The moments where you take a stand will define your life.
It is almost
as if your life is a series of inconsequential events punctuated by a
few brief, moments where you either rise to the occasion, make
something of your life, or step back, avoid doing what you need to do
and fade back into nothingness.
I know this seems harsh and cruel to define someones life,but that is how it is.
How can a great life for you be anything other than
you taking a stand? The better you want your individual life, the more
you will take a stand.
My
life has been mostly this down cycle of not doing much with occasional
bursts of something real, something great, something fun and even
something monumental thrown in.
You will not have any kind of life at all
without doing this. You know I am right. You know this is said over and
over again and yet you still ignore it.
From Danger and Play
Thanks again Mike for saying what is right.
I ignore it too. But by thinking about it and writing about it, I move myself little by little to a life that I can be proud of. It is only by this continual study and self analysis and looking for ways to take a stand will you grow.
I often think back to my youth and the list of what I consider my best decisions and how they have shaped my life.
I think back to enormous fun I have had with friends, wild times I spent with wonderful girls and the fantastic trips I enjoyed with family and friends.
I think of my wedding day, the birth of my children, my graduations, my job interviews, jobs I was hired for and the pride I felt when finishing projects.
And I mostly think of the courage I exhibited when I turned my life around and left my wife.
If you honestly examine your life you will see that when you were the most bold, the most determined, the most in charge of your life, you had great moments that propelled you into the future and are what you think about the most.
If you want to think better of yourself, do just that. Forget what other people are doing. Forget what other people are saying. Forget what other people might be thinking.
Think about you. Think about your life, your dreams, your experiences and what you have done and what you are going to do.
I am not talking about taking a stand like in the history books, risking your life or prison.
What I am talking about is that in all aspects of your life, you take a stand on what matters to you. If it matters to you, it is worth it.
I
keep talking about leaving my wife because this was the defining
episode of my life. I had what I thought was a good relationship in the
early years of my marriage turn into a nightmare relationship where each
moment was either a timid waiting for her to blow up, brief moments of
happiness when she was in a good mood, or a deep depression and
despondency after she lectured me or gave me a tongue lashing.
I was just waiting to die. I was hoping that she would die. My life was a total mess and I saw no escape.
But there was an escape. There was a way out. There was life. And there was hope.
I took a stand and I left her.
I was not going to tolerate one more second of her abuse.
This
was not a nice, mutually agreeable leaving either. I fled. I ran. At
that point in my life the best I could do was run. I could not stand up
to her and demand that she treat me in a way I could tolerate. It was too
far gone.
Taking a stand means you doing whatever you need to do
to make your life better. If you have to shout someone down, do that.
If you have to quit your job, do that. If you have to go bankrupt, do
that. If you have to let the bank take your house, do that. If your wife
is not good for you, leave her in whatever way you can.
It is always better to run, to leave, to flee than it is to die without trying.
You taking a stand is however you define it.
This
is a mindset. This is a way of thinking. If you get this, it will mean
you do not tolerate things in your life that are not good for you.
If
your wife is not good for you, you leave her. You don't negotiate with
your wife to treat you better. Either she treats you right or you are
gone. This is different than the bogus ideas you see about marriage. In
the best marriages, there is no bargaining, there is no negotiating.
There is mutual love and mutual respect and mutual kindness.
If
your job is not good for you, you quit and get a different job. You
don't negotiate with your boss to treat you right, give you more money
or better benefits. If he doesn't just do that, he doesn't value you, or
he has no means to value you. In either case, you lose. The only
solution is to move on.
People normally think of taking a stand
in the stand up to a bully or force your wife to be nice to you or pound
on your boss's desk until he gives you a raise.
But that is not what I mean. I mean to walk away from the people who are not good to you or good for you.
You can take a stand by leaving, by walking away, by moving toward something better.
You
do not have to take a stand and be slaughtered, like the fools in a war
zone, or like the timid men, who continue to live under the unrelenting
verbal abuse from their wives or their bosses.
You take a stand
by standing up from the self imposed shackles you have willingly
accepted and moving toward whatever it is that you want.
The only way I could become the happier man I am today was by leaving my wife. You might be in the same situation I was in. I suggest you take a look at my book - Leave Your Wife & Become a Happier Man with the 3 Step System.
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