My Sudden Realization

I have been in limbo ever since my last post 10 months ago. My last update was so positive. It read like I had direction and goals that I was striving to reach. The truth is, perception rarely reflects reality. I wrote that in an attempt to motivate myself. Unfortunately for me, it didn’t work. I have all these aspiration I wish to reach and all these ideas I wish to try, but unfortunately, I am my own worst enemy. I overwhelm myself to the point of sloth. I over-think everything and come to the eventual conclusion that, whatever the goal de jour is, I cannot achieve it without some sort of miracle. And then I make the worst decision; I wait for the miracle to happen.


I am not one for making excuses. I feel that we all have the power to change our own lives into whatever we see fit. However, after much soul searching, I can trace my demise back to two incidents. Let us, for a moment, flash back to the year 2000. I was in high school. I was skating along, not taking myself seriously and doing the bare minimum to get by. Much like I am today. I cannot remember what the catalyst was, but something changed in me and all of a sudden I became an over-achiever. I put in the time and effort to take more challenging classes and boost my GPA, because I knew I wanted to go to college. Don’t ask me why I did, because frankly, I don’t know. Fast forward to 2002 when I got the notice from UCI that I had been accepted to matriculate there in the fall. Elation boosted me into over-drive, and I began to do everything in my power to make the finances work. And, to my eventual surprise, they did.

September 2002.

I was proudly moved into the Oakenshield dorms at UCI. I had said my last goodbyes to my family, and found myself staring blankly across the room at my new roommate, Adam Dorn. With my mind and body still shifted into over-drive, I set my sights anew. In order to make the finances work, I knew that I needed a job, and so that became my new purpose in life. In a matter of weeks, I was shaking hands with my new boss, Steve Speers, and agreeing to start work that next Monday. Though I was still driven to do my best, I found myself shifting down into neutral. I fell into a routine of work, school, study, and sleep. Four long, sometimes difficult but mostly fun years later, I was looking down from the stage at my graduation, facing the rest of my life. That was the first time in quite a lot of years that I felt scared of what lay before me.

I had a degree from a prestigious University and, what I thought at the time to be, a very bright future. I knew that it was time to take inventory and make a new plan. I was full of energy and felt like I could take on the world. In no time I had the next 10 years figured out. I said goodbye to all of my college friends, packed all my stuff into storage, and headed out on a month long vacation with my family. I was secure in the knowledge that, after taking a sabbatical, I had a plan.

September 1 2006.

Vacation was over and my lease was signed. All of my personal belongings had been rescued from the cold blackness of a storage shed and were sitting in the backs of three vehicles on their way to my new life in LA. I had taken theater courses in college and found a love for acting. So, like many young, naïve people, I decided to make a go of it. Without a moments hesitation I moved all of my stuff into a small studio apartment and again said goodbye to my family. I quickly found employment and was just three days away from starting my training when the first incident occurred.

Just nine days into my life in L.A., I was robbed at gun-point, 3 blocks from my apartment, in the clear brightness of mid-day, on a residential street, by 4 young thugs. All they got off me was my cell phone, but my foundation was rocked and I finally knew what it meant to be shaken to the bone. I feared every noise and cursed every person who did nothing while incidents like these happen in their own neighborhoods. I immediately went online to contact my parents and the very next day there was a U-Haul truck in front of my 10 day old apartment and all my belongings, many of which had still not been unpacked, were loaded into the back. All of my savings were wiped out in that incident, since I had signed a one-year lease and I had to cover the monthly fee on the apartment until they could re-rent it. I was forced to do the one thing that I swore I would never do, I moved back home.

My dad and I agreed on a payment plan of $100 a week to live at home and he, out of the “goodness” of his heart, allowed me to postpone payments with 0% interest until I was gainfully employed. Well, I didn’t get my first paycheck from my new job as a server at CPK until December, so that meant that I had 11 weeks of rent that I owed my dad on top of my current payments. When you have other bills to pay on server wages, a $1,100 debt took about 2 ½ years to pay off. My motivation was shot and my drive was shifted to park. I became withdrawn and unsure. I stopped setting real goals because I was afraid. I didn’t know it at the time of course, but I have recently come to that realization.

The second incident (or, the final nail in my proverbial coffin)

About six months later I found some of my old spark and decided that, since the L.A. thing didn’t work out, I was going to go to my fall back of being a police officer. I became my old self again and thought my prospects were great. After all, I had a degree in Criminology, I had no record, and my roommate from college, Adam Dorn (who had the same major as me) was accepted to the San Jose PD. Unfortunately hope turned to despair as agency after agency rejected my application. My life was shattered once again and I again turned inward. Two failures in a row were too much for me to handle.

Since these two incidents, I have done absolutely nothing with myself. Sure, I talk a good game about this prospect or that idea, but I have no conviction behind it. They are empty words, devoid of truth or meaning.

Here I am, at the end of 2010, and I have nothing to show for my previous 4 years of life. Just like the catalyst from 2000, I have come to self-awareness tonight. I use to think that I could handle everything, but now I realize that the thing I felt I am in control over is actually controlling me. I need to find my old spark. I need to not fear the unknown. I need to not hesitate from the uncertain. I need to find direction once again and take my life down a new path before this current one destroys me completely.

I don’t know if anyone is going to read this, but I had to get my thoughts out in the open so that I could analyze them. After doing so, I have come to the following decision: My priorities are going to shift and I am going to find my confidence once again. I don’t know where this path will lead me, but one thing is for certain, it has to be better than where I am now. I am not making any promises; I am merely putting my life on notice that things are going to change.

Headshots

It has been a while since I posted last because there has been nothing to post about until now. I just got finished with a two hour session with a photographer, shooting photos for a good headshot. I decided to take the acting rout for now, since I am still young and have little real-world responsibilities. I now face the exciting, yet arduous task of sorting through 166 photos to find the one or two that are just right. I will post the photo(s) when they are cleaned up and ready for public viewing. I had a lot of fun with the photographer. He came up with some good ideas that I had not thought of, and for the most part, they worked.