Forty

In the summer of 2007, I started to really think about how unhappy I was. I was working over 90 hours a week and travelling up to 1500 miles on average. It was a miserable existence. I worked as a corporate investigator/LPM which meant that I was always on call, much like a cop. My cell phone would never stop ringing and I rarely went to sleep before 2am. I would work my day shift cases, come home to shower/eat and start my "second" shift working on the administrative side of the job. It was ridiculous...and sad.

My relationship was suffering to the point that I suspected it was probably too late to fix it. This routine had been going on for at least a year and a half. I don't blame her because despite what I believed at the time I did have a choice...I could have just looked for another job or quit. The money was good, but not when you broke it down to an hourly rate or graded it on what it was doing to me internally. I was a cheap cog in their machine. And every day that I gave them more of me I gave her less. Not to mention there was nothing left for just me.

I began to consider my escape, wishing for it daily and when it appeared I took it. I knew I needed a few months to decompress before I would even be able to think freely again. The catalyst to all this was that I knew within 15 months I would be turning 40 and although I don't have an issue with being 40 per se, I did take issue with being an unhappy 40 year old continuing down the same path.

At some point you either make a decision to change or a decision to accept that this is just going to be your life. I was unwilling to accept another 40 years of what the last 22 working years had been.

So I left the job, didn't look for another, let my brain and soul unravel a bit and tried to figure out what I wanted. I was right at that point of trying to define myself when my grandfather was diagnosed with terminal esophageal cancer. There was no way looking at the one large tumor that poked up through his boney back that I gave him a snowball's chance in hell of beating it back a second time. The doctor's gave him 45-60 days. It was at this point that I really knew where my priorities were.

I was blessed to have the last 7 months with my grandfather, who recently passed in early September, without the interruption of a job or other distractions. Aside from the dramatic buzz of some family members, he & I found a place...a rhythm together that allowed us to enjoy each day with each other while slowly saying our good-byes. I have never been so at peace with someone's death as I was with his. It's not that I won't miss him from time to time, but its more because we said everything that we were supposed to/had to say to one another. He lived a wonderful life, not perfect, just good...and he died with dignity almost exactly how he would have chosen. Not many people get that upon their exit.

So here I am today, 40 days away from turning 40. Its only in the last 3 weeks that things have begun to feel increasingly focused on my own deliberate intentions. Life is no longer about the dying, the drama or the services. Now, I can do what I had originally intended to this year...to focus on creating my life. I have no regrets though about taking the time to focus on family...in many ways it made what happens next in my life that much more of a priority.

I've begun to let go of the past. I am no longer willing to wait for people to be where I think or want them to be in my life. I appreciate their roles in my life, but ultimately this life is my own...it is about me. It sounds a little selfish, but you can spend your whole life looking around at others, wishing, waiting, criticizing, judging, getting caught up in their dramas or self-sabotage. Or you can consciously focus on you and how you want to live and how you want to impact this world around you. It's not about other people...life is about you.

Too many people get so caught up in the dramas of others as a way of avoiding the very same issues that reside within their own lives. It's much easier to have an opinion about how someone else should be living rather than focusing on how YOU are living and if YOU are happy.

I had to find peace with the past. Then I had to spend some time alone with myself relearning how to be in the moment. That meant purposely removing myself from public life for a little bit. I had to turn the volume down around me in order to hear what I was thinking. Within my own thoughts were the voices of negativity. Facets of my personality had taken on roles in my life...and they were leading me toward an unintended, undesired path. I had to learn to harness those thoughts and start retraining them to think differently about things. Much of this goes back to prior belief systems that I have always held. But I needed to remind myself about those beliefs and turn my attention toward focusing on what I wanted out of my life.

That has lead me to this point, where I now work on it daily, defining my wants...sometimes by use of contrast. Everything has been an exercise in definition & attention. Just like I have begun to work out my body and each day a different muscle group, I have to do similar exercises with my mind and soul.

Giving attention to only the things I want...which sometimes means distancing myself from people that want to complain or judge others. I am simply done with that chapter in my life. It is destructive for all involved. You cannot change other people. You may however be able to inspire them to want change in their life by witnessing the changes you make in your own. I am not out to be anyone's inspiration though...right now, its really just all about me.

So I turn 40 in 40 days. Everything is heading in the right direction now...slowly, but at least I am heading north. I now live with purpose and deliberate intention. It doesn't matter if its 40 days, 90 days, a 180 days and so on. It's just about defining what you want, focusing your attention on only that which is desired and allowing it in. Days don't matter until you've started to run out of them and realize you didn't live how you wanted. I release that and in doing so allow in an entirely different life. Namaste.