WheresMurph
Adventurer
DOWN THE RABBIT HOLE WE GO.......
.
.
It was nice and safe there.
For a while.
Tick....tock....tick....tock.
Trying to tell myself that I had to be responsible and get a safe secure job so I could climb back up the ladder that I unceremoniously fell off in 2008. Like I had all the time in the world to wait for things to get better, to improve.
Plenty of time, right?.
Looking back, if you had known or met me then, you would be forgiven for thinking that I had an extra life stashed away in a bank somewhere given the way that I behaved and carried on sometimes.
A lot, a lot of wasted energy. And time. And money.
I still do sometimes. Waste time that is. It's hard not to. I'm more aware of it now that I'm sober, not too much wiggle room for excuses these days. Which is just how I like it now.
Back then I had a good excuse. I was drunk most of the time. It was the booze, not me, right?. Riiiight.
That was the problem, right?. Wrong.
Get rid of the booze, get rid of the problem, right?. Wrong.
Getting rid of the booze just made me more completely and painfully aware of the problem.
Me.
I still am the problem. I am not "cured". I never will be. I will always be an alcoholic. All it will still take is just one drink. Should I choose that route.
I choose not to.
I have chosen not to for the last 1,681 days.
At least now I have the ability and am conscious and aware enough to be able to deal with the problems instead of my troubled thoughts and feelings being medicinally soothed, placated and anesthetized by alcohol. Even when I was drinking like a fish, I always knew and felt inside that it wasn't a solution. It was just adding to the problem even more, making it worse.
Now I have no excuses left, at least no really good juicy ones, so it forces me to own up and take a lot more responsibility than I did before.
Sometimes it doesn't work, but most of the time it does.
Self discipline doesn't come naturally to me. But I have a better success rate than I did before January 2009 when I got sober.
Removal and Replacement.
Going down the hole.
Removing myself from situations and things that caused me problems.
Replacing bad habits. With better habits.
However, not all habits need to fit into the "better" category.
And better according to whom?. And from what vantage point?. From whose vantage point?.
Everyones definition of what constitutes better is going to be different.
I just know some of the things that are better for me, and one of them is not drinking alcohol. And not living life in a hamster wheel either. And leaving my comfort zone.
There's a certain degree of irresponsibility to my life now, according to society anyway. Of one day throwing caution to the wind and hoping that I can make a better attempt at it this time around. But it's not haphazard. I don't feel that I am wasting time now. I know I'm not. I feel able to create things. Things that I like and am immensely proud of.
I'm ok with me now. But there's always more.
If not me, then who?. If not now, then when?.
Some get it at an early age. The realization that life is for living, now, without seeking out permissions.
And not just a last minute dash, a realization of "oh **** I'm 50" and trying to play catch up or even a few months before your expiration date either.
Which none of us ever really know, do we?. Some will find out though, either through a medical diagnosis or emergency, whichever comes first. And it will.
I was guilty of the latter a lot of the time, of following the herd, seeking accolades and spending a very large part of my waking moments conforming to what I thought was expected or required of me from a system that I had chosen to entangle myself in. I was subconsciously thinking, and betting, that when I had become successful and had amassed my "fortune" I could buy myself the freedom to do what I had, earlier in life, put aside for later use. What I didn't realize at the time was that I would only go through all those feelings only once. One time only. Every given waking moment in my life happens only once. ****. Can't go back now.
Not realizing at the time that you can never go back. No amount of money can buy one second of that time back. And you can't buy those feelings back either.
You can't, and shouldn't, put those thoughts and feelings aside for later. You can't just pick up at 51 where you left off at 24, or even 34. Or 44.
Feelings that only a younger "full of piss and vinegar" mind, attitude and hormones can allow you to experience. You can't buy that back 10 years further on, or even 5 years on for that matter. Because 5 years on, you're 5 years older and have moved on one thousand eight hundred and twenty six days from that point.
Things have changed. A lot.
And sometimes they change in the blink of an eye.
And while you're blinking, the rest of the post, including a crash course in dismantling a BMW GS Adv transmission to try to hunt down an elusive rattle, can be found by clicking right here
Have the day of your choice,
Murph.
.
.
Florida, 2009.
My comfort zone was an illusion, a mythical compound I had created in my life and I was gradually, millimeter by millimeter, settling into it like a comfortable leather armchair.
My house that was in foreclosure, my garage that was attached to said house that was full of "stuff", my BMW 1150 GS, and the knowledge that everything around me was recognizable, recurring, habitual. All of it a known quantity. Safe. Secure. It's called an anxiety-neutral zone. I didn't know that then, but I could feel that it was so. I felt limp and lethargic inside, like there was more. But I obviously was choosing not to take the road less traveled in order to pursue it.
Places, people, streets, friends, weather, activities, behaviors. All about as comfortably familiar and boring as it ever was in my life. It's a silent, faceless killer.
I was suspended in time. There was no challenge, no sharp points to jab me in my flesh and painfully remind me that "hey, you're still alive son". Barely. Technically.
My fear of the unknown and of myself was keeping me on lock down, and I all I had to do was keep telling myself that it could be worse.
And I'll try to fix it tomorrow.
My comfort zone was an illusion, a mythical compound I had created in my life and I was gradually, millimeter by millimeter, settling into it like a comfortable leather armchair.
My house that was in foreclosure, my garage that was attached to said house that was full of "stuff", my BMW 1150 GS, and the knowledge that everything around me was recognizable, recurring, habitual. All of it a known quantity. Safe. Secure. It's called an anxiety-neutral zone. I didn't know that then, but I could feel that it was so. I felt limp and lethargic inside, like there was more. But I obviously was choosing not to take the road less traveled in order to pursue it.
Places, people, streets, friends, weather, activities, behaviors. All about as comfortably familiar and boring as it ever was in my life. It's a silent, faceless killer.
I was suspended in time. There was no challenge, no sharp points to jab me in my flesh and painfully remind me that "hey, you're still alive son". Barely. Technically.
My fear of the unknown and of myself was keeping me on lock down, and I all I had to do was keep telling myself that it could be worse.
And I'll try to fix it tomorrow.
It was nice and safe there.
For a while.
Tick....tock....tick....tock.
Trying to tell myself that I had to be responsible and get a safe secure job so I could climb back up the ladder that I unceremoniously fell off in 2008. Like I had all the time in the world to wait for things to get better, to improve.
Plenty of time, right?.
Looking back, if you had known or met me then, you would be forgiven for thinking that I had an extra life stashed away in a bank somewhere given the way that I behaved and carried on sometimes.
A lot, a lot of wasted energy. And time. And money.
I still do sometimes. Waste time that is. It's hard not to. I'm more aware of it now that I'm sober, not too much wiggle room for excuses these days. Which is just how I like it now.
Back then I had a good excuse. I was drunk most of the time. It was the booze, not me, right?. Riiiight.
That was the problem, right?. Wrong.
Get rid of the booze, get rid of the problem, right?. Wrong.
Getting rid of the booze just made me more completely and painfully aware of the problem.
Me.
I still am the problem. I am not "cured". I never will be. I will always be an alcoholic. All it will still take is just one drink. Should I choose that route.
I choose not to.
I have chosen not to for the last 1,681 days.
At least now I have the ability and am conscious and aware enough to be able to deal with the problems instead of my troubled thoughts and feelings being medicinally soothed, placated and anesthetized by alcohol. Even when I was drinking like a fish, I always knew and felt inside that it wasn't a solution. It was just adding to the problem even more, making it worse.
Now I have no excuses left, at least no really good juicy ones, so it forces me to own up and take a lot more responsibility than I did before.
Sometimes it doesn't work, but most of the time it does.
Self discipline doesn't come naturally to me. But I have a better success rate than I did before January 2009 when I got sober.
Removal and Replacement.
Going down the hole.
Removing myself from situations and things that caused me problems.
Replacing bad habits. With better habits.
However, not all habits need to fit into the "better" category.
And better according to whom?. And from what vantage point?. From whose vantage point?.
Everyones definition of what constitutes better is going to be different.
I just know some of the things that are better for me, and one of them is not drinking alcohol. And not living life in a hamster wheel either. And leaving my comfort zone.
There's a certain degree of irresponsibility to my life now, according to society anyway. Of one day throwing caution to the wind and hoping that I can make a better attempt at it this time around. But it's not haphazard. I don't feel that I am wasting time now. I know I'm not. I feel able to create things. Things that I like and am immensely proud of.
I'm ok with me now. But there's always more.
If not me, then who?. If not now, then when?.
Some get it at an early age. The realization that life is for living, now, without seeking out permissions.
And not just a last minute dash, a realization of "oh **** I'm 50" and trying to play catch up or even a few months before your expiration date either.
Which none of us ever really know, do we?. Some will find out though, either through a medical diagnosis or emergency, whichever comes first. And it will.
I was guilty of the latter a lot of the time, of following the herd, seeking accolades and spending a very large part of my waking moments conforming to what I thought was expected or required of me from a system that I had chosen to entangle myself in. I was subconsciously thinking, and betting, that when I had become successful and had amassed my "fortune" I could buy myself the freedom to do what I had, earlier in life, put aside for later use. What I didn't realize at the time was that I would only go through all those feelings only once. One time only. Every given waking moment in my life happens only once. ****. Can't go back now.
Not realizing at the time that you can never go back. No amount of money can buy one second of that time back. And you can't buy those feelings back either.
You can't, and shouldn't, put those thoughts and feelings aside for later. You can't just pick up at 51 where you left off at 24, or even 34. Or 44.
Feelings that only a younger "full of piss and vinegar" mind, attitude and hormones can allow you to experience. You can't buy that back 10 years further on, or even 5 years on for that matter. Because 5 years on, you're 5 years older and have moved on one thousand eight hundred and twenty six days from that point.
Things have changed. A lot.
And sometimes they change in the blink of an eye.
And while you're blinking, the rest of the post, including a crash course in dismantling a BMW GS Adv transmission to try to hunt down an elusive rattle, can be found by clicking right here
Have the day of your choice,
Murph.
