Thursday, August 11, 2005

Interesting link to a thirty minute or so speach by a guy who was an engineer, then was a lawyer, and now is an entertainer.

What Do You Want to Be?
-- links to a link that will take you to the download.

Interesting, different.

Often, in dealing with grief, you have to decide, what do you want to be? What do you want to become? This is because you are going to become something, as are all those around you, no matter what you plan on. Life and change will happen. Especially if you have subsequent children, you are going to relive, evolve and become regardless of what you think you are going to do. Life will not remain static, and if you do not anticipate and plan and decide, it will still happen, just without your input.

An excellent question: what will you decide to become? What will you do for those who are part of your life, how will you help or hinder them in what they are going to become? What will your choice be?

6 comments:

Lisa M. said...

Often, in dealing with grief, you have to decide, what do you want to be?

For me, grief and the experiences that brought it, have "aided" me to chose a path I would never EVER have considered prior to the events that have taken place.

Life and change take place. I couldn't agree with you more. Sometimes, I want it to though. Somedays I want to be stagnet. To not survive, to not grow, to not forgive, to not understand...and even to not communicate with God.

But life continues and changes do take place, and even on the other side of the pain, growth, inspiration, and forgiveness, do come. They even sometimes creep up on you.

I rarely comment here. Not because I don't read, but because it takes me a while to digest, accept and process what you write. You often articulate feelings that I have experienced, but have not been able to state.

Thank you for your efforts~

annegb said...

Lisa, you really said what I feel, as well. I take awhile to digest Stephen's posts, too. And I have felt everything you describe. May I ask what was the loss in your life?

When my husband and son were killed, I turned to the church. I made a 180 from a hard drinker to a Nazi Mormon. It wasn't calculated, Mormonism was so comforting.

But when my surviving son committed suicide, I knew my life was going to change forever. And it has in millions of ways, not always for the better. I was so mad, so martyred, for so long. The only reason I didn't follow him into the grave is my knowledge that suicide does not bring peace. There have been moments when I almost didn't care. I just wanted out of here.

What do I want to be? I don't know yet, Stephen. For a good long time, it was about mere physical survival. Now I'm starting to realize that I must use my story to help others or it was totally in vain. No direction yet, but God's been pretty good about getting me on track.

Anonymous said...

I don't feel that I am able to articulate what I feel very well, so I'm often too intimidated to speak up. That is NOT who I want to be and I am seeking to change that one aspect.

I have been on a grand search of who I want to be, who the Lord wants me to be, and what I think that I should be. I want life to be about more than just surviving it. Some days it feels like I am just trying to hang on tightly and endure to the bitter end. I know there can be more than this, but I am often at a loss as to how to find it. I have been finding my solace and comfort through a renewed discovery of the scriptures and prayer. I don't know where else to turn. The answers are still so elusive sometimes.

Lisa M. said...

annegb~

Lisa@Madsenfamily.net is my email. Why don't we email? I would love to share my experiences with you.

Randy said...

Well, I know what I would like to become; the problem is getting there. Or back there, in my case. I'm a happy-go-lucky kinda guy by nature, and I'd like to be that way again.

I dealt with my childrens' autism and retardation by reading everything I could get my hands on, and trying to implement a crash behavioral program. I didn't let myself feel any emotion at all, not consciously anyway. Six years later, I'm an emotional and physical wreck, and I've had to face the reality that my boys need far more in a programmatic sense than I can give them. DW tells me that I gave them a lot in other ways, so I guess that's good. But I can't stop feeling anger at myself for not being more capable. Also, when I was more religious, I was genuinely angry at God.

Sarebear said...

This is a hard one. I haven't suffered the loss of a child or parent yet, and not to say that what I am about to talk about is in any way as deep or the same kind of thing, but I am going through a grief-like process as I begin therapy with a psychologist, and treatment from a psychiatrist, as I have been recently diagnosed with bipolar disorder and a variety of anxiety disorders, although they are still nailing those down, they are the working diagnoses at the moment.

I am 33 years old. And my daughter was recently diagnosed with high-functioning autism. And I can barely function, and somehow the Lord thinks I am the best mother for her? I actually do have faith in his faith in me, so that answers that question.

But having been mis-diagnosed with depression for so many years, I am grieving for the person I could have been. The chance at normal choices and normal experiences and a normal life that apparently I never had, because it seems that these things go back to childhood.

My very ability to choose, my judgement, is affected and swayed by my illnesses. Brain disorders, they call them. That could take me off into a whole other area of free agency/mentally ill and what all that means, but the point here is (and I have trouble being as concise and well-written as I used to be able to be, so bear with me), I have chosen to fight.

Though the struggle is hard, and I have no idea how to cope with my illnesses, let alone be able to mother my child and teach her and access services she needs, all I can do is try.

For me, it is though I am walking into the darkest hurricane you can imagine, facing it head on, and boldly striding towards the tempest, and knowing that all I can do is try.

That is what I have chosen, as I have struggled this week with my own dark despair and whether or not to give up my option "to get out", as it were. I did, just so you know.