“What you get by achieving your goals is not as important as what you become by achieving your goals.” – Henry David Thoreau

Recently, I had been pondering exactly who I am, how did I get to be who I am now and what do I want to be; pretty deep stuff. A couple of months ago I had written about how stuck I was behind myself and how I was continually putting up barriers to being who I wanted to be. I was at a very dark place when I wrote that post. Since writing that confusing blog post I feel as though I am a completely different person. What happened?

That day I posted my dark and frustration laced blog post, I had begun to post my daily gratitude on Facebook. Each day I would feel my mood changing and I was truly feeling more positive about who I was and where I was going. I had noticed that even after a couple of weeks I was not feeling the same lows anymore, I was levelling out. Then, as life often does, it threw me a curveball. On week 3 of my gratitude posting, I was triggered back to my past, I felt defeated and angry. My first real test of my mental state. That night I had posted on Facebook my thankfulness towards my wife in getting me through a very tough day and how grateful I was having her support and strength. It was on that very post that a comment from a friend changed my life. She suggested that I do a TEDx talk about my story. I was intrigued.

After doing some research as to what exactly a TEDx talk was, I realized that this was something I was meant to do. I could barely believe myself. Here I was, actually convinced that I could stand up in front of a group of complete strangers and talk about my abuse. Am I crazy?? What the hell? Well, the rest is history. I applied, got accepted, prepared and delivered the talk of a lifetime. Here I sit, never so confident in myself and my abilities. If I can do something like that, what else can I do? Wow!

I am amazed at just how quickly life can change if you open yourself up to opportunity. I have dedicated my life to be the most positive person I can so that I can raise a son who someday might be able to maintain that positive momentum. In a short couple of months, I have gone from not seeing the light at the end of the tunnel to basking in the glory of infinite sunshine. At that time I had felt that I would never get there… EVER. I had almost given up hope. By taking a flyer on writing my gratitude each day, I had opened the door to find out about the most challenging task that I would ever complete. I now live each day with the question “what’s next?”.

Open the doors. Take your chances. Live for today. It is amazing just how life continually throws you it’s answers to the most complicated questions when you are focused on now. Life is like a game of Jenga in that it is a series of events stacked upon themselves and it is up to you to stack them in the correct sequence. Problem is, you need to remain in a present mindset to find that right order. If you become weighed down by your past and/or your future, you will end up stacking your events in the wrong order and you will then become confused, anxious and depressed.

This year, my healthy (almost ritualistic) habits have enabled me to remain rooted in the present. For the first time in my life, I got a brief glimpse at just how amazing life can be when I seemingly have things “figured out”. What is most important; I believe I found out just how to get those events stacked correctly in my favour. In one brief moment, I was able to make the impossible… possible and I found out who I am and what I can do. Even though that moment was brief, I will never forget it and will strive each day to be back there again. Now, I am just waiting for that next Jenga piece to come my way.