Tl:Dr My gravest mistake in the past five years has been holding onto the fear of leaving behind everything I knew for what I wanted.

Body

Complain, complain, complain. Moving their jaw is the most physical actualization most people will ever put into solving their problems. Complainers, like myself have googled a thing or two, maybe they picked up a book, perhaps reading a few chapters. I knew all too well the situation I gotten myself into. Like most people I possessed a good concept of the first few steps I needed to take to get my life on track. I've even had the same consistent goals for myself, dating back before my first heart break.

We came together and shared those goals actually. They were part of our dream. She'd finish school with a degree in Education. On the way I'd snag a few certifications and learn a foreign language, we'd travel the world together, picking up every few years to enjoy a new location. We'd quit eating out and cook a little healthier. Instead of going to bar, we'd go to the gym. Together, we'd build and improve each other. It worked too! For all of two months. She started to slip up, excuses came for why she couldn't lift. "It hurt to walk or ride a bike." Started coming out of the same mouth that scolded me for not taking her hiking. She'd have a few friends over for drinks after a "long day of classes." "She's not taking care of her self so neither do I!" popped into my head. I back slid too.

Trying to pick up the slack for both of us, I became so focused on her, I forgot to take care of myself. We got caught up in a downward spiral. The relationship grew worse and worse, in the end it was nothing but a toxic waste we clung to for the sake of our dream. She never put forth any effort to reach that dream after we split. In fact she flunked out that semester we broke up due to emotional trauma. Giving up any hope at the dream we had together, she left me with the realization: it was never her dream. Those goals, those aspirations still live on in me today. Those were my dreams, I just designed the path I was taking around her. She never wanted to put in the work it took to get to the final destination, she just wanted to be spirited away to happily ever after.

I hit monk mode, that's where I began to journal. Tracking myself I finally began to see progression through my actions. I was a million miles from home, friends and family, when I finally did get back, it was a bit of a surprise; I'd left a sniveling mess and came home with some confidence. We went out to celebrate at our old bar. Needless to say my habits were waiting for me with all my friends. It wasn't long before I began sitting around doing essentially nothing in lieu of taking care of myself. Back in the same lifestyle, my old habits took hold. I hadn't really beat them, I'd just been removed from them, forcing myself to find new hobbies. Now given the choice between the two, I slid right back into the easy way of things. Eventually I slid so far back I had to do something.

Even though I wasn't living it, I couldn't help but see what was going on around me. I wasn't doing it but I knew I'd feel better eating my own meals. Stretching would take that slouch out of my shoulders. Having trouble remembering phone numbers again, wonder what that could be? My wardrobe once improved, only ever got better. Even to this day that's something I can always see and appreciate about my awakening. Going from shoulder length hair in pajama pants, paired with the latest free t-shirt from the local head shop, into clean cut with nice jeans and a fitted tee makes it hard for anyone from before to recognize me in passing. Knowing what it felt like working for more pushed me back into it. This was the happiest I'd been since I came out of monk mode. Trust me, my journals said so. When I walked out of monk mode six months later, it wasn't just a wardrobe change there was a physical difference about me. I'd gone from 6'1, 152 pounds to 6'3 173 pounds and everyone knew those two inches didn't come from a growth spurt.

When I came back to my social life, friends wanted to know what happened. A handful wanted to lift but only a few actually started lifting regularly. I held off my old habits for awhile, started making friends in other areas of life but slowly, I took up drinking again, moved in with a bad influences and it got worse. I was still lifting, still taking care of myself when work destroyed one of my hands. Three months, "no use" was placed on my hand. For three months I collected a check but couldn't do much of anything I enjoyed at the time. Instead of using it positively, I spent it meeting friends at bars starting at 10am. When my restrictions were finally lifted, I wasn't mentally ready. I moved out, cut ties with the people that were encouraging my bad behaviors. Life got better but I was never the same after I lost control for those months.

Ups and downs followed me for the next 18 months. Bouts of lifting and binge drinking. The pendulum swung back and forth, over and over again for varying periods of times. Working a weird swing shift, the old timers eventually encouraged drinking to help sleep when getting off in the AMs. Next I found myself drinking at happy hour before work. I lost my job when my phone charger disconnected from the wall after a long night after bar. I woke up two minutes passed punch. They told me I could beg for my job but I hated the hours. The first few weeks went swell, stretching, reading, walking the dog, filling my day full of positive things until my friends phoned in with their location, then it was off to the bars. A twenty-two year old spending Tuesday morning on a bar stole reading The Gulag Archipelago, surrounded by men three times his age, just waiting for his turn to die. That's what I became. I took better care of myself but eventually I ended up doing all my reading and writing from that bar stole.

A trip out to the West Coast to see two of my departed best friends sobered me up. Grouping up at a music festival, we ventured out to summit a mountain. After we went our separate ways, I backpacked down to L.A., spending a week homeless waiting for my flight. Considering swimming in an ocean and climbing a mountain were goals from years earlier, I went home energized with the attitude, "I'm going to make this my summer." Getting back I hit it hard for two weeks then went right back to the same friends and lifestyle I was determined to leave behind.

The first five days of 2018 I spent drinking with one of my best friends, he confessed to me, " I can't stay productive, even when I come home to work, I loose my edge." He was having the same problems I'd be dealing with for over four years. He ran off to lands unknown, forced himself away from everything he knew but when he came home, he comes home to me and our old ways. I was scared to go it alone. Selfishly I tried to force two lovers and multiple male friends out of a lifestyle they weren't trying to leave. Girls just tagged along, hoping for a free ride. For the boys, those who really wanted it became men on their own. Me, I've burned another Facebook, deleted Snapchat and changed my phone number yet again. This time I'm not running from a women but a lifestyle, the habits and all the people in it holding me back.

Conclusion

In the end you'll have to go it alone. Winners don't hang out with losers. If you're living a life you don't like, chance are, all the people closely associated with that life suck. They'll have habits that'll rube off on you, even if they don't intentionally do it, they'll bring you down. Especially women. A girl who isn't taking care of herself before she's with you, isn't going to start magically taking care of herself because you're fucking her. Eventually you'll meet new people with new hobbies and interests that align with the life you want to live but first you have to actually be able to live that lifestyle. If you're still playing around with your old life, those bad habits will bleed threw to the new one. I tried for four years to will anyone, woman or man, out of a lifestyle they weren't actively trying to leave. I burned myself out trying to help people who weren't helping themselves. All this out of the fear of being alone.