My Only Regret

I know I'm not supposed to have regrets. I really don't have any, but from time to time I wish I had been outwardly rebellious as a child. The inward and sideways rebellion I practiced nearly killed me, and it's taking a long time to recover from that. 

When I reached my teens, I wanted to run away. Too chickenshit, maybe, or not enough self-esteem, or maybe it was just my path to sit in my shit. I hated my home, I hated my parents, I hated (most of) my school. Instead of physically running away, I chose to escape chemically, which, of course, ignited the alcoholism within me. Even if I had stayed where I was, but stood up for myself - but that wasn't to be.

I share this because I know there are others out there who have lived or currently live in situations that feel intolerable. A lot of people I know are so pro-family that they would be loyal to their parents even if they were serial killers. Today I believe that sometimes a person just has to call a turd a turd, walk away, and not look back.

I don't know that life would have been better, or that I would have been better. It would have been different, that's for sure. I feel like I spent way more time than was necessary living my life for others - hoping to gain someone's approval. What nobody told me (or what I never heard) was that most of all I needed to gain my own approval. I need to live my own life - trying to live someone else's version of my life just does not work.

And so I do that today. And, because of my experience, I share whatever wisdom I've gained from living the way I did with others. Because I believe depression stems from oppression (either by self or by others), I encourage others to begin to live from who they really are. I let folks know that they're just fine the way they are right now. I meet a lot of people who are thoroughly disappointed in themselves because they've failed to meet the expectations of someone else. I am going to repeat that:

I meet a lot of people who are thoroughly disappointed in themselves because they've failed to meet the expectations of someone else.

And you know what? It's bullshit! We were not created to fulfill anybody else's purpose except our own. We were not created so that someone else could live vicariously through us. We were not created to atone for someone else's self-perceived shortcomings and mistakes. 

I encourage and support anybody discovering and living to their purpose at any age, but I especially let young people know that they are individuals with a unique set of gifts and talents and their own life to explore. If it happens to mesh with someone else's life, awesome. If not, that's fine, too.

I came into recovery, then, with a double-whammy - first, I felt a lot of shame and guilt because I didn't live up to someone else's expectations of me, and second, I feel the shame and regret from wasting my time on earth trying, instead of exploring who Ken is.

It's not easy to switch gears and begin living to one's own purpose. It's challenging, difficult, and sometimes sad. But it's also real, and it's enriching. If there were some sort of camera that could capture the way I felt about myself and my life 40 years ago and the way I feel today, the difference would be amazing. In my mind I see the dark, timid little creature I was 4 decades ago, and today I see the bright colorful being I'm becoming. It's amazing. And if I don't, even today, live up to the standards of a few people, well, too bad. Save your standards for yourself, not me. I've got my own, thanks.

There, I feel better.

Namaste,

Ken

Let's Get Real!

From "The Velveteen Rabbit," Margery Williams, 1922

I have survived, despite a half-century of self-neglect and self-abuse. Much of the self-destructiveness I practiced centered around my fear of living life and my fear of me. There is a spark of life within me that even I don't have the power to snuff out. When I accepted that reality, I knew that I must begin to learn to face the biggest obstacle to me living a decent life - me.

Most people understand shortly after they begin their recovery journey that they are going to have to face some things - that part (or maybe all) of our addiction comes from the desire to cover up what we don't like or fear about ourselves. We basically have to face our darkest secrets in recovery. That can be scary. No matter what the darkness is - resentment, fear, shame from being abused or from being the abuser - whatever - it is poison, because it remains deeply hidden within us, away from any kind of light. Our secrets and our shame becomes a cancer, and, if left untreated, eventually destroys us.

Now, almost none of us walks into a recovery meeting the first time, or into treatment, and blurts out, "Hi, my name is so-and-so and I hate my mother." Rarely happens.  Much of the time, our 'stuff' that we carry into recovery is a tangled mess - so much so, we are often unaware of all of it, and we need assistance with untangling it all.

When we were young, many of us learned we had a 'permanent record', and that it was a very bad thing to have anything on this permanent record. Say you stepped on a crack in the third grade. You were worried for the rest of the day, knowing that your mom was lying on the kitchen floor, unable to move, because you were careless and broke her back. So, you get home as fast as you can to rescue mom, and discover that she's just fine - no broken back. On the one hand, that's awesome! We didn't permanently injure mom! On the other hand, that stepping on a crack was still a bad thing to do, even though it seems like it had no effect - this time. In the 3rd grade we did not possess the critical thinking skills to determine the difference between the truth and bs. And then, one of (at least) two things happen - we learn that, perhaps, in certain circumstances, maybe we can get away with doing something 'bad', or, we thank God, or our lucky stars or whatever, that we didn't break mom's back through our carelessness, and vow to never, ever, ever step on a crack again.

But what about that permanent record? If we get a C in geometry, it might prevent us from getting into the finest post-secondary education, and we'll end up with crappy jobs for the rest of our lives, marry beneath our station, have ugly, delinquent children, and be miserable, unhealthy wrecks until the day we die.  And, because we got that C in geometry, we might end up hanging around with the wrong bunch, and get into smoking cigarettes, drinking, and maybe even sex. All of that goes on our permanent record, which, if it isn't perfect, guarantees us to have a shitty life.

Yes, the two examples - hurting someone through doing something innocent like stepping on a crack, or ruining our lives because we're average in math - are outrageous examples as we read them with an adult brain. But the concept isn't outrageous. As children, we learned that our parents and elders were always right (or we learned to not trust). So, if someone tells us we're going to go to hell because we swore or told a lie or stole something, or, if in a moment of anger, we said, "Dad, I hate you!", that can stick with us even as adults who understand that that Hell probably isn't going to happen. (Imagine how confused a person must get if they're told they're bad by an abuser. That's a mess to untangle!).

So everybody has a dark side. Everybody learns to cover it up. If one is a human being without an addiction or a mental health condition, one could probably go their whole lives without shame affecting them much. However, in addiction and mental illness, any shame we have is magnified and multiplied, because it is food for the addiction and or mental health condition. But every human being presents a 'socialized' self to the outer world, and the self we present is rarely if ever a perfect reflection of who we really feel we are on the inside.

My experience has been that if I want to recover, I have to get as close a match between my outside representation of myself and how I am on the inside. It's scary and challenging. I can say, however, that it is not only possible, but one of the best things I could ever do for myself. Here are some of the benefits of getting real that I've experienced:

• I no longer walk around with a nagging worry that someone will 'discover' me and reject me;
• I experience more peace and happiness with who I am;
• I have a better group of friends than I've ever had, and I haven't had to bribe or coerce them to be my friends - they're real, too;
• I have more mental energy to focus on the things I love, because I'm using less to keep up an image;
• I have less depression, and I self-sabotage a lot less;
• I get to stay sober;
• I no longer feel like a fraud every.single.day;
• I trust others more;
• I trust myself more;
• I believe my opening up, being real, and showing that it's not only possible but desirable allows others to be real;
• My relationships are real (and, conversely, fake folks drop away);
• I grow to love myself and humanity more.

These are just some of the benefits of allowing myself to be the person that the Universe created. It's all about freedom - that which we cry for so much, yet push away by our actions. And I understand today that my flaws and imperfections are there as ways to connect with my Higher Power and others; because, trust me, if I were perfect, I wouldn't have nothin' to do with nobody. This I know.

It is a scary process, but one which is quite doable if done prudently with safe people. A person probably doesn't want to walk into the biker bar they've been going to for the past twenty years one night and announce that they're gay. However, there are other ways to come to healthy grips with who we are. If you're interested in doing this, start by finding someone who has done it themselves.

Shakespeare wrote, "To thine own self be true." He knew. He knew.

Namaste,

Ken

What I Get When I Open My Mind

I used to not believe what I could not understand. This is kind of the way humans are, I think. But I took it one step further - because my thinking was so right, if I couldn't understand it, it wasn't understandable. I did not seek to understand; I didn't even seek to accept.

For instance, if anybody ever saw any good in me, either they were lying or I had them fooled. This kind of attitude makes for very short relationships, and by relationships, I mean all kinds - friendships, romantic relationships, jobs, etc. If you thought I was a decent person, you were either lying or delusional, because deep down, I knew I wasn't a decent person. I wasn't the kind of person that had anything that was likable or any sort of skill that was useful to anyone. 

This belief in my innate badness is very much a shame-based belief. It was so strong that it persisted despite much evidence to the contrary. Most people (I think) think they are pretty good people who occasionally make mistakes or do bad things. My perception of me was that I was basically a bad person who occasionally did good things. 

In my opinion, it is impossible to stay in recovery and keep this attitude. Or, it is impossible to keep this belief and stay in recovery. It is also impossible, in my experience, to keep this shame based attitude and have a healthy relationship with God. 

I will not say that I presently have the best attitude or belief about myself that I could have, but it's better than it used to be. I'm finally beginning to see that there are steps in between the alpha of desperately sick and the omega of perfectly healthy, much like there are steps to acceptance. 

I saw a bumper sticker a few years back that said, "Don't believe everything you think." Good advice! As I've mentioned in previous posts, the human brain is set up to jump to conclusions. It takes effort (plus a little insight) for most folks to move past their first thought. But lazy thinking isn't my only problem. It is the tip of the iceberg. My problem is the thoughts and perceptions generated from a lifetime of thinking that I'm a piece of breathing, walking shit. The change in my thinking must come from my depths - surface change isn't lasting change.

So here's how this whole scenario used to show up for me: I would get some opportunity that would give me hope that I had some kind of chance at having an enjoyable life. Because I had this great opportunity and some hope, I could avoid doing the things that were majorly self-destructive, like drinking. But the change was only on the surface. Because I knew so much, or maybe because I was too afraid to let anybody in on who I thought I really was, I did not go after the deeper stuff - the beliefs. When I was young, I didn't even know that I had no self-esteem, or shame-based beliefs, or any of that shit. The way I felt about myself was as natural as my hair color or my eye color. It was me. 

When I began to recognize that maybe, perhaps I don't process life like everybody else, I did not seek to understand what was different - I simply tried to suppress that difference. Because I'm smarter than everybody else, you see.

So I would cycle. About every two years (sometimes longer, if I had a prison sentence - that seemed to help in a strange way) I would crash. I would start drinking again, quit my job, abandon my domicile, quit my marriage or my relationship, and jump head-first into self-destruction. Until somebody stopped me and gave me some hope. It got to the point where I hated getting hopeful again, because I knew I was in for another disappointment down the road.  This used to be my life. Crash and burn, get some hope, do well for a couple of years, crash and burn.

What's different? A little over four years ago, after a crash and burn, I resolved to become authentic. I knew I was a big fake, and I knew I couldn't recover unless I became authentic. So I started down that path. Started. I was in a relatively safe place to be me, whoever the heck that was. But after I left that place, I reverted to Mr. Sobriety and went about making my millions, rather than allowing more healing to take place. So, after nearly two years, I crashed and burned again - the last crash and burn.

I still needed to practice authenticity, but I also needed to keep recovery first. And that I have been doing. But what was the change? I think I've mentioned it before, in different ways - I've basically run out of f^&#$ to give. I no longer care about if someone finds out who I really am. I no longer care if I make a million or if I don't. I don't even really give a good goddamn if anybody likes me or not. And when I dropped those prereqs to recovery, lo and behold, I began to get better. Bit by bit, I began to heal.

So what happened to the belief that I'm basically a pile of shit who occasionally manages not to stink? In addition to letting go of what I thought others might think of me, I began to let go of what I thought of myself. I began to put less stock in my own thinking. I began to see if maybe others weren't right when they said I was a decent human being with a something to offer. And the results of this inquiry - perhaps call it "Maybe Ken doesn't know everything" - have led to some amazing discoveries. 

The biggest discovery is I'm not the person I believe I am. I sure don't know who I am, but I'm not the waste of oxygen I once thought I was. Being relieved of that underlying belief has made sobriety a lot easier, and it has made recovery from depression possible.

I saw myself on videotape last night. Twice in the past couple of weeks I've had occasion to speak at some meetings at city hall. I was fishing around the city website, and came across recordings of those meetings. I was surprised at what I saw when I was on tape. Here was a gentleman who wasn't ugly - looked pretty normal to me - and said what he had to say in a nice and interesting manner. I knew that was me, but part of me didn't recognize me. I'm used to public speaking, and I like doing it, probably because I'm often talking about myself, and I seem to be received well. During these two meetings I did not know I was being videotaped, so it wasn't like I was doing anything for the camera - I was just doing what I do. It's like writing for me - it just comes out. Yet I thought it was funny that I really didn't recognize myself. And I'm grateful, because it shows me that my perception is still not on target. I need to know that, because every once in a while I dip back into shitville.

I'll mention one other amazing thing before I close - and this is very important: Because other people took the time to acknowledge and support the good they saw in me, I can now see the good in others who perhaps find it difficult to see themselves. This is one of the greatest gifts I've ever, ever received - to not only see myself differently, but to see others in a different light as well (Cyndi Lauper's 'True Colors' is bouncing through my head now). 

I've heard this for the past 25 years - my perception creates my reality, not the other way around. And I'm just beginning to manifest this truth. When I toss away my first thought about anything and allow something better to take its place, I start to get better and my world gets better.

Namaste,

Ken

A Guest Post from Joe McVeen from FB

"I was 14 when my mom fell down the stairs.

I got home off the school bus and followed a trail of blood to her bed, where she lay covered in crimson from her head wound. She used a pillow as a bandage.
I stood there holding the home phone, petrified, my finger hovering over the “9” to call an ambulance. I had never called 911 before and I had almost worked up the courage to do so when Mom half-consciously insisted that I didn’t.

I asked her repeatedly if she was sure, and she insisted again and again that she was fine and it wasn’t a big deal. And as much as I pretended to be independent then, her word still carried enough weight for me to obey. So I didn’t call. I turned and walked shell-shocked out of the room, raced to my bicycle and went off to play football until I had erased the memory completely from my mind.

Two weeks later she was immediately life-flighted the moment she got to the hospital. In those two weeks, the bleeding on her brain dried and swelled, severely damaging her motor function, behavior, and memory. The mom I had always known was gone.

I watched the helicopter take off in total silence. I thought I was blaming her for falling, but I was truly blaming myself for not dialing those three numbers.

That simmering silent blame was cemented in me for years. I masterfully suppressed the biggest trauma of my life, and made it look like I was perfect on the outside. A varsity football captain, full academic engineering scholarship, glimmering resume, the best internships, I made sure to check all the boxes.

This compressed blame fueled me to place more and more weight of external success on my shoulders. I went to personal development seminars, read dozens of books, and planned my whole engineering career out to the dollar.
Then one day the unnecessary ego weight on my shoulders was finally too heavy, and the false shell of bullshit came crashing down.

I visited my mom in the nursing home and cried like a baby with her on her bed. I held her like I should have the day she fell. I told her how sorry I was for not calling 911, how much I have always loved her, and forgave her with all my soul while looking deep into her tear-strewn brown eyes.

In that beautiful moment, I also forgave that shell-shocked 14-year old boy in me. I told him that he did the best he could with what he knew at the time, and now he was free to stop running from his problems to go off and impress people in some game or career.

It was that instant that I developed the loving courage to face real problems with all my heart, which is the source of the passion I bring to my mission today.

Winning is not healing. Impressing is not healing. Fitting in is not healing.

In a moment of loving forgiveness, your greatest struggle becomes your greatest strength.

It's all love, my friends. Don't forget to forgive yourself too.

Please share this message so others can be inspired to walk the path to healing, growing and inspiring ❤️.

I love you Mom, for the beautiful soul beneath your broken body. I thank you for all that you sacrificed for me to become a man."

Joe McVeen