After entering fatherhood in maybe the most unconventional of ways, I continued to blunder my way through those early years. It is just now that I have matured enough to admit the truth. I am not a real man yet and the fruits of my labor throughout that first decade of adulthood made that fact apparent. Such labors include but are not limited to, joining the military during a time of war, surviving combat, suffering Post-Traumatic Stress, reviving my desire to live, beginning then completing an advanced degree in the science of nursing, and finding the time to co-star in what can only be described as a melodrama of sorts.
The blunders and events listed above took a toll both literally and figuratively. Before now things like liberty, independence, and inheritance for everyone, never registered as a necessity in my mind. Yet more and more so the importance and meaning of these words began to be relevant in my mind and life. How could I do better? How could I know what I never knew? What rights and liberties might my children forfeit as low-born? How could I teach them to have independent thought? What inheritance might I leave for generations to come? Although still confused and afraid most of the time, at least I am starting to see the error of my ways and consider the more critical question.
I was beginning to understand how knowing the limits of my personal development could be the difference between corrective instruction versus verbal abuse. I must be able to see the seemingly unforeseeable. Examples of such would mean being vigilant with my finances and placing a tight strangle-hold on the immediate gratification of impulse buying. I must assign greater value of my time by investing more of it into self and family. The cost of circumstantial living is indifferent to reduced personal liberties, independence, and inheritance as exhibited by one’s set paradigm. If not for willful insistence to change that paradigm, good or bad, it will stay the same! The circumstance of the poor continually persist, as does the circumstance of the successful in the same fashion. Good people work hard and do right, but after thirty years on the job, they retire with barely enough income per month to afford good food and electricity.
Look around, it was all once but a dream… The clothing you have on, the device you are using to read this, the car you drive, and even the process that delivers water to your kitchen. Men and women known as inventors dreamed these things and created them into existence. This because, we are creators! You are a creator and your thoughts become things. All the things you have worked steadily for and dreamed of are now or will soon be tangible. Focus your thoughts again and now! What will you have? Imagine if instead of shoes to put in the closet, your focus was to purchase a rental property with walk-in closets, or instead of a new phone your focus was to own a phone company. If you would only have the thought and stay constant in an all-out do or die respect, the results will be the same. Unfortunately, ninety-five percent of people focus their thoughts on shoes and new phones! Even more unfortunate, is that day you commit to diligent self-investigation and heavy reflection…!