Today I'm Changing

Change comes to us at difficult times. It can be a divorce, a child's birth or it can be an awakening.

I'm 37 years old. I've never been overseas, I've never done all the things I wanted to do when I was 17. I wanted to see the world but I let getting discharged from Marine Boot Camp change that.

If there is one thing in my life that has inhibited my understanding of who I am it's that discharge. I knew who I was at 18 and I knew what I wanted, I have felt that way in a long time and it's been twenty years.

Recently I've been thinking about that 17 year old, brought on by a post I wrote for The Today Voice that will go live onTuesday April 2nd.

I hadn't thought of that 17 year old in a long time and what he wanted out of life because I felt like I've been a disappointment to myself and to my dad, who hasn't really been in my life for the last thirteen years.

In three years I'll be 40. In one years I would have been available to retire from the Marines with twenty years in. But as change happens and sometimes it's not very pleasant, I see through different eyes now.

My life now isn't what I thought it would have been then, but who's is?

Today I make a change for me. To take control of who I am, what I am and where I'm headed in my life. I never thought I would write words like this, but something we have to write what scares us in order to move forward and make changes instead of letting them happen.

Today I'm changing!

Why I Lost Faith

I remember going to a friend’s house as a child, his mother was nice as was the rest of his family, but there was one time that stands out for me.

His mother asked if I was Mormon, I didn’t know what she meant. I was a kid and I didn’t understand the question. My friend said I was before I could say anything. I don't fault him or his mom, they're wonderful people and I still care about him even though I haven't seen him in person in twenty years.

It wasn’t until I was in my teens that I realized what happened in that moment. I had friends who did Scouts, who were into those types of things, but I couldn’t do, I wasn’t Mormon and I lived in Utah.

I believe that moment caused my first doubts in God. If there was a God, why would he shun me for not believing in him. What purpose does it hold for his believers not to let me participate in activities other kids were doing.

I realized in my late teens, early twenties that I had no belief in God. A lot of this came about because I’d been shunned by the faith which surrounded me through my life, but when I began to look for something other than a deity based religion I came upon Buddhism.

It’s been over ten years since I read my first book about Buddhism and I believe that leaving Christianity and finding my way  caused problems with my family, friends, girlfriends and eventually with my in-laws.

My in-laws still live in Utah, my father-in-law has nothing to do with the church, he still follows the Christian faith and in following his faith he doesn’t understand my wife’s beliefs and my own when it comes to a God figure, which Buddhism doesn’t have.

I grew up surrounded by a faith that shunned those who didn’t believe and I felt like an outsider my entire life because of it.

Today I still feel like an outsider, or like there’s something wrong with me because I don’t believe in a God. Those who’ve always believed in a God don’t understand why I feel this way, they probably never will, but I lived in Utah as non-Mormon and even though some people never said anything offensive to me about being non-Mormon in Utah, there were numerous people who did.

Growing up I felt like I was being punished for being who I was, for not being the same faith as everyone else around me. This is the main reason I’ll never move back to Utah.

I’ve been Buddhist for over ten years and I still feel shunned by Christians who don’t understand my beliefs.

Buddhism has led me out of some very dark places in my life. It led me out of committing suicide when I received an awful letter and it’s helped me guide my kid’s lives the way in which I never felt mine was.

My parents were always searching for their God and never thought to think about us.

My kids have no concept of God or the Devil. They don’t know who Jesus is and we like it this way because of the torment I went through and the way I was treated.

When our kids are old enough to make their own faith choices I’ll support them regardless of their choice, but my hope is what I’ve taught them about Buddhism will lead them away from a God and toward a path they make, not one that has been set in front of them.

In your mind it's ourageous, contagious, the battling in your brain will be the end.
Another pain, drain, who the fuck cares about your hair loss? Their's kids and adults dying for food and you're asking for money for hair plugs?
Find yourself, don't trust the inability of those around you to care less about yourself. Freedom? It's an illusion.
It's the new age revolution.
Stuck online, in cyberspace. Your traveling, doing the things those before you only dreamed of and your, what...watching porn.
Get your stick back in your pants, give up on your last dance. Don't fret you're never going to regret the time you put in.
You're chaos and chaos never runs out.

Your life is yours anyway

Trampling on the history, the microscopic fantasy that the world isn't what we thought it would be.
Killing the dream of what we thought we'd be, the tragic, infatuated...lost people of history.
Religion isn't "it", realize your pain or get out of the way. Never sounding your horn or the raging chorus of idiotic, chaotic raffle of what the  life you've chosen to..live.
Sitting inside the walls of what your fantasy and reality...are.
It's disturbing your sleep, creating the painful creep in your mind, your listing, your pain, the tragic and carefulness you thought you had is...gone.
You see the pain and raging torrents of your frustrations and fear, telling you that, like "Pink Floyd" says...is there anybody in there.
What are you to say about who you are, you're lying, dying and laughing at everyone else trying to make their way in the world of what you thought you'd wanted to be.
You're just laughing at the world.
Grab yourself, stand up. Get together and make-up. You shouldn't wait to feel the rhythm of your pain.
Don't let the drugs take it away. Let your mind heal your soul, let your thoughts break you out.
It's always in yourself, it's never in the wealth. Don't forget who you are, don't let them train you like a puppet on a stage, let the chaos reign on your parade.
It never ends...this life. Don't let them, don't fret with what they say. Your life is yours anyway.