I just have to realize that I'll never have all the answers.
As many of the followers of my blog already know, I've been trying to reinvent myself. In June, when I was laid off from my job, it took me a couple of months to re-gather myself after the job that I literally burned myself out at had just cut me loose. Those couple of months after, I was just burned out and felt used up. I was depressed for awhile, but like I'd been taught, you make sure everyone sees you smile and keep the depressing feelings far away from the people in your life.
That worked for awhile. But then after I realized that I needed to do something to help myself get past all the turmoil, life just kicked my ass into gear. I knew that the only thing that would make this man happy was to look towards the future. What was I going to do? How was I going to pick myself up?
So after some serious soul-searching, I decided that it was time to rearrange my life and switch gears. I was going to follow my dream and become a teacher. That's what I always wanted to do, and the time to do it was now.
So I took measures to do it. I decided to go to bartending school so I could supplement the financial strain of the cost of returning to school to get my teaching certification. And I completed bartending school successfully and prepared to follow my dream. If I needed to, I could have just dug into my IRA trust account and paid for it, but it just didn't seem right. I was scared that if I'd failed at my dream and needed the funds in that account to live off for an extended period of time, I wouldn't have money when I was older, alone and needed a lot of money to live off.
This is the reason I wanted to speed through my courses and bartend while doing this. Of course I should have told myself that I would never get a full-time bartending gig because no one was going to take a chance on me. (*I'm not going to rehash my rant on bartending, especially in Asbury Park when there's less than a handful of black bartenders working in this city - you can read my previous blog on the subject, "Who knew getting a bartending gig around Asbury would be so difficult?" if you'd like ... but I digress)
So to continue on what this blog entry is all about ...
I've been feeling more and more disillusioned in my work, my dreams, my life and myself as a person. I always tried to be the best at what I did. I hardly never fell short because I wouldn't let myself fall short of accomplishing everything I set my mind to do. I've been feeling like a failure, and I couldn't let anyone know how desperate and disheartened I'd been feeling. I'm a bit ashamed to admit this, but since losing my job I've applied for over 100 jobs and haven't gotten any of them. It's been really upsetting to not only my ego but also my self-esteem.
I'm the type of person who can never let anyone see him break down and cry. I'd built my personal reputation on never allowing another person see me cry; I'd always felt it was a sign of weakness.
Last week I felt like I was at the end of my rope and I couldn't even tie a knot and hang on. But despite the stress and angst, I decided to be around people to at least avoid feeling alone. I think that was my mistake; I'd forgotten that most people only see me as a strong-willed innocent who always keeps it calm, cool and collected.
And as the night went on, person after person was doing something that just drove me to the brink. I can't blame any of them because they had no clue that my internal struggles had come to a head and was ready to explode to the surface.
I did two things that I'd promised myself I would never do - I blew up at a very dear friend who didn't know that I was so distressed with my life, and I broke down into tears in front of another close friend who had the unfortune of being in my presence at the inopportune moment of my breakdown.
This blog is a way of apologizing, not only to them but myself. They both know how much I love and adore them and respect their places in my life. But it's turned out to be a good thing that this all happened. I know that I need to let people in on my inner-demons so they know just how much I can handle. That's something I need to work on.
And I've never been a fan of getting therapy to help overcome issues that are just too much to bear. But I may need to consider it now. Things are just very tough for me these days and I know that I can't have a sit-down talk with my mother. She was always my rock, and although I know that I can always talk to her, I'm painfully aware that she can't answer me back.
So maybe it's time to consider therapy of some sort to get over this hump. Perhaps it's not the worst thing I could do.
