Cleansing the Doors of Perception.....

(A nickel to anyone that posts the full quote or the author of said quote in the Comments section)
The last several days I have been quite down. I have been sick and there has been some personnel issues going on. Being sick always gets me think about the mind-over-body issue to which us soldier get used to quite quickly. How much can I push myself to accomplish the mission? But this entry isn't all about me....

I know a soldier that is completely and utterly self-defeating. Given any opportunity for free-will, this soldier will make the perfectly wrong move of not even choosing. I believe it stems from a deep self pity of an origin I have yet to discover. Not that it is my job to psychoanalyze people (not anymore at least), but when I am exposed to this soldier regularly I am left with the need to make sense of it.

This blog entry is not about the soldier, either. This is about how we self-destruct and set false limits on ourselves; our own self-imposed blockades to success. I constantly search myself for traces of anything that stand in my way to the goals I have set for myself. I am honest with myself and cleanse myself of them, that's what is getting me through this deployment. Why should life be made harder at our own hands? Isn't that really a search for truth? Because if we set up excuses and filters through which we need to evaluate our every perception, then how can we ever accurately see the world? That's obvious rhetoric, but something I challenge everyone with whom I talk. They mostly don't realize it. Some people find it challenging to have a conversation with me, but it serves as a defining line, again making my life easier.

No, this is not a declaration of personal success or some new philosophy on life. It is merely another observation. What stands in your way to happiness? An event that happened in the past you can't let go of? An unresolved relationship? A fear? Insecurity? We know what we should be. We know what we want. We know what we want to be. We also are mostly afraid. Afraid of the unknown, afraid of ourselves. We aren't afraid of what might happen. We have a good idea what will happen, we are afraid of our unknown reaction to it. Challenge yourself because it effects everyone around you.

I confess that I have two or three unresolved issues in my personal life that I am constantly trying to resolve. Those close to me know what they are. But I am happy that I have come to terms with so many many more things over the years, and set them aside not as stumbling blocks or curiosities, but as building blocks for wisdom and strength. Otherwise isn't experience just wasted time?

So why is all this an issue? Why did I even bother discussing it? Well, my friend JL got me pondering our collective journey through life with his recent comment. I remember that alley, I remember those days. I saw it recently when I visited home while on leave. I see how far all of us kids have come. Some of us have stopped short along the way, some of us like to think we haven't gotten where we are going yet. And I've always wondered why.