AP Photo/Hadi Mizba courtesy of www2.ljworld.com
This process metaphorically has obvious meaning, but is the first initial step in the quest to true self-improvement. In my last post I introduced my intentions, and gave you a little background on the current events of my quest. Now I will explain the problems I encountered and what it took to go forward in my endeavor. Everyone at some point reaches some sort of boiling point in their life. It can be from a consistent amount unmet obligations to doing in over-indulgence of a negative situation. For me it was taken on too many projects and not meeting my regular obligations. To give you an idea of what I do on a regular basis, I work and attend school full-time. These are my daily obligations, in between these obligations, I did freelance work, worked out, and even pursued other educational concentrations. As you can see, I tend to take on more than I can chew. I actually can route back when these habits started forming in my personality.
It was after my first tour in Iraq, I returned to my hometown of Las Vegas in April of 2004. At this time I was 21 years old, and just started college with endeavors to get into the film industry. It was no time before I found myself wrapped up in one of my biggest projects I ever took on, which was to produce a full-feature independent film. Currently, on top of everything else I also worked full-time. Now there are a few things I need to clarify, the war did have a profound impact on my life that affected me on a great deal. At first impression, coming back from Iraq I really felt like I didn’t have any problems at all, a matter of fact, I thought I was actually better because of it. Maybe it was a feeling of invincibility that most young men feel at that age, but more realistically it was a result of me ignoring my own problems of coping. During my tour I came into some situations that really destroyed me as a human being and even has brought upon me contemplations of suicide. My way of coping was keeping busy, it was a good habit, that in turn, brought about very bad habits. If I could go back, I would of taken a couple months off and got counseling, but I felt I was above such treatment.
So the question you ask, is where did it all go wrong? My focus on my life goals were very wide, I wanted to finish my degree, and have a film company. The film was completed, but the quality of it was awful. I also dropped out of school, because I bought into the bad advice of an employer that school wasn’t important. I was an idiot. My focus was very sporadic, I was taking one film assignment after another, at the time my business partner convinced me to take another bad filming project that I eventually walked away because it was having affects on my health. Now fast-forward to now, before coming upon this enlightenment, I now had several things going on, and then it all came to a dead halt. I failed my class this last semester, and I was fired off a freelance job, which I have been late in delivering. My work performance was awful and I had no money, and I needed to save for my move that is coming up in about three months from that point. The universe has finally won, I didn’t have the answers anymore.
What happen, I actually had a breakdown, looking back, this was a very good moment in my life. As quoted from the movie “Jerry McGuire”, “..Breakdown? Breakthrough.”, in all that went wrong, I found an opportunity to make everything right. So I made a list, of everything that I wanted, everything from finishing my degree to doing laundry. I wanted for once figure out what I wanted out of life. Now the hardest problem was understanding my problems. I then made a list of all the things I didn’t like about myself, and the list was long. This was probably the first time in my life I have become self-aware of all my problems. It was actually a very liberating event, I had a huge sense of relief, because for once I had an idea of what was going on in the bigger picture. I finally woke up for the first time in my life.
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