From Beginning to End

Well, it’s mid December and the year is coming to an end. You know, perhaps the year didn’t go as well as I would have liked but the truth is, there is so much for me to be proud of this year that I decided I needed to acknowledge them all one time.

Here is a copy of my first post…

”OK.. Here we go. Here are some basic facts. Last year was the worst year of my life. A year that included some of the most horrible events of my 39 years of existence. I'm not going to go into all of that (even though I actually did and deleted it), because my whole point in creating this blog is to document the transition to 2012. I have no doubt that this is the year I will have the greatest impact on the world.

So, today is January 1st, 2012. I have $100 that is supposed to last me for the next 3 weeks somehow. I have a tiny little apartment, a beat up 1990 Le Baron convertible, 2 dogs, my cat, a very few good real friends, a much condensed list of facebook friends, a brand new twitter account, a new blog and a nagging sense that this is the year for me, my company. my career and my finances. Besides, if I am wrong... there's always the Zombie Apocalypse to save me :)”

There’s no doubt that last year WAS the worst year of my life and as promised time has healed most of the wounds. Somehow, I DID make it those 3 weeks with $100 and I started my job at Sweet Tomatoes. That turned out to be a disaster, but that’s not the point. I eventually sold my car, bought a truck and of course I still have the beasts.

I didn’t get as far with the creation of my company as I would have liked. If anyone is interested in investing let me know! :)

As for my career, well something excellent did happen. I realized that I did NOT want to work in restaurants anymore. 2012 has absolutely been a year of learning for me. I have learned what I like and what I don’t, what I want and what I don’t.

So there are a LOT of things going on:

• I relocated back to Orlando and am back in the house that I own.
• I am back in school and 1.5 semesters away from my AA degree.
• I started a job at the Orlando Ballet and I absolutely LOVE the idea of working there.
• I’m single but confident in myself and the assets I have in relationships.
• I’m gluten free and weigh less than I have at any point since I was 25.
• I’ve been writing consistently and have gotten pretty positive feedback doing so.

The bottom line is this: I have spent a year working on understanding EXACTLY what I want and don’t want from a relationship, a career and this life. I have learned (as this blog will attest) what I can handle and what I can’t. 

There is one area that I made a miscalculation… I didn’t make the huge impact on the world this year, just on my own life. I needed to do that first and honestly, that’s OK with me.

There does not appear to be a Zombie Apocalypse and we will know in the coming days if the Mayans were right. Either way, I am very happy with my personal progress this year regardless of the outcome for the rest of the planet :)

Lastly, I have to say, the accomplishment that I feel the most pride in of 2012 is this blog. It got difficult to write sometimes and there were weeks where nothing got written, yet all-in-all I kept a pretty good record of the events of the year. Even more fascinatingly, I learned how many people have actually read and followed m blog. Old friends that I hadn’t spoken to in years, new friends that just met me on this journey and total strangers from across the world have all contacted me to comment on it. Literally, this blog has been visited over 6000 times. That's amazing! That has meant more than words can say to me.

Anyway, thanks for reading!! Bring on 2013!

Good Times... Orrrrrrrr....

In life there's a common belief that one should always remember "where they came from".

Yet I truly believe that one of the great purposes of life is to move forward and evolve continuously. I think it's part of our genetic makeup to look back on past events and see them as less taxing, painful and/or traumatic as they were at the time that they occurred in our life. Consequently, I believe attempting to remember things that you've overcome in your life can be a futile attempt at humility because our brain has simply lessened the lasting impact of terrible events over time. Hence the "time heals all wounds" crap, I mean cliche. Learning from those experiences is, of course, crucial but reliving them virtually impossible.

My best example is the chickenpox. I'd argue that no one remembers exactly how painful or how devastating they were when they had them. Sure, you can say that you were a kid. I wasn't. I was 25 and my doctor said it was the worst case he'd ever seen. Even I don't remember the extent of the pain. Essentially, all that I do remember is that I felt like they would never go away and that nothing would ever feel that bad again. THAT'S the lasting impression that they left on me....


My journey thru Hell took an unbelievably painful turn on this day last year. It was the day that I found out that my 19 year old shift leader had committed an armed robbery and quite literally endangered the lives of my entire crew, including a 16 year old girl who was training on the first night of her first job ever, the night the restaurant was robbed. It was absolutely devastating. I remember screaming "FUCK!" at the top of my lungs when my boss told me she had been arrested and charged. I had spent a week since the robbery vigorously defending the girl because I simply could never believe that someone I knew as well as I thought I knew her, would do something so despicable.

All of this came 2 days after my car had been repossessed. I was entering a life altering downward spiral.

Today, one year ago, I didn't know that tomorrow, one year ago, I would be terminated for those events that had occurred a week prior. But that's precisely what happened. And it left my life completely empty and had me questioning everything about myself and life in general. It was a despair that I cannot adequately express.

So, happy November 21st 2012 to everyone, especially me. I have learned so much in the past 365 days yet rereading this post I haven't recaptured one one-hundredth of the feeling and honestly, I guess I feel blessed for that.

Life is a series of triumphs and tribulations. Occasionally, one of them changes your perspective forever. I'm grateful to be here, in Orlando, in school, away from the drama and the pain. This, right now, is one of those times that I'll look back on and see myself as being incredibly happy. Even if I do forget that once in a while.

So, my challenges have changed in 2102, as has my perspective. I have spent the year trying to remember where I came from and applying the hard learned lessons that accompanied it. When December 31st comes this year, my year of respect and remembrance will be over, and I look forward to the good part... Appreciating where and who I AM NOW!!!

This is so my issue...

It’s mid-November and the year of personal growth is rapidly coming to a close for me. Yet as time marches onward, I still feel that I am not quite there yet.

I am trying very hard not to fall into an old trap.  Insecurity is a fascinating thing. It makes you see things that aren’t there; miss some of the things that are right in front of you and find yourself in a bad place when you didn’t even know it was happening. 

If there is one thing that I have learned this year, it’s that I am a good person. I, literally do nothing with the intent to hurt people or myself. It’s something I am VERY proud to say. 

We all have things that we don’t like about ourselves. We all have things that we assume others don’t like about us. Yet, when we are confronted face to face with someone telling us that THEY don’t like that quality, it seems particularly tough to handle. I have my imperfections. But even those aren’t meant to be hurtful or angry. They’re simply things that make me human. When someone that you care about tremendously points them out it becomes almost overbearing and if I’m not careful, they can make me spiral. I can’t change my past and, quite frankly, I wouldn’t want to. 

The problem with life in the 21^st Century is that what was once a shoe box of old photos and memories in your closet is now on Facebook (or a blog) for the world to see and reference forever. I had an old girlfriend who was so insecure that she made me destroy all of my photos of life before her. I loved her, so I did. The problem was, we broke up, now there’s no record of my life before her and my 25 birthday or so. I vowed I would never do that again. The problem with things like Facebook’s timeline is that it ALSO keeps the things you never wanted to keep and in some ways didn’t even remember you posted, thought or EVER wanted to relive. It was so much easier with a shoebox…. You’d cut them up, burn them or trash them however you wanted. Now it’s more complicated.

I imagine that I am rambling, so let me get to my point. I am not perfect. I work every day to be the best me that I can be and in this life that’s all I think you can ask of anyone. Unlike most people, I have plastered a GREAT DEAL of my personal life online. Many people have asked why.

Sometimes I think it’s because it’s therapeutic. Sometimes I narcissistically think it’s because I can help others to realize how human they are. 

The reality is I am not sure why I am ok with posting my past and my flaws online. It may really be because I am hoping that by people around me knowing everything about me, they’ll know when they are hurting me and stop. It doesn’t always work that way though.

So tomorrow is a new day. I’ll try to keep my opinions to myself. I’ll try not to hurt those around me. I’ll try to make myself a better listener and try to close in on perfect. I won’t succeed. But I guess the hope is that one day, what I do have to offer is just right to be happy.

Safe and Insecure...

One of the songs that I have listed the lyrics for in the past few weeks is called "Narcissistic Cannibal" by KORN. That is one of a small handful of songs that tells a story about self-sabotage and insecurity. It's a concept that I used to embrace and have made an active effort to release. That idea has liberated me personally...

There's no way of measuring the impact of insecurity on relationships. There's no concrete statistic that shows the specific details,and consequences, of emotional insecurity on the divorce rate, the percentage of siblings that do not speak or the number of friendships that have ended as a result. Yet,there is no doubt that it is an overwhelming component of all of those fractured relationships, and far more. The dictionary defines insecurity as a lack of confidence or assurance; self-doubt, but this does not measure the consequences of this condition on people's own lives. Insecurity leads to jealousy, mental instability, and acute anxiety and self-sabotage.

Happiness is an intangible concept, a “pie in the sky” ideal that gets discussed and remains largely undefined throughout most people’s lives. More often than not, people look backward at their lives and remember “happy times” despite that fact that, during that actual period, they were just as consumed with the idea of being happy then as they are at present. In order for one to be happy, they have to define the word, as well as their own personal perspective, to make it tangible. In other words, set a goal of happiness. This theory helps a person to limit the effects of their insecurities, primarily because they do not entertain as many distractions from their ultimate goal.They also make more proactive decisions and generally gain confidence with each passing day.

Jealousy tends to be the most often discussed result of insecurity, but it has nowhere near the strongest impact on the relationship.Self-sabotage does. There are generations of stories of people’s self-sabotage leading to their own destruction. From Howard Stern to Heath Ledger, from Adam and Eve to Oedipus Rex, insecurity has led to the downfall of thousands of people to both real and fictional. The idea that someone feels that they themselves do not deserve to be happy, literally makes them destroy themselves and their relationships out of fear. They see it as an irrational fear that it is ultimately going to happen anyway and that all they are doing is sanctioning the inevitable. Sabotage! Online dating is often an excellent example of self-sabotage, people sit behind a computer looking at people that they feel inferior to and tell themselves that they wouldn’t stand a chance with them and keep clicking. Sound like high school? It is. It’s sabotage!

Self-sabotage and jealousy can have serious consequences on human health. It has been scientifically proven that stress is a major cause of heart disease and many other harmful, even fatal, ailments. People stress over where their mate hasn’t called, why they haven’t come home, when they’re going to make ends meet, etc. As these stresses build, they have long term ramifications on the person themselves. Many get caught up in the drama of their daily lives without realizing that they are essentially shortening their own time on earth.

So where does insecurity come from? To answer this question,a person must look at every aspect of their lives, from family and upbringing,to appearance and social status. People tend to put a lot of pressure on themselves and others. Moreover, in relationships, some tend to feel that they are dating “out of their league”, and as we age and our bodies change, some people's’ insecurities make them date younger (hence the midlife crisis) others,make them remove themselves from dating altogether. While when some are younger, they date much older people to feel more secure.

The key to overcoming emotional insecurity is far more simple one might imagine. Success breeds security. Often there is chill as that word is read. Success feeling of accomplishment in life. For many raising a family equals success, for others it means rising to the top of a major corporation or opening a business. For some, it is just continuing to take another breath and live for another day.

The reality to be faced is that the only one that can create happiness is the person themselves. So dating someone to feel special, getting the right job or marrying and having a family can only aid to happiness, but the success comes when that person looks in the mirror and realizes that they are the best that they have to offer themselves and this world. That feeling breeds confidence; with confidence comes security, with security people find happiness.

A Word to the Wise

“I am simply of the opinion that you cannot be taught to write. You have to spend a lifetime in love with words.” ― Craig Claiborne

For thousands of years, there has always been an intense fascination with vocabulary and writing. Personally, from 8^th grade, when I starting writing love letters to girlfriends, through high school with songs and poetry, to my professional life where I have written artist bios, press releases and magazine articles, writing has been an integral part of my existence. As a child, I remember my mother telling me that “swear” words were a representation of ignorance and demonstrated a lack of vocabulary. I was hooked! How can a word or words mean that you have less of a vocabulary? I loved that idea! I learned every bad word and most every good one. Most people will tell you that I use both styles quite well.

Words are so ridiculously powerful. Whether it’s an abhorring insult or a spectacular compliment, the words spoken, or written, to someone can move them, hurt them, elate them or destroy them. Words have started and ended wars. They have made memorable, weddings and funerals alike. This gift of language has enabled us to teach and learn, overcome adversity, become empowered and implement our dreams and desires. Words have been accused of causing death as well as breathing life.

Words in the form of lyrics are undoubtedly the most often overlooked aspect of our literary impact. From Air Supply to Eminem, words have been used to incite and express anguish, make political statements, create social awareness, restore order and create chaos.

Perhaps the most stunning aspect of language is the impact it has unknowingly on people. This is part of my feelings previously expressed about personal accountability. At this point I have to say, I have been, in my life, the poster child for abuse via language. It is one of the many things I have changed about my life. That said, there is a responsibility that comes along with using the language; one that is not always embraced by its users.

When used carelessly, a word “Bitch!” can anger, escalate and infuriate, while when used properly, “Beautiful!” can flatter, sooth and quell. Arguably, the most often misused words are equally “Love and “Hate”.

Phrases such as “You look fantastic!” make a person, especially an acquaintance that you haven’t seen in a while, feel fantastic. Yet, “Boy, you have lost weight” can imply that someone used to look terrible!

The power of some words and phrases cannot be entirely measured; “Are you pregnant?” can have devastating unintended consequences, while “You look very nice today”, can be entirely misconceived. A few months ago, I asked a fellow student if she thought it was “hot in here” (It WAS!) She replied by recoiling and stammering and gave me the impression that I was the “Creepiest” guy alive.

So, the next time, you decide to flip the bird or say “Damn!” when an attractive person walks by, remember that those words aren’t just said. They’re perceived, heard and interpreted by someone else. Words are weapons and gifts; they’re deadly and life-giving. Think before you speak. You will only be showing your own intellectual capacity.

“Kind words can be short and easy to speak, but their echoes are truly endless.”  ― Mother Teresa

Living Like I am Dying...

A little over a year ago, I cut most people out of my life in an attempt to regroup.

In retrospect, it was a strange decision I admit, but I reached a point where I didn't know who or what to trust. I deleted all but about 10 numbers from my phone and cut over 300 people from Facebook.

Basically, the reason I did so was to purge myself of all of the negativity in myself and my life. I cut off my family and many of my friends and in time, I basically began to rebuild from the ground, up. It was a defining time for me. As most of the people that I have known for the last year plus will tell you, I have evolved a lot as a person since that decision.

There have been some recent events in my life that have made me appreciate where I am at both physically and emotionally. I'm not going to get into it because honestly it isn't about me. It's about my friend. But the point is, I had an AMAZING night last night with some friends I haven't seen in almost 20 years. It was an eye-opening experience and it made me realize that just because time goes by and people lose touch doesn't mean you aren't cared about. Actually, perhaps the greatest aspect of true friendship is that it can pick up right where it left off.

So to make my point, I am opening my world back up to the people that want to be in it. I'm sorry if it seemed or seems if I am being arrogant. It wasn't at all like that. It was more about me finding out about me and understanding my own identity. Now I want to share that identity.

This life is too short and fleeting to be too caught up in minutia. Every day is a blessing that needs to be lived like we are dying... Because, we are.

Dave-DeVito, Orlando, FL, Creative Writer, Copywriter, Article Press, Web Content, Editor Proofreader

Dave-DeVito, Orlando, FL, Creative Writer, Copywriter, Article Press, Web Content, Editor Proofreader