Brave Enough To Be Bliss

how that has shaped the guest as a person and in a career. After hearing this, I asked myself what my happiest childhood memory was, and I honestly couldn’t think of one.

I thought about it for a couple days and finally landed on two occasions where I felt maybe not happy, but most at peace. The first was at a church event in a neighboring small town, where we had a 10-mile walk followed by a gathering where kids were given the invitation to accept Jesus into their hearts and follow him. I remember feeling differently that evening about Jesus than I did when I was at church, so I made that decision. And while I don’t remember having positive feelings when I was at church, ev en after that, when I was baptized by immersion, I do remember coming up out of the water feeling different. I don’t recall it specifically enough to describe it further, but whatever it was, I wasn’t scared of it and perhaps that is why I recalled it as t he second time I felt most at peace. I’m not sure how Simon would summarize the impact on me and my career, but I share that as an example of how I believe an unexpressed, negative early childhood experience colored everything about how I felt about myself, my behavior and ultimately my life, even though I didn’t consciously recall what had happened to me for more t han 50 years. If I had been a guest on Simon’s show prior to this, I would have had to lie to come up with a happiest childhood memory because it wouldn’t have been how I felt insid e, even though I wouldn’t have understood why at the time. Early on, I wondered if anyone would believe me but now it simply doesn’t matter because I trust my own knowing. When I lived scared, I needed someone else to validate my experiences. I needed someone to tell me I wasn’t crazy because I feared I was crazy. Now, I can refer to my beautiful crazy and smile about it, not caring what anyone else thinks because if anyone wants to question my life’s experience, it will be because of their fears, their insecurities, their issues…not mine. I trust myself more than anyone else. Years back when I saw the television show This Is Us advertised, I remember thinking how I’d never want to watch that. It looked too depressing, which I now understand meant it looked much too much like real life, and real life meant real feelings and I wanted no part of that. But a couple years ago my physical therapist recommended the show to me, so I began watching it on Netflix. I loved every episode, wishing it didn’t have to end. But as the saying goes, all good things must come to an end and in reality, eventually, all things come to an end. A real end. Including this book. And this is it. For real this time… (turn on closed captioning to read the words in addition to hearing them)

This Is Us 6x17 - William’s Speech to Rebecca (youtube.com)

The idea of sharing my life story all started from a number of things about it that just didn’t work. They were sad, and some would say bad. But they all stemmed from someone hurting me, and the fears and controlling behaviors I had as a result were my way of coping with this oftentimes, very hard life. I was trying to protect myself from further pain even though, in reality, I now understand I was perpetuating the pain.

Fear and control. It makes sense, it just wreaks havoc with life.

As William says to Rebecca in the clip above, “If something makes you sad when it ends, it must have been pretty wonderful when it was happening.”

And that is why I had always tried to find closure, create an ending because I wanted to avoid the pain of losing pretty wonderful. I believed I didn’t deserve pretty wonderful, so I feared the ending and at least when I proactively created the ending, it gave me an instant of control. I had survived fear only through the feeling of control. And it turns out that’s a hard habit to break. Really hard.

I may never eliminate it, but I’m catching it much more quickly than I used to, and I can do so without Ginger’s assistance. I saw her once more in July and by the third visit everything felt back to normal. It was a good

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