rock bottom (noun) - at the lowest possible level
Over the past 6 months, I have suffered loss in the form of my home, health, family, and relationship. All the values I held were shattered and I was forced into a deep cave of dark and desolate sorrow.
A month before my birthday I tore my Achilles tendon placing me in a cast and crutches duo. My wife and I were forced to leave our apartment due to raising rent where we lived in our car for 2 weeks until a friend let us stay at her place until we figured something out. Thank goodness right? That is what I thought too. Then my wife left me... That has to be the end of the struggle, right? I get to start putting my life back together, right?! Wrong, my grandma who raised me passed away in the middle of the night... Devastation. I don't know how to quite put my feelings into words besides I am grateful I don't live in a war zone but my world has started to become a hell of its own.
Each of these things on their own might be manageable but altogether I feel like I am in a rushing river with a cinder block chained to my ankles. Where do I begin?... Which of these can I do something about? As sad as it is the passing of someone close to you will show you the fragility of life and the fact that once you're gone that's the end of it. Any amount of suffering will only lead to more suffering in a spiraling feedback loop. So I gave myself time to grieve and reminisce on the love and life my grandma taught me and with this, I can tackle the next matter. My Achilles will heal with time and physical therapy so I just need to accept these terms and literally put one foot in front of the other, one day at a time. Now my relationship, there wasn't infidelity or abuse but just a disconnect from what we expected from each other and our differing value systems. How do I approach something so loaded with belief and deep-seated opinion? Well, I can't. Unless I give up my values in attempts of compromising we will always arrive at a stalemate because in the sacrificing of values resentment will build more often than not. Therapy, you say? Did I mention when she left me she moved 2000+ miles away to live on an island? Looks like another chance to practice radical acceptance. This concept is still quite foreign to me but my friend who is a therapist said it is the only way to get through life without victimizing yourself or blaming others for how crappy things are. He said that with acceptance you neither have to agree, endorse or promote what is happening but just acknowledge that it's going to stay that way whether you like it or not and your only control is in how YOU respond. I could give up and just say poor me. Or I could say I can't change it and that's okay. What can I change about it anyways? Can I bring my grandma back from death? Can I make my wife see things differently and come back? And even if I could what would ensure that we wouldn't just separate again if I don't address the issues that led to the separation? My Achilles is going to need time and of course, I could be super diligent with my physical therapy to speed it up but it still requires acceptance to a new reality of where I can't play sports until its fully healed which means I need to find a new haven.
Even with all this going on I must still admit I have my cheerful moments thanks to the love and support of family and friends and when I'm not distracted I have the feelings of sadness and frustration. But I accept those feelings as well. What I have noticed is that the less I fight them the quicker they are to leave. Instead of adding fuel to the flame with emotion I give myself a mental hug and say this is all going to pass. And I will rise from all this a stronger and wiser person. These things happen in endless waves to everyone on this planet. It's an inevitable truth of life.
3 months later after the injury, I am walking. With the slower paced tempo than I am used to, I have learned greater respect for my body and the processes necessary to stay healthy. My diet and exercise have had to change for the better. With my wife leaving I have gained a deeper connection with myself and the respect for her boundaries as well as my own in order to heal up the wounds of a love that turned sour. The passing of my grandma allowed me to have a reminder of how precious life's moments and lessons are constantly shaping us with unorthodox pieces of training and valuable insights.
Of course, I still have moments where I can self soothe by giving up hope and saying that all of this happened TO ME. But through experience I have learned to make it my default that these events happened FOR ME. I gained patience, compassion, gratitude, and awareness of the feelings that are sometimes misleading us to believe that the world is unfair. But I assure you that if you take an extra moment to learn from the millions of mistakes you make and improve on them you will always end up a better person than if you blame others and hold onto the negative emotions that course through your body. This process is very present in our media today. Find the most outrageous and scary topics and amplify them. The business model is if you present the horrible side of things people will buy into the drugs, possessions and status that will numb them to the reality that they are still stuck with their inner thoughts. But if you master your inner thoughts to not want those things your outside will reflect that and you will no longer be enslaved by your emotions and urges. Instead you will be in control over your circumstances whatever they may be. Which in my humble opinion is the underlying appeal to having those things. The money will make life easier, drugs are a temporary vacation from feelings and status will grant you access to more opportunity. But what if I told you that no matter where you go, and what you have, you are still you and you can be just as unhappy and dissatisfied if your inner work hasn't been done. So accept that where you're at today is your choice and you can only start there. You can't undo anything that has been done. You can't even anticipate the future. Just devote the same energy you would have to follow a media story or celebrity and make your life the primary focus. What good are we if we don't ensure our own survival first? You can't do much to help others if you're dead or depressed. And sometimes that first step is asking for help. My greatest lesson in all of this is that. I tried to take everything on my own but I crashed and burned. I could not overcome all of this on my own. So I asked for help and now I am here writing to say that you have the capacity in you to ask someone for help... You deserve help. Even if that means reaching out to a random person writing about their struggles online like me.
~Supernormal