most truthful and poignant quotes I've ever read, is "when you set out on a course of revenge, make sure to dig two graves".

Cut your losses with bad people and be done with it. Let them go. Living well is always the best revenge anyway. When you put someone in your sights to get back at, you will inevitably end up burning yourself just as badly in the process.

Some people are just going to suck, and do or say shitty things to you. Free yourself of them and live well. No shovel required.

- Paul Carter

When anything starts to become overwhelming, remember you are going to die

-Chris Jones