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When I was 19, a boy drowned at the pool where I worked. I was the first responder. This is the story of that day as I remember it.

Dedicated to Murphy Shurig. Aug 4, 2002

This post is part of my 30 day creative writing challenge. Click here to learn more about the challenge or explore the other posts in this series.

“Lifeguard, lifeguard!”

The screams were coming from a group of boys who moments ago were playing and throwing a ball back and forth. They were regulars at the pool but I didn’t know any of them well.

This was my first summer at this particular pool, so I hadn’t gotten to know all of the pool rats yet. I did know that they were all above average swimmers though. They were also just on the edge of my zone, (the part of the pool a lifeguard is responsible for watching). It was right where my zone and the other life guard’s zone intersected.

I thought they might be trying to get my attention as part of a game they were playing, something that is not all that uncommon. But when I looked over, I saw them holding up one of their friends. They were lifting him to the edge of the pool.

I looked over in time to see them setting him up on the edge and let him go. Just in time to watch his pale body fall lifeless to the deck.

And then time stopped…

THIS IS NOT A DRILL!!!

In what seemed like slow motion, I jumped from my platform on the guard chair down to the ground. I’m not sure why, but as I ran over to where the boy was laying, I pulled the whistle and lanyard from around my neck and flung it away.

When I got to where they had dropped his body I saw my worst nightmare laying on the ground in front of me. His skin tone was not natural. Not blue like they show in the movies, but not like any color skin I had ever seen before.

I checked for a pulse. It was there, but it was weak. The manager on duty must have noticed that something was going on because she started to walk over.

I screamed at someone  nearby to call 911, and ran to the guard shack for gloves and a mask. Thing I should have had on me at the time.

When I got back, the manager had starting rescue breathing. She must not have had the airway opened properly because that air went right into his stomach and not his lungs.

How do I know? Because vomit, that’s how. Lot’s of it. Right into her mouth!

Watching the kid throw up should have thrilled me, except this was not voluntarily evacuation. The air she was breathing into his stomach just needed to escape… along with whatever he had eaten for lunch.

I straddled his lifeless body and started thrusting above his pelvis and just below the belly button. Pelvic thrusts to make sure the airway was clear and to help purge the rest of whatever was left in his stomach so we could try the breaths again.

She cleared his mouth with her finger, put the mask over his mouth and tried to give him another breath. He threw up again but this time was different. This was a mild mix of foamy whiteness and whatever else was left in him from the previous purge.

I look to my right, towards the two other pools. The rest of the lifeguards are still sitting in their chairs. People swimming as if nothing was happening. I noticed that the lifeguard who had her back to me was turned around to see what was going on. I could tell she was crying. I can’t imagine what it would feel like to sit there and not be able to react.

My first thought was anger. “Why aren’t you helping?” And then I realized it was actually a good thing. It was a big facility and if they had cleared the pools, a huge crowd would be gathering around us.

Even then, a crowd was forming. Small at first, but the people who had cleared the slide pool were starting to notice that something was seriously wrong.

I continue scanning the scene. It was like time was frozen but I wasn’t.

I locked eyes with a mom who was standing there with her two kids. One on either side of her, under each arm.

“Get them out of here!” I shouted in her direction.

Where is the other lifeguard that was watching the slide pool with me? Shouldn’t she be handling crowd control? Did anyone call the paramedics? Breathe kid, Please just take a breath on your own! Dozens of thoughts were shooting through my head all at once.

I finally see the other guard. She’s standing over by the front gate, probably waiting for the paramedics. She was also crying.

I look back down, another breath, still nothing. I check for a pulse again. It’s there, but barely. No chest compressions, yet.

It get’s a little fuzzy from there, but those few minutes felt like forever. The next thing I know the paramedics were there and it was all I could do to get away from the seemingly lifeless body.

I took a step back and fell to my knees. How could this be happening to me?

I was prepared for this. I was the guard who was always stressing the importance of training. I was the guard who suggested that we start doing weekly in-service trainings, but “that would not be necessary at this pool!” is what I was told it.

“We’ve never had a drowning or major accident at this pool. There is no need for that kind of training.”

That’s what the manager told me earlier that summer. The same one who had just been mouth-to-mouth with a lifeless 13 year old boy.

What a shitty time to be thinking I told you so!

That was just a few days before another ominous conversation I had at the beginning of that summer. A conversation in which I told my girlfriend at the time (a lifeguard at the same facility) that “Someone is going to die at this pool.”

I wasn’t specifically saying that someone would die that summer, but I sure as shit said it, and I hate that about myself. I hate that I saw it coming and still did nothing.

I saw that the training was lax and that to most of the seasonal staff, life guarding was about getting a great tan and hanging at the pool all summer. They were all strong swimmers, and the pool was in a wealthy neighborhood. After all, things like that aren’t supposed to happen here.

At least that is what they thought, before that day.

Could I have done more?

I hated myself for not being more vocal. For not being more adamant when I saw someone sitting in their chair sideways, or ignoring the pool. I should have spoken up when I saw someone using the rescue tube as a pillow, or reclining in their chair for a better tanning position. But I was the new guy. What was I gonna to do?

It wasn’t like I spent the summer before that managing a another local pool, and the summer before that working the wave pool at a large water park. I quit counting after 100 rescues that summer. But not at this pool.

There we were, half way through the summer, and I hadn’t made a single rescue. Maybe they were right. Maybe nothing bad was ever going to happen here.

So I started to relax. I started to become complaisant. Mostly I just wanted to fit in. And after a few times of being called “Pool Nazi,” I decided to roll with the cool kids. I decided to set my intuition aside and do things their way. I decided to drop my guard.

But I should have known better. Because I was also the guy who had been through everything you could ever go through as a lifeguard. I was the guy who knew, that at any moment, something could go wrong. The one who should have been prepared. But there I was. The first responder, and unprepared. I was the guy who failed. And it might have cost the kid his life.

To make things worse…

The police wanted to talk to us right away. They took me and the other guard, the one who had run to the front gate to wait for the ambulance, and put us in the back of a cop car to fill out the required reports. A cop car that just so happened to be sitting at the base of the steps that lead to the entrance of the pool.

It left us sitting so that everyone leaving the pool, as it was being cleared, would have to walk by and see us sitting in the back of that car. I felt like a criminal. I couldn’t stop shaking. No tears though, those would come later.

After I was done with the police I went into the office where some of the pool staff and management was talking. I remember trying to call my parents to come pick me up, driving was out of the question. My dad answered the phone.

Before I could get a single word out, I started bawling. Uncontrollable tears as the reality of the event began to set in. One of the managers, or maybe one of the board members (I can’t really remember) took the phone from me to explain the situation and have them come pick me up. I was 19 years old.

A piece of me died that day, even though the kid lived. But just barely. He would never regain consciousness.

It would take me more than a decade to realize how this event had changed my entire trajectory. To realize that it sent me on a spiral of self destruction that would eventually lead me to drop out of college, move across state lines and bury myself in whatever distraction I could find.

I spent a lot of time at his bedside the next few days, until the family decided to take him off of life support. His pain was over. But mine was just beginning.

A final round of tests during an autopsy revealed that he suffered from some sort of heart condition. It just happened to hit him while he was under water. They said that the same thing might have happened to him if he was playing at a baseball diamond, or in his back yard.

But he wasn’t at a baseball diamond. He wasn’t playing in his back yard, was he? He was at a pool. He was at my pool. And I was the guy. I could have saved him!

I was left to replay the events of that day in my head over and over. Wondering what I could have done differently. Knowing that none of those thoughts were productive but allowing them to eat at me nonetheless.

The local fire station set up some counseling for us, but it wasn’t at all helpful. How was an hour of talking going to change anything? The memory would be forever engrained in the deepest creases of my mind.

I would later meet with the boy’s parents and deliver a letter I had written to them.  Two letters actually.

One was a firsthand account of the events of that day (in a sealed envelope in case they didn’t want to read it) and the other was a letter offering myself to them, in whatever way they might have me.

They never blamed me for the events of that day, but they didn’t have to. My worst fear had come true, and I blamed myself.

 

This post is part of my 30 day creative writing challenge. Click here to learn more about the challenge or explore the other posts in this series.

Today I saw myself in another man and hated what I saw

I was in an argument that had absolutely no purpose. An argument, simply for the sake of arguing. Picking sides in a battle because I had to be right, but by the time I noticed, it was already too late.

I was too stubborn to step back and too determined to prove to myself that I was right. Because, well… I was right.

But so was he. Kind of.

And so there we sat. Both right, yelling at each other for no real reason, and then I saw it.

I saw myself.

Looking at this man I saw myself arguing with so many others over the course of my life. Defending my position because I was already emotionally committed to the argument.

Unwilling to humble myself because my macho man mechanism was in full force.

I hated that moment. It made me realize how it must feel to sit on the other side of a stubborn mule like myself. I found myself in the middle of the same argument that I must have had a hundred times before. Almost always as the immovable rock.

So as hard as it is for me to do, I tried to humble myself. I tried to take a step back but I couldn’t fully disengage. I still had enough of the old me left in the tank to try and show him how much like me he was actually being. But it was of no use.

He had no interest in having himself tell himself how much like himself he was acting.

And it was in that very moment that I grew. As if I had hit a psychological growth spurt. As I sat there dumbfounded, caught in this real life freeze-frame of a time, not long ago, when I was the one who was arguing recklessly. Oblivious to the futility of it all.

It was in that moment that I realized how childish I have been all along and quite often still am. It was in that moment that I realized there was no sense in being right if all it meant was feeling wrong.

And so it ended. Another tough lesson in this game we call life, but one we would all be well served to learn. Maybe next time, I’ll see myself in a man and like what I see. And maybe I’ll learn how to be more like him. Maybe I’ll learn to swallow my pride and take a step back. Or maybe, I’ll just do it all over again, like I have before.

After all, do any of us ever really change?

Are you a writer? Ever have a desire to write? Click the button below to learn more about my 30 day creative writing challenge and learn how you can empower yourself through your words and the words of others.

 

An in your face article that challenges you to consider the real reason our country is in turmoil. Who is really to blame?

This post is part of my 30 day creative writing challenge. Click here to learn more about the challenge or explore the other posts in this series.

Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.

– Ralph Waldo Emerson –

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First of all, lets set some ground rules!

The word “fuck” is in the title of this article! So If you keep reading it and then decide to bitch at me for using it again later, then that’s on you. Don’t come crying to me in the comments or on social media about how inappropriate my use of the word is or how much it offends your sensibilities.

After all, If a couple f-bombs are all it takes to keep you away from what I am about to say, then imagine what other wonders of the world you are missing out on while hanging from that noose of naiveté.

Secondly…

Fuck YOU!

That’s right, I said it! And you’ll be lucky to get one or two people throughout the course of your life who are willing to be as honest with you on a consistent basis as I am about to be.

The truth is that everything is not going to be alright. Things are not a-okay, and the world we live in is full of people who will fuck you over as soon as you give them a chance. People who will hand you a dollar bill to help you pay the rent while stealing your house from the guy who rents it to you.

People who care about nothing more than using you as their philandering whore. Who give you just enough to keep you happy, and feeling free. A type of 21st century slavery. Something that will leave generations to come as slaves to a silent master. And do you know why?

Because fuck you, that’s why!

Our country was founded by people who felt that freedom was part of a natural law. A right that should not be intruded upon by men. But the country they gave us has been overrun by people who have strategically played the system on both sides in order to control a game bigger than you might even be willing to consider. And they are doing it all right under our noses. Do you know why?

Because fuck you, that’s why.

The books have been cooked for a long time now and the real reason that things are not getting better is because as a species, we need to be pushed to the brink in order for us to break. Its a fundamental flaw of human nature. One that leads us to fall prey to the pied piper time and time again.

So I know these words might piss you off, but you know what… I don’t much care. And do you know why?

Because fuck you, that’s why.

For not seeing that the the people in control want you to hate me. For letting them make you think you do hate me. Not because of who I am, but because of the labels they have given us. For not seeing that they are in control of our education and the entire national conversation. Only letting us know what they want us to know and burring the rest with streams of misinformation in order to further confuse us.

For not seeing how easily humans are controlled on a mass scale. For not understanding the fundamental nature of our educational, religious, media and government institutions. For letting them pass off their own doctrine as that of the majority.

For going in to work each day and selling your soul to do something you hate. For not selling out to your passions and for not chasing your dreams. For not being willing to create an opportunity if your path is not clear. And for hating those who do.

For not playing more. For not spending more time laughing! For acting your age. For living life as if you were on a stage. Always on call, always taking the easy path to ensure you don’t fall.

For thinking you deserve something. For thinking that because you had something yesterday it’s still yours today, or that you won’t need to keep busting your ass in order to keep it. For not realizing that nothing is permanent in this life, and that the world will erase you as fast as you let it.

For not recognizing that our society is still in its infancy. For not knowing that the American experiment was a gamble on mankind as a whole. That it was an all-in bet on whether or not man could rule themselves.

For not understanding the consequences of giving the government overarching rule and control of the means of production. For getting mad at lobbyist in Washington but allowing them to enter your house in high definition for hours a day in the form of entertainment and news. For being a hypocrite and not even knowing it.

For knowing and still standing by. For not participating in local elections. For not looking for something more than superficial. Fuck you for not seeing that our society has been designed to do exactly what is happening right now. For not seeing that the rug is about to be yanked out from underneath our feet and put us on all on our asses.

For thinking that we can give the same assholes who drove us into this collapse, the keys to the tow truck that is supposed to pull us out of it. For not seeing that Democrats and Republicans are both pieces of the same puzzle. A large game of chess that has been played on a global scale. One that will never end. One that will be played over and over again, everyone available for sacrifice. Other than the royalty that is.

So fuck you for all of that. For being a doormat. For lying there on the ground so flat. For watching idly by as the the world falls down. And for sitting quietly on the leash while continually being pulled around.

And fuck me too, for blaming you. Because if it’s true for you, then it’s true for me too. Because we all sit around and pretend like it’s not our fault, but in the end, who else is there?

So… What the fuck are we gonna do about it?

 

A short poem about self doubt and the process of being consumed by the unhealthy thoughts that often creep into our heads. Day 4 #30DOT

Click here to learn more about my 30 Days of Thought Challenge

We have all heard Einsteins definition of insanity (or was it a Chinese proverb?) as doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. It is something that people throw out via meme, tweet, t-shirt, bumper sticker etc. yet, almost every one of us continues to do the same thing day after day. We are after all, creatures of habit. And I am not the exception.

I like to talk shit about how the world works and bloviate about politics and philosophy, but I rarely take the time to look at myself. Sure I beat myself up here and there, but I rarely talk in depth about my real flaws or focus on the fact that I am often part of the problem, not of the solution.

Give me a website that is not converting and I can show you how to drive traffic, build engagement and increase conversions. It’s like optimizing digital products comes naturally to me, but ask me to fix myself and the blinders come on. My ego throws up a wall that stops me from objectively looking at what is really wrong. I raise the barriers and start to defend my behaviors. I get frustrated and of course, nothing changes. Then, like clockwork, I begin to hate myself for being so stubborn.

But today I am trying something different. Today is the first of my 30 Days of Thought Challenge, and I have decided to do something completely different today than I have done every day for the last 5+ years of my life. Starting with this post and the admission that I need to change myself before I can ask or guide others to change themselves.

That being said, not only am I starting a writing challenge, but I will also be working to change a few of my bad behaviors over the next 29 days as well. For instance, today I set and alarm for the first time in years, I woke up early and I even thought about eating a healthy lunch. See, who says you can’t teach an old dog new tricks? But those are all surface issues and this is where I hit my first real barrier.

You see, I have been struggling with a few issues that I am not sure I’m ready to share just yet, but I have a sneaky suspicion that they may all come out during the course of this challenge. I intend to purge my mind, body and spirit over the next 30 days and I’m going to do it right here on this blog. So I hope you’ll join me because I am going to need your support in sticking with this thing.

If you do decide to join me on this quest, thenfeel free to share your 30 Days of Thought with me as we go along. Feel free to use the same format, and then share your thoughts in the comments of each article or send them via email to 30DOT@raymmar.com

You can also share with us on social media by tweeting @RayTirado and using the #30DOT in your posts!

That is all for today. See you fuckers tomorrow.

Just a note:

Most of my blog articles are super long and heady. This challenge is not about posting long, well articulated arguments about how the world works. This experiment is about sticking to a new set of behaviors over the next 30 days in order to try and change some of my stubborn habits. That being said, these posts may be all over the place. Think of them as unedited journal entires. There may be some typos here and there and sometimes they might be short, sometimes they might be super long. At the end of the day, I am just challenging myself to stick with it for 30 days and then look back from there.

I challenge you to join me in organizing your thoughts and connecting with the real you. #30DOT

In a world where genetic modification is on its way to becoming the norm, are we really going to sit and scream at the TV because a guy gave into the temptation to do everything possible to become the god that we all propped him up to be?

“He’s Out!”

Alex Rodriguez finally admits to using steroids.

Yet another major headline from the professional sporting world. Another news cycle spent talking about the use of performance enhancing drugs instead of the real issues that ail our country. But let’s be honest. Do we really even care anymore?

After all, we are talking about the business of entertaining masses? The “purity of sport” argument has long since passed (at least in the professional arena) and now, all we are left with are large corporate machines that only care about selling tickets, driving advertising revenue, and presenting the allure of exclusivity.

Sure the athletes need training and talent, but if a technology exists that can make you better at what you do, then why wouldn’t you use it?

If your goal is to be the strongest, fastest, most home run hitting dude in the world then why wouldn’t you find every tool known to man to make that a reality.

Alex-rodriguez-busted-for-steroidsAfter all…

the steroids didn’t make him a great ball player, they just amplified the skills he already had. I could take all the steroids in the world but if you put me at the plate and throw me a 90mph fast ball, the only thing I’m going to do is get the hell out of the way.

These athletes already have such an advantage in training, equipment, medical care, etc that the concept of restricting their access to a performance enhancing drug is like telling a diabetic that they can use insulin but not the pump that automatically regulates its flow into the body.

We let these athletes use injections to limit swelling and speed up the recovery process, even in the middle of a game. They study themselves in labs to focus on heart rates, breathing, and perfecting their techniques. Peak performance is presented as the only acceptable outcome and then we have the audacity to get mad when someone finds a shortcut to better performance.

How hypocritical of all of us.

Who among us is not looking for an advantage to do better in this game called life right now? We have become a society of cheaters, and as much as we want to pretend that we’re all goody two-shoes and living a perfect life, we are all guilty of looking for shortcuts at one point or another. We actually glorify it in business, politics and education, but god forbid we see it in sports.

alex-rodriguez-shaking hands-steroids-attorneysIn a world where genetic modification is on its way to becoming the norm, are we really going to sit and scream at the TV because a guy gave into the temptation to do everything possible to become the god that we all propped him up to be?

At the very least, we should be willing to be honest with ourselves about the hypocrisy of all of it.

Imagine if…

We told Hollywood actors that they were no longer allowed to be in another movie if they have undergone plastic surgery. Or what if we told all the magazine publishers that they are no longer allowed to Photoshop the images that they use inside of their publications.

Maybe next we’ll try to tell college kids who take Adderall that their test scores are invalid or the pregnant mother that she has to suffer through the pain of child birth because the epidural would artificially dull the pain. I know, let’s tell the banks that they can no longer lend money to anyone who doesn’t already have the same amount sitting in the bank as collateral. That way no one can gain an unfair financial advantage in the world.

It would be absurd to present any of these arguments on a massive scale and you might even get laughed off the map for doing so, but every one of these things is an artificial enhancement to our ability to perform . Not all narcotics but each of them important drugs on which our society is wholly dependent.

We love drugs. Especially the ones we’re not allowed to have.

We love the erotic drugs of pornography and hedonism, and we spend more money on legal drugs (coffee, cigarettes and prescriptions etc.) than any other country on the planet. We have statewide battles to legalize drugs from plants that grow naturally all around us and everywhere you look, people are gorging on something that is intended to either make them perform better or at the very least, feel better about themselves.

We live in a world where superficial is really all that matters to most of us, so why should we get upset when someone skirts the system to bring the best version of themselves to the surface?

Aren’t we all addicted to something?

Whether it’s technology, relationships, food, alcohol, or any of the other things we rely on to distract us from ourselves. We love it when our performance is enhanced. We love things that make us faster and allow us to do more with less.

Isn’t that the holy grail of life? Business? To gain a competitive advantage? To find something to set yourself apart from everyone else? Something that makes you better, more appealing and ultimately gives you some level of power over others.

mlb-steroid-investigation-baseballWhy then do we all pretend to be so outraged when we find out that one of our heroes is just like us? That he too is human and that in spite of everything we made him out to be, he turned out to be just another man.

Is it that we are disappointed to find out that even our heroes are fallible?

Are we incapable of admitting to ourselves that when we turn on the TV to watch a professional sporting event, we are tuning into the modern day version of the Roman Coliseum? Are we scared to admit that we have an unhealthy dependence on this drug called entertainment?

Furthermore, if we’re going to keep living with this societal addiction, then why not give in and let it be the best of all addictions? Why not lift the ban and watch someone hit a 700 foot home run? Why not let them run faster, jump higher, hit each other harder and score more points? Wouldn’t that be ultimately more entertaining?

In closing

I say go ahead, show me your surgically modified, genetically altered, steroid injected, best version of yourself. Why not hide the parts of your that are real? Why wouldn’t you show off the parts that you make perfect for public consumption. After all, the cool kids are already doing it.

And if we’re all going to keep pretending to be better than we actually are, then why shouldn’t everyone else have the same opportunity? Even a professional athlete.

Image credit and read more about the A-Rod news here.

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We can steer our boats around the rocks and so we assume that we are in control but we are but a spec, floating on the surface.

Sticks and stones my ass. Words hurt like hell and they have the power to destroy. They can control you, drive you, push and pull you. Words are all things and words are nothing. Everything is a word, and according to Urban Dictionary, so is this but…

What exactly is a word?

If you Google the word “word,” you get this:

noun – 1. a single distinct meaningful element of speech or writing, used with others (or sometimes alone) to form a sentence and typically shown with a space on either side when written or printed.

And if you dig a little deeper, (all the way down to the next result) you find this definition:

: a sound or combination of sounds that has a meaning and is spoken or written

or

: a brief remark or conversation : something that a person says

Getting closer but words are stronger than that

Words are the foundation of everything we do; of everything we are. They are the mechanism by which you are currently reading my thoughts, and they are the core components of communication in any real sense.

There is no other way to describe in detail, the events of any particular moment in time, without diving into the words of some other individuals reality. And even if you could, how would you describe it without words?

Sure there are pictures and video, but the world captured inside of them must also rely upon words.

Words are the purpose of art.

Art is the visual expression of the words inside of an artists head. The visual representation of emotion. Interpretations designed to spark thought. Thoughts that can drive words from your mind to your mouth. From pen to paper.

A writer must paint with no brush and shoot video with no camera. They must reach through the eyes of a reader using these silly arrangements of letters that we call words, and those words must appeal to intellect, as well as emotion. They must move the audience with substance, not simply with style.

Words are pictures that develop right in front of the readers eyes. A painting that is perpetually being painted. A writers canvas is the reader’s brain and his medium is the combined thoughts and ideas of each individual reader themselves. Impossible to be completely understood unless the message is received in context and in its entirety.

Writing is a form of art where each observer is required to participate actively in order for its true impact to be felt. The reader must give in and allow the author access to their brain. Leaving them completely exposed, if only briefly, to the mind of another man.

Words are the DNA of language. They are the root of commerce, the basis for human interaction, and most definitely the ruler of every religion.

Put words in an old enough book and they become history. A snapshot from another world, a moment captured in time and displayed for anyone to explore.

Words are the ultimate level playing field.

Words allow you to travel through time, and are entrusted with recording history. They are the sum knowledge of our entire species, and are a requisite to educate and inform societies. It is the responsibility of words to fill the pages on the scripts of life.

Words, or the lack thereof, are the root of every battle between good and evil.

Those who can use words to captivate audiences and project their visions clearly are the ones that get to shape the futures of the world we live in.

They are the visionaries and the entrepreneurs, the psychologists and the sociologists. Words are the engineers and architects, the designers and the developers, the you’s and the me’s. Words are everything and we should all have them as friends.

You should learn to play with them regularly. Because the more time you spend with words, the more power those words will give you in return.

You should learn to respect and revere them. Listen, read, and hear them. You should find a way to explore new things because each new experience leads to new words, which then become stories, that then become you.

But what do I know, after all, these are only words.

A short poem about the American mindset and the peril we face as we cling to what is left of our individual freedoms. #AskHardQuestions

Go to school, get a job
Buy a car, then get married
Pile up debt, Wear the facade
Don’t look up, ‘til you’re buried
Get lost in the mob
Treat the world like a slob
Become a slave to your job
Then get what you can
Because you’re American
And we deserve it all
So just watch as it falls
Then, get down on your knees
Because we’re no longer free

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The Importance of Learning to Control Your Inner Killer

In this podcast we explore the power of a positive attitude and expose the human predisposition to being controlled as a species.

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As always, if you want to skip over the introduction, you can do so by jumping to the 1:40 mark. Just remember, a polar bear will be left stranded on an iceberg every time someone does this.

1:40 – The Power of Positivity

Pretending to be positive is a powerful way to impact the world around you.

Most sales people are trained in the art of pretending to be positive but it is something that we would all be well served to learn. People underestimate the impact that positive thought can have on the lives of the people around them. Especially if you can find a way to stay positive on a regular basis.

When you understand that we all have problems that we are dealing with and that complaining about your particular problems does nothing other than push the people around you away, then you can finally start to see the real power of positive thinking. Even if you struggle with the execution early on.

Now, I am not talking about stupid, overbearing, goofy-faced pretending. I am talking about genuinely believing that things in your life are good and will get better. Start believing it or others will see it for exactly what it is. Fake.

The truth about happiness – Read the full article

3:09 – The slave mentality

Humans have delegated their entire existence to external controls. Everything outside of entertainment and the facade of education that is. We have given up on trying to understand the world around us and how it really works and instead accept whatever the popular belief is, regardless of how easy the truth might actually be to access.

We have given ultimate control of our lives to the government and we have become slaves to our elected leaders and the corporations that place them.

We are slaves to our lives, jobs, debt, drugs and on and on.

The perversions of our attitudes and over all psyches have been so completely corrupted, that we are actually satisfied in our slavery. The lack of individual accountability has put is in a precarious place as a population and the uninformed masses that make up the membership of that new majority are dragging us all towards mediocrity.

solving-problems-like-a-psychopath

“The world is a very dangerous place. Not because bad people do bad things, but because most people do nothing.” – Albert Einstein –

5:50 – It’s a cancer really

The distractions have been purposeful and direct. What we are watching sprout up around us, is the fruit of more than a hundred years of hard labor. The culmination of closet communism in America. Something that the whole world seems to be running from, while we  (America) run towards it with open arms.

The good news is that people are waking up to the truth. Every day people like you are listening to podcasts like these and reading articles like these to learn more about what is really going on in this country.

I think more people need to be reading and exploring the history our founding, where we came from and where we are going. Understand the ultimate fallibility of man and the inherent nature of large societies to self destruct. It has happened over and over again throughout history, yet we continue to accept it as if everything were ok.

8:10 – How to claim your superpower

Becoming bulletproof is important to finding your place in the world. Learn how to be comfortable in your own skin by finding beauty in your individual flaws. So many of us are worried about what is going on in the world of others more than worrying about our own world as a whole.

How to claim your super power Read the full article

A community of support

None of this is going to be easy. It is up to you to apply and execute these ideas as they apply to your particular place in life. If you want to dig deeper and join the conversation then register as an early adopter and then join us in the forums.

10:18 –  It’s not always easy

It is important to understand how powerful a shift you can make in your own life (as well as the life of others) by allowing yourself to commit completely to making these changes. To convince yourself that you are actually able to do it.

You may have to fake it before you make it early on, but I promise that over the time, you will love the new, freer, you. The people around you will love you more too. They will actually be able to see you. Maybe even for the first time.

12:05 – Let’s not pretend that pretending is always enough

Just pretending to be positive is not going to cut it.

Some days you may have to go to war with yourself, all on your own. Depression and self imposed hurdles are real, and pretending to be happy is never enough. Eventually you have to buy into the idea of actually finding fulfillment in whatever it is you are trying to do and let it consume you from the inside out.

13:45 – What if money didn’t matter?

What if we just give everyone a million bucks? Think about it.  It would cost pennies on the dollar compared to the level of debt we are burying ourselves under as a society and it would instantly free us all of the constraints of our current monetary monopoly. Or would it?

You might think that by giving everyone a million dollars, you’d make everyone rich, but what it would really do is expose the trivial nature of the mirage we call money. Imagine how devalued the dollar would become if all of a sudden, it was all actually spendable, by you and I, the average person.

Flooding the market with that much cash would expose the nature of our monopoly money. It would make the entire system instantly irrelevant. It just goes to show how perverted everything about our monetary system actually is, and why it is important that the average American do a better job of understanding the monetary policy that has enslaved us all so effectively.

15:50 – A cure for depression?

Disclaimer: I am not a psychiatrist and you should not take my thoughts as mental health advice. I am only offering my perspective, insights and personal points of view that has helped me cope with my depression personally. 

Acknowledging the dark thoughts and exploring the evil nature of your negative emotions is an important step in your development as enlightened individuals. You have to explore the boundaries of your positive and negative thoughts, if only in your own head, in order to understand the limits of what someone else might do without your level of control.

You have to learn that those dark thoughts and the crazy voices in your head are just other parts of you.You must learn to embrace and control them, just as you control any other part of your emotional interactions in life.

Depression can make that difficult but these theories can help. Take it from a guy who has struggled with depression his whole life. These tips may not cure your depression but they can definitely help you understand and manage it.

You also have to understand that these emotions do not define you. You can have these thoughts and know that they are not in control of your actions. Exploring these thoughts in depth is really the same as exploring the other thoughts and desires for knowledge that you might have through life. All a part of the insatiable curiosity I try to inspire with the content on this website.

18:20 – Solving problems like a psychopath

Embracing these thoughts and learning to use them as pieces of the bigger puzzle that is your life, can really help set yourself free. Many powerful professionals and personalities have characteristics that are common among psychopaths.

Buy the book – The Wisdom of Psychopaths

Knowing and understanding those boundaries will allow you to understand that there is real evil in this world. An understanding that can lead you to strength and eventual mastery of the thoughts in your head.

20:00 – Are you even capable of succeeding

So many times we are responsible for holding ourselves back. While the whole world is waking up to the idea of mass slavery, America (the one place on earth where people actually found freedom) is succumbing to a type of soft-tyrannical control.

21:10 – Getting fucked

It is your responsibility in life to not get fucked.

Not that I am excusing the people who are doing the fucking, but it is ultimately your responsibility to provide yourself with an adequate defense against all of the fuckery in this world.

Each of us enjoys a certain level of chaos, so it is natural for us to find comfort inside of a certain level of it, but more often than not, you are the very reason why you will never do anything amazing with your life.

23:50 – Why you should think about robbing a bank

Seeing the world from the perspective of a master criminal allows you to see all the angles.

When you allow yourself to see the world as if you were trying to rob it blind, then you can see where all of it’s weaknesses are masterfully hidden.

This is the same reason hackers are important to website security and why master criminals make great informants. They are uniquely qualified to exploit the flaws of whatever system they are tasked to sabotage, and then find creative ways to fix them. This is the very approach I propose  for solving problems in life. It is the reason for this podcast and a large  reason behind much of what I do.

I think the average person walks around this world completely clueless to what is going on and I plan on doing all I can to reverse that trend.

 

Why fitting in is not what it seems and why you should avoid it at all costs.

You see them all the time.

The cool people.

The person you wish you could be.

The people we all wish we could be.

We look up to them, want to be them, wish we could grow up to be… “Just Like Mike!”

The people who convince you that you can only be cool if you look, act and do what they do. Eat, drive and play like they do. Fuck, slut and strut, exactly like they do.

More and more in society we deify these individuals and prop them up on pedestals, in place of ourselves and our peers.

Instead of promoting the exploration of a deeper inner-consciousness (one where we might actually find ourselves) we promote a collective unconsciousness. One that that has infected our entire society.

We find ourselves entertained by our lack of education and enthralled by our erotic inclinations.

We exalt the men who make us think that in order to fit-in we must give-in. They make us feel like we should relinquish our thoughts and accept theirs instead. I mean, everyone else is already doing it. You want to be like the rest of the class don’t you?

You know who I am talking about: The politicians, corporations, large religious organizations etc. Basically anyone who’s agenda it is to manage the masses. The ones who hide their message in plain sight. The ones who tell us we’re wrong any time we try to fight.

They lurk all around us. Tempting us to give up our hopes in exchange for theirs. Convincing us that individual endeavors are arbitrarily inappropriate. That if you really want to “be cool” you’ll think about the collective. Sacrifice yourself for the greater good. Fit-in to get-in. You know the rules.

The basic concepts behind the game haven’t changed since you were in elementary school. The stakes however, those have changed. Dramatically.

Now we’re playing for keeps. We are playing for souls, and life-savings. For products and for professions. We are allowing our whole lives to be played like pawns in a game. Small steps forward, always at the command of someone else.

The cool people have always liked to collect other cool people. The “elites” always entice the masses with the simplest of notions. But it is the independent thinkers that live on the outside of their influence that make them worry. The ones who stand free from the restriction of their opinions. The few who think for themselves.

We make them feel uneasy about their intentions, even if their intentions are good. But take note, it is rarely the well intentioned who plead for you to “understand.” It is often those who would lead you astray that would have you change your way.

The cool kids are always worried about what brand of clothes you are wearing and the make and model of the car you drive. They want you to worry about possessions because things are beautiful distractions. But us? We ask you to convince yourself. We pass on our information and then suggest you look more than skin deep. That you make an effort to find the answers on your own.

We must not label ourselves on the premise of “have” and “have-not,” but instead on the concept of “does” and “does-not.” We must base our interactions on what each of us as individuals are contributing to society as a whole. Forgetting about how we can fit in and focusing instead on how we can bend the world around us.

In what way can you make a mark? How can you make the world want to fit in with you? In what way can you move the masses? How can you turn the tables on the establishment?

Because the truth is that the majority of people in this world will never lose a minute of sleep thinking about you. They will not care whether you are depressed and want to kill yourself, can’t get laid or can’t get paid.

Whatever it is that is holding you back is your own puzzle to solve. It is up to you to go out there and make the best of whatever circumstances life has dealt you. It is up to you to look at life and the world as something more to explore. It is up to you to make yourself impossible to ignore.

So if you ask me, (and I know you didn’t) I say “Fuck the cool kids,” those assholes always run away when things gets hard. Forget about fitting in and go find yourself instead. I bet we’d all like that version of you a lot more anyway.

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Imagine if you were forced to live in a portable jail cell. A dark, dingy dungeon that moved with you wherever you went.

A portable penitentiary. One in which you were inmate, the guards and the warden.

Now imagine never being able to leave that dungeon.

Imagine living your entire life inside of that cell.

Imagine that the whole world sees you as free but you understand the severity of the sentence that you must serve.

A sentence that has no beginning, no middle and no end. Cursed, from birth till death.

I keep you trapped in your own mental prison, but not a shiny new one.

There are no white walls or stainless steel toilets in this prison.

No luxuries from the modern world to save you from your solidarity.

I am a middievil dungeon. One that has enslaved man from the beginning of time.

Stone walls stuffed with the suffering of many, sealed inside of steel bars that never seem to budge.

There is a slow drip from the damp ceiling.

The drops of depression land on your head as if they were dew from the devil himself. Each day leaving the fresh sparkle of skepticism.

Each day another struggle to stand up.

Each day another demoralizing defeat at the hands of your own demise.

You reach out, grasping for whatever you can find, anything to help you cope.

Drugs, alcohol, and sex offer a temporary release but often end up reminding us of the evils we are trying to escape.

You stare into your phone, and then off into space, searching for someone, something more than superficial. But, no amount of social sharing is going to separate you from this solitude.

You feel the answer inside of you as if the key were hiding in plain sight. As if you could just reach down and unlock the door of depression and just let yourself out.

You feel like you might finally get to step outside and know what it’s like to live totally free.

As if there was a magical cure for this disease that devours you, but be sure that this dungeon has no entrance, and no escape.

I am not a place where others can come to visit. This is not a place that others get to see.

I simply am. All around. Inside of you. Inside of me.

Every so often that place leaves us be and for a brief moment we are shown that key.

A key that you think might set you free but its just another false sense of reality.

It’s just another hope that will never happen. A sight you’ll never actually see.

Some days you feel like you may not survive and some days you’ll feel like I might just set you free.

But you would be wrong, I’ll never let you leave.

I am your depression, this is your dungeon and you will never escape me.

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I am willing to pay whatever the price may be, for being unabashedly me.

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So… What’s Your Biggest Fear?

I was with a friend the other day, and as I was about to leave she asked me a simple question.

She looked me straight in the face, and asked me what I was afraid of.

She caught me a little off guard with that question, and I said to myself, “This bitch is trying to be my mamma.”

I couldn’t tell if I was bothered because of the nature of the question, or because I felt like maybe she could already see the answer.

I puffed my chest out like a proper macho-man and said, “I am not scared of anything!”

But then, I started to think

My heart sunk into my stomach as I came to the realization that I did have a fear. A huge fear.

One that I have trained myself to ignore, but a fear none the less.

But let’s back up for a second, I have a confession to make.

I am a total failure

I actually admit that proudly, and like to get it out of the way early.

I don’t usually lead with it, but hey, this is a blog, and not an HBO special, so I don’t have much time for character development.

I have failed repeatedly in my personal life, my professional career, and definitely in my political perspectives.

Quite frankly, I’m sure I will continue to make mistakes. Lots of them. I’ll continue to stumble, because this is the life I have chosen to live.

I will never apologize for being who I am or how I am, but this does not answer the question at hand.

I’m really good at faking it you see

I can twist you and bend you however I want.

The power of coercion is strong in this one. It has been since I was young.

Maybe that’s why I found the world of sales so comfortable. I felt right at home in a world where all that mattered was whether or not I made the sale.

It was easy for me

Living in a lie seemed normal. It seemed like everyone was doing it.

I’d do whatever needed to be done in order to get what I wanted. The problem was, I had no idea what I wanted.

Maybe that’s what led me to build a house of cards on top of all of those lies.

Maybe it’s that line of thinking that led me to believe that I could be happy in the life I was building, or maybe that is why I sat there that day with a gun in one hand and a phone in the other, wondering whether to pull the trigger or call for help.

Maybe that is why I am writing this article today. Maybe I was unwilling to admit it back then.

Maybe I was unwilling to admit that I was wrong, so I pushed forward. I pushed with no regard for the price that would one day have to be paid.

But that was then, and this is now.

That price has been paid.

In fact, I am still paying. It cost me 10 years, a wife, some strife, and almost my life.

It has pushed me to accept and reject many things about myself and the world around me.

It has forced me on this path that I am on, but this, again, does not answer the question at hand.

You want to know what I am afraid of now?

You want to know what I’m scared of today?

I fear that one day I will become successful, and the world will look at me as if I were a total joke.

I fear that one day I will stand at the top of this mountain I am climbing, and people will say that I lied, cheated, and stole to get here.

I fear that they will say that I hurt others in order to help myself.

I fear that the whole world will get to look at the person that I really am, and then decide to destroy me because they can no longer control me.

You see, I have faced all of my fears

I can honestly look you straight in the face and tell you that the only thing I fear anymore is finding out that I actually am a fraud.

That I am incapable of doing what I set out to do.

I am scared that at some point, I will have to turn back and admit defeat.

I am afraid to find out that the guy who “faked-it-til-he-made-it,” actually made it, and he won’t know that it is okay to stop pretending.

I am afraid that I won’t recognize success, and that I will keep on thirsting for more.

I am afraid that I will never find true happiness because of my inability to truly let people in.

I am afraid that I will be unable to realize that once you fake something for so long, it’s no longer fake, it’s just you.

I am afraid that one day it will all come crashing down again, but that this time I won’t be strong enough to handle it.

But even that doesn’t really scare me

Up until now, I’ve done this all before. I have been on this road, and I know where it leads.

I might not be able to see around the bend, but I have memorized the map.

I adjusted my approach in order to come around the corner just right: at just the right speed so as not to fly off the edge of the cliff.

I will make the turn, hammer the gas, and never look back.

This time is going to be different.

This time, I am becoming successful by being myself, and that is what scares me.

I am scared to be walking around this world naked – emotionally, and otherwise, completely unprotected, yet somehow entirely prepared to take the arrows and to face the consequences.

I am willing to pay whatever the price might be, for being unabashedly me.

There will be no shield, no barrier, no buffer between me and the real world.

No one to blame for my failures but myself…and that, my friends, is absolutely terrifying.

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What is your biggest fear? Let’s talk about it in the comments below.


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“Oh no he didn’t…”

“Oh yes I did!”

Let’s start with a question:

How many ways are there to make a baby? Naturally that is.

I say naturally, because I am assuming someone who is getting artificially inseminated is probably not making an abortion decision so lets presume I am also using common sense for the rest of this article as well. If you are incapable of forming logical thoughts, you should probably go read something else.

Now back to the question at hand…

How many ways are there to make a baby?

There is only one way to make a baby naturally; last time I checked at least. A male puts his penis inside a woman’s vagina and ejaculates. The sperm and the egg do some high five shit and next thing you know cells are splitting.

9 months latter a little version of you is screaming all night keeping you from your precious 8 hours of sleep. (Parents, feel free to use that as your birds and bees speech!) #YoureWelcome

So now that we understand that…

We send you back to your regularly scheduled programming, which is already in progress:

“Uhh oh…. I don’t want a baby” said someone somewhere, after a drunk night of playing hide the salami. But, isn’t it already too late?

Couldn’t you argue that at this point the decision has already been made. That you have already done the deed. “Made-your-choice”, if you will.

You had sex; you knew what you were doing. You decided not to use a condom, take the pill or otherwise protect yourself from the one specific result that the act you committed is designed to produce. You may think sex is about the orgasm but really it is about the insemination and propagation of your species. If you cannot understand that concept then do us all a favor and please stop reproducing.

Cant you see that the entire abortion argument is based on a false premise. One where pro-life is different than pro-choice? Cant you see that they have succeeded in getting us to spend our time fighting among ourselves in an attempt to change the wrong part of the system altogether?

We scream at the state for their meddling while we collapse internally as a family? As our entire society rots from the inside out?

Sex is fun but it is also a huge responsibility.

Much like drinking alcohol or doing drugs, deciding to have sex is not something that should be taken lightly.

Think about it. If you go get drunk and kill someone on the drive home, you don’t get to just decide at some point during the trial that you just want to pay some money and erase the entire event from the timeline that is your life.

You don’t get to tell the judge that you made a mistake and that you don’t want to face any of the consequences. Instead, you get to sit in court and probably spend some time in jail. You get to live with what you have done and try to make the best of it.

The difference is that in this case you get to see the pain you caused. You get to look the family of the person whose life you took in the eyes, and feel their pain course through you. The baby has no choice, no day in court and his only family is the one sentencing him to death.

Sure, you can come out of jail and try to get your life back on track and make sure you don’t make the same mistakes again, but you can never go back. You cannot change the past. You can never take it back.

Back to the point

I go back to my article title… “Why All Conservatives Are Actually Pro-Choice”. Conservatives are typically pro-life which happens to be the other CHOICE when deciding to abort or not. Why is that choice diminished among our current pop-culture?

Why is the choice to chose responsibility looked at with scorn or somehow relegated to anything other than what it is… Responsible.

Why is ending life the only “choice”? Why is the argument fought as if there were only one choice to make when facing the decision of an unexpected pregnancy.

I would even argue further, that it takes more courage to keep the baby, but don’t run out of here thinking I am completely complicit with the entire conservative ideology on this argument.

What about rape?

The whole abortion discussion is such a touchy issue. There are so many nuances and you almost always upset someone’s ideology, which is often the collection of everything that makes them, them.

I acknowledge all of these things. I am just trying to approach it with a level head and some rational thought. Anyone who screams at you like abortion is supposed to be a cut-and-dry, black-and-white issue is just plain ignorant.

I could never pretend to tell a woman who had been raped that she has to keep the baby.

That is not my decision to make. I can love her and support her and encourage her to give thought to the choice of life.

I can encourage her to bring the child into the world and at least let them fight for themselves.

I would try to convince her to give them the chance to go out and make something of themselves. To let another family give her unborn child the childhood that she doesn’t want to, or cannot provide.

I would push her to think about the weight of this decision. A weight she will have to carry from that moment forward, but at the end of the day, it is not my body. It is not my decision to make. It is ultimately her choice to make.

The beauty of being human, is that we have to make our own choices. We have to live with our decisions and we are the only ones who can make them. That’s what makes this a pro-choice vs pro-choice debate! One which we must wage on a level stage of ideas and away from emotional attacks.

If there were only one option it would not be a choice. You cannot then, argue the issue from only one side of that choice! You cannot simply discredit the other side of the argument simply because you disagree.

There is a choice to be made, and allowing it to be argued on any premise other than the ones of that specific context is just plain disingenuous.

I still struggle with this issue

I know there are a million other issues at play here. There are a lot of places this thing could go next but I am just trying to start a conversation. I am just trying to get you to think about the premise of the entire debate and understand how we allow these issues to divide us as a nation!

All I am saying is that there is only one way to make a baby, and we all know what it is.

There are some situations in which the process is taken out of the hands of the woman (forced sexual relations, rape, date rape, etc) but for the most part, people having abortions are there because they already made one bad choice. Because they chose pleasure over sense. Because they had sex and got pregnant, and now are either not prepared or are unwilling to accept the results of their actions.

Instead, they are sitting in the courtroom, signing a contract with the judge, trying to erase history. Cashing in on one of the few instances in life where you can actually apply for a mulligan.

So… I’ll leave you with a couple questions:

Does that mulligan come at the expense of a potential life?

And, is that a choice you are really ready to make… especially for someone else?

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My friends have been trying to introduce the two of us for a while now; I just haven’t been all that interested in meeting anyone new lately. I have never actually seen her but she has quite the reputation. I hear she is not much to look at, but they assure me we will get along fine, apparently we have a lot in common; we are both awesome and unpredictable.

I am a little worried because I hear she gets around. I’m not one to judge, or jump to conclusions, but I’m not in a hurry to feel like a whore either. I don’t want to be just another notch on her belt, though; I am rather curious to see what all the fuss is about. Surely she can’t be everything they say she is… can she?

The Decision

I keep telling my friends that I am not looking for a relationship but they assure me that she is not the relationship type. I figured, “what the heck”. I’m in need of a distraction in my life right about now, so I selfishly set my apprehensions aside and agreed to meet her. What’s the worst that can happen?

I selfishly set my apprehensions aside and agreed to meet her. What is the worst that can happen?

Later that day, I found myself debating whether I would truly be ok using her for my situational gratification? Could we really just enjoy each other casually, without attachment? Could I calm my concerns and simply enjoy her company, no-strings-attached? One date would not be so bad… would it?

Part of me is getting a little nervous. I am not looking to fall in love, but If she is half as amazing as everyone makes her out to be, then how will I ever resist a second date? What happens if I fall hopelessly in lust and find myself unable to control my composure.

We Meet

We decided to meet at a friends house. We picked a neutral site so there would be no unnecessary pressure on either of us. Mutual friends would be close in case things got awkward. We figured, worst case scenario, we would meet, feel each other out and then go our separate ways if things didn’t work out.

But the conversation was effortless, and before long we were lost. Oblivious to our surroundings, enthralled in the experience of each other’s company.

She Makes A Move

Every so often her leg would brush up against mine and I knew she was doing it on purpose. At one point she put her hand on my thigh and it was as if she had reached right through my skin, down to the bone, squeezed a nerve, and sent a chill running through my spine, up into my brain, culminating in a shiver that shook my entire body.

I had been warned about this; I knew she was making her move. I resisted the temptation to run off alone with her; there would be plenty of time for that later. Instead, we just sat there and enjoyed the moment. Slowly building on the tension that was quickly filling the air between us, growing stronger, growing evermore intense as the night went on.

My jaw clenched and my body quaked at the indecision of the emotions that were filling my head. The music coursed through us as if the radio knew just what we needed to hear at exactly the right moment. I looked around at one point and noticed that no one else was around us. We were alone with each other but surrounded by something I could not explain.

As time passed we grew closer still. By the end of the night we were in a full embrace, unable to keep our hands off of each other, consumed by the night, and in that moment I saw myself for the first time. Unencumbered by the constraints of society or the judgement of the people around me. It was like she reached down my throat, grabbed everything good that had ever been inside of me and smacked me In the face with it; setting me free, if only in that moment.

It was like she reached down my throat, grabbed everything good that had ever been inside of me and smacked me In the face with it; setting me free, if only in that moment.

My friends were right. 

She was not the prettiest girl at the party and I’m not sure there is any real long-term potential, but there was definitely something irresistibly attractive about her. She understood me and made me feel like we had been friends our whole lives. She wasn’t everything they told me she would be but I definitely want to see her again.


What do you think? Have you had an experience like this? Let me know about it in the comments below!

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Have you ever met someone who just gets you… understands you… completes you?

Someone who, although you were in your darkest hour, made you feel like you were doing exactly what you were meant to do and being everything you were meant to be.

A person who free’d your heart from the shackles of shame and allowed you to begin living your life again. Someone who made you feel like you were in exactly the right place at exactly the right time and in that moment, nothing else mattered.

I can’t imagine it happens more than a few times through the course of our lives.

If we are lucky, we recognize the importance of this person before it is too late. But unfortunately, I feel like all-too-often, we are left looking back, wishing we had done more, wishing we had fought harder, plead stronger and held on longer.

“What do you do when this person leaves your life? How do you move forward?”

What if you were the one who walked away, knowing the pain you would cause and conversely have to endure?

What if you understood that the only way to move forward was to move on?

What if you were wrong?

I need you to know this.

In my darkest hour we met, and shortly thereafter, I left.

You might never know how much it hurt me, how many tears I spilled, wondering if I had made the right decision; the sleep I lost thinking about you.

The sleep I still lose thinking about you.

I don’t know if I will ever publish this but if I do and you happen to read it then I need you to know these things.

I will always love you!

I was so lost, wandering through life. Unwilling or unable to move past all that had happened before. Stuck, as if frozen in time, clinging to pain and darkness as if it was all I had left.

But, you knew the way. You taught me to forget. You replaced those memories.

You stood next to me when everyone else ran away. How will I ever express the debt I can never repay?

You fixed me. You rescued me from myself.

You didn’t reach down and try to pull me from the hole I was in, you climbed down and sat right next to me until I was ready to leave.

You showed me that no matter how hard it rained, we could always move past the pain.

You restored my hope in the world, pulled me back from the edge of a cliff and made me smile like I had never smiled before.

From the first time I saw you I loved you and you unlocked my heart with that first kiss.

You were exactly what I needed at exactly the right time.

I wish circumstances would have been different. Oh, what I would give to have things turn out differently but we both know that can never happen.

There is a part of my soul that will never heal from having let you into my life. I wonder if I will ever be able to feel completely whole again without that piece of me, but I would never ask for it back.

I would live in pain forever before risking an existence without the memory of you.

I am scared for the one who comes next.

I tell myself I am over you but part of me will always wait.

Like some sick romantic comedy I will move on, because that’s life, and eventually, time heals all pain, but you could come steal my heart at any time.

With one touch you could make me melt. I would be completely defenseless against your advance, and on that day, I would stand in the rubble and smile at having had one more moment with you.

I truly hope you are happy.

I hope you think of me on occasion.

Maybe one day our paths will cross again but for now I am going to try to forget you.

I am going to try to remember the worst of you so that I might have some chance at knowing happiness again.

But it will never work, I will never forget you.


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