I grew up in a loving home, better than most, yet we didn’t have much material-wise, but we made do. It wasn’t a hard life but it wasn’t easy either, at least for me as a child. My parents did their very best at providing with what they had and for that, I would never complain or compare. It taught me money isn’t everything and family is. My father was my best friend and someone I was close to for as long as I can remember. The knowledge he imparted to me, I still use to this day.
However despite everything, I always felt like I had a cloud looming over me, from very young. My mother attributes this to her depressed state while she was pregnant with me, since money wasn’t coming in and my father was doing his best at the time. I’m not sure how much of that had an impact on me, yet for no particular reason I was in a state melancholy most of the time. I wasn’t a “troubled child” nor did I do harmful things to myself or others. I didn’t get caught up with the wrong crowd or become dissident, in fact I was well liked by many and didn’t struggle to socialize.
Eventually that state of mind spilled over into adolescence and I started having low self-esteem. I wasn’t visibly depressed nor did I behave like someone who was struggling mentally, but deep down inside I was. I realise that now, so I understand when people talk about suicide, that there were almost no signs of it prior in the person who committed. I wasn’t suicidal or anywhere close to that, yet I wasn’t as cheerful on the inside as I appeared to be on the outside. I didn’t intentionally put on a “show” or was pretending, I just felt I needed to be strong since I’m male and also I love being around the right people which usually puts me in a better state of mind. Alone is where the I felt my lowest.
Maybe if I had grown up in a toxic home, that might have escalated things for me and fueled my inner demons, luckily my loving home kept me and still keeps me happy and away from making emotional mistakes.
By not addressing and admitting my mental state of mind I avoided opportunities to seek help or find ways to improve, something now I wish I had done. That eventually lead to me to making bad major life decisions in adulthood based on sadness and depression, which affected me gravely and still do till this day.
With my low self-esteem I struggled with romantic relationships, although wanting it and having numerous opportunities, because I failed to see my worth. I was surrounded by people at that time who, unintentionally, fueled my negative tendencies, which didn’t help, since they too were negative in other ways. Looking back now, that was not good for my improvement and I didn’t, until I broke away. Unfortunately by the time I did break away I had attracted yet more negativity into my life without knowing it.
Due to my inability to see clearly and think positive all the time, the little happiness I got, I clung on to dearly. I was somehow trying to escape my past and felt my new future was promising. However, since I never addressed my depression or sought help to heal properly, I was attracting the same personalities and negativity in different persons and scenarios. I had progressed, but not enough to escape my past.
This is how I learned about the power of attraction and why we attract the things we aren’t aware of, inside us. Not just what’s in our minds or what we desire, but I’ll get to that another time.
What was yet to come would be some of the worst experiences I’ve had in my life till this day, and I lost my father to cancer during my teenage years. These experiences were worst than what we faced as a family battling his cancer.
My father was my best friend and his passing left me somewhat lost for a very, very long time since I had to figure things out by trial and error. It fueled my already existing depression for years and I welcomed a short lifespan. Again I wasn’t suicidal but started living carelessly and unhealthy, smoking, drinking, partying non-stop, etc. I continued this lifestyle of self-destruction for quite some time until I stumbled on to what I thought was a better life for me. The promising future I mentioned before… boy was I wrong.
Those following years I faced my toughest trials, despite being married to someone, it even brought me to a point where I had actually considered suicide for a brief, brief moment. Luckily my son was in my life and I snapped out of it the moment I saw him. The only good thing to come out of those turbulent years was him.
After my marriage met its expected fate, I moved on thinking life would get better. After all that I endured, it had to be better right? Well the Universe doesn’t work that way. For a moment it was better, but little did I realise how broken I was and a few months could never be sufficient to heal properly. I felt like the world had screwed me over for nothing and almost went down a path of hate and vengeance, and the ones who were to pay might have been innocent. Then without realising I had attracted yet another batch of people over a period of time who weren’t as bad as my distant past, but not much better either.
This is where I started to question things. Why, despite all that I was doing and accomplishing, did I attract the “same people” all the time? My life was vastly different, I felt like I had moved forward superficially and my circles were totally different, then why was I facing the same dilemmas all over again and again?
This is where I decided to turn inwards and realised that what was happening to me wasn’t a consequence of my outer life but instead my inner. My surroundings wasn’t the problem, it was me. Everything had changed except me. This is where I became introspective and honestly after doing and failing for so many years in my adulthood, I felt like I finally understood life.
I started spending a great deal of time by myself and truly understanding my past experiences. I had understood why things happen the way they happened but now I finally came to terms deeply, with the numerous pains, failures and even unresolved feelings I endured early on in my life. I started appreciating my “failure” of a life.
Those experiences defined me. They tested me and pushed me to my limits, yet I never gave up. I swam through treacherous waters and arrived on the other end, a survivor, stronger and wiser. I ultimately believe everything happens for a good reason and it did, although it sounds cliche, nothing is truer.
Had I not been through so much and thankfully did not become permanently broken, I wouldn’t be here talking/writing my truth to you. A lot of my fears have now stripped away and I’m living my best life with so much potential to create a blissful path forward with all the knowledge I’ve gained. Things have started falling into place almost magically for me. However I know better and why it’s happening. It was always my mental state of mind.
No one came to save me, I saved myself by turning inwards and I believe we all need to save ourselves. I stopped waiting for moments to turn my life around for me. I began turning life around myself.
The moment I looked at my life logically and deduced the one constant in my life was me, therefore my behaviour and mental state of mind, which is essentially me, was attracting what was happening all the time. It didn’t happen overnight. In fact, it took about four years and more, of serious introspection and reflection to finally release my poisons which surprisingly wasn’t difficult, it just took time.
We are what we consume and also what we produce. Our thoughts and emotions is everything, it defines us, it allows us, it makes us… It’s easy to blame others for your situation, however the longer you hold on to that, the longer you’re denying yourself moving forward. It’s time to start admitting we are not only the creators of our destiny but also our failures. We cannot control the outer world, therefore the safest and most effective course of action is to fix the inner world. Us. Our mental state of mind.
– Feature image by Silviu Zidaru