Hello,

This passage is a warm up of sorts, something that won’t be too long, but helps me get the creative vibes going, because tomorrow I plan to write a blog I hope to be my best yet. Part of me thought I couldn’t write with this song as inspiration, because I don’t drink. I’ve never dialed drunk, or thrown a punch in the name of someone I no longer know. Anyways the beginning of the song caught my attention, and for the record I prefer the version with Post Malone.

“I’m remembering’ I promised to forget you now,

But it’s rainin’ and I’m calling’ drunk,

And my medicine is drownin’ your perspective out,

So I aint takin’ any fault.

Am I honest still?

Am I half the man I used to be?

I doubt it, forget about it,

Whatever.”

The part of this that really gets me is, my medicine is drownin’ your perspective out. I’m not sure if this is a specifically me thing, or if others have experienced this, but sometimes my anxiety medication makes me block out what others say, how others see things. Now this has certainly tainted relationships, especially my last.

I had this habit of taking no responsibility for my actions, and not listening to how other people were seeing things. In a lot of senses, this is still a habit I’m learning to break, I love to deny accountability, and blame what I do and say, on my mental illness, but it’s wrong.

I didn’t always know it was wrong, but I definitely know it’s wrong now, but it hasn’t changed a damn thing. These are the moments where I don’t know how to be kind to myself, I think sometimes you have to be an asshole to yourself, to hold yourself accountable. I don’t care if I have anxiety, depression, CPTSD, it doesn’t mean I get to act however I want. For a long time I allowed that to be the case, and some days it’s still the case.

Breaking this habit is hard for me, sometimes I am acting out of what the anxiety is telling me, or doing to my body. That doesn’t mean I can’t take any fault.

I think there’s a strange gray area, where I can take fault for how I’ve behaved, past and present, and also recognize, the anxiety isn’t my fault. It’s a combination of genetics and trauma. I think it’s a 75/25 I take fault, the anxiety caused the action.

I do have a positive here though.

Am I honest still? Am I half the man I used to be?

I would normally respond like Noah wrote and say “I doubt it, forget about it, whatever.”

I’m not that person anymore and that shows growth. I think I’m now more honest than I’ve ever been.

As far as being a man goes, what makes a man?

If honesty, accountability, integrity, vulnerability, compassion, and empathy make a man, then I think I’m more of a man than I used to be, and I think as I continue this healing journey, I slowly become more of the man I’d like to be, or the person I’d like the be at least.

I think the idea of what makes someone a man is a dangerous thought, it can lead to toxic ideas, like being a man means lifting weights and being tough. I don’t subscribe to that shit.

I’ll admit a secret, my entire life, being someone who’s on the leaner side with less muscle, I always felt like less of a man because I wasn’t big and strong, now I see being big and strong, is something that comes from within.

I had this thing as a kid, where I felt afraid all the time.

This thing where I was the guy in the school yard who wasn’t willing to fight, so people wanted to fight.

I think I’m growing to become the aggressor.

Instead I say you don’t have to find me, I’m looking for you.

Bullies only want to fight the kids that don’t want to fight, the people they think they can beat. Well I’ve been down a dark road, and I don’t care if you’re bigger than me, stronger than me, a better fighter than me, you may be able to beat me physically, but mentally, you don’t stand a god damn chance, and I’d rather be mentally strong than physically any day.

Mentally strong people can weather storms, they can look after the people they love, they can be there for their people in hard times.

Bullies, the people that want to fight the kid that doesn’t want to fight, they are cowards, and the only mental battle they face is the one with themselves.

Where the skies are gold not gray,

J.