MyTimeToBlog
My entire life I never knew I could be the man center stage, speaking up, but that was due to my upbringing. By the time I was 21 years old, I had moved 13 times, living in multiple states — and I'm not a Military kid. This was all from my mother being involved in countless abusive relationships.
To watch the woman who has nurtured you from your first breath it's painful to witness. I always cowered in my corner, unable to deal with what I saw. So instead of reaching out for help, I made myself comfortable in that darkened corner. I had no friends there, nor family; I only found solace with what I had there: nothing.
Can you imagine years vanishing from your life, thinking that that corner was all I needed? It kept me hidden from the world. It gave me a false sense of self. Nothing became my ideal in life, because it was all I had in that corner.
Every state I moved to, that corner was there. We never talked, so communication for me in the real world was impossible. I couldn't verbalize my feelings when asked to by a girl. I'm befuddled by what she wanted, because in my corner, I didn't have anything to share.
The older I became, the more impossible it was for me to express my emotions. All I was was nothing. No friends. No education. No nothing...until my mother needed me.
I crawled from my corner, carrying with me all the problems that placed me there. It was like a light blinded me when I made my way out. I cowered within myself, not knowing how to be anything but what the corner taught me.
As I made my way into the world again, nothing made sense. Get a job. Pay a bill. Be social. I was in my corner, meandering around a world I didn't grasp. Now I was free of my abusive stepfather, because I did come out of my nothing and did something to him: hurt him physically.
The corner made me recoil, but the pressing of harm towards my mother's health caused me to lash out. Shocked by this display, I was lost. I harmed my stepfather. Me, the corner didn't show me my answers, so I moved to another corner, this one was where I contemplated my acting out.
I decided, with no guidance, that I would hurt my stepfather again--and anyone else who would harm my mother. Again, nothing came from that corner as positive, only a negative outlook that was welcomed there, because nobody helped me escape those thoughts I cultivated there.
As I lived in my corner, I was forced to enter the world. The more I did, the more mistakes I made: making the wrong friends, doing drugs, not being responsible for my priorities. I was taught nothing in the corner, and it proved itself as I began making my rounds.
A confrontation came to me one day. The worst ever, because I didn't know how to do anything but harm others. It worked with my stepfather, but I took it too far: my actions ended with me in jail, and eventually prison.
A new corner of nothing arrived. This one with dire consequences--and I had to learn quickly. Fear shaped my corner now, so I cowered there, praying nobody would see me. They did--and they approached me in my corner, questioning me.
Young and filled with nothing, I was lost. This corner screwed my life up. I now had other people coming to my corner, and they were as bad as me. I saw them losing out in prison, and the more I did, the more I wanted something new...but I was afraid.
These steps I took from my corner led me to new sites. The kind where I discovered men were nothing, and wanted to continue being nothing. Somehow, I finally recognized I couldn't live like them anymore. So, I did something at my lowest: I asked for help.
Each time I did, I grew from nothing to something. I was shedding my old thinking that my corner was a perfect utopia of nothing. This led me to speak up more and more, because all the apparent examples of corner life made me grimace. These examples were content, and captivated by the nothing of it all.
When I had my aha moment that the nothing was a waste, it came from a man who had a smile. One that bloomed in his confinement as he spoke about change. This man was center stage, shining bright as he opened up about his corner, filling it with drugs and alcohol. He described his battle from the corner to center stage. I wanted that, and I listened with intent.
Once I grasped that I could be on the center stage, I worked every day to deal with my corner of nothing. I learned I could be something, but the work was hard. The kind of hard a marathon runner trained a year for. Mine took decades.
Every day, I took a new step from that corner. Each one leading me closer to center stage. The light on me, and I'm speaking. I'm sharing what it took for me to get there. When I did, they listened. They were entranced by what I shared...even as I peeked back at my corner.
The more I shared my past, the more I began seeing that I'm something that conquered the nothing of the corner. I looked at that battle like David with his Goliath. My Goliath was asking for help from people who cared, then I nurtured what they gave me, and now, those who reside in their corners can hear from me how I worked tirelessly to stand center stage. It wasn't easy. No, it was the hardest thing I ever did in my life...but I'm glad I did.
The world has many corners. Even as they do, we can get from them by filling our lives with people who made it from them. Their teachings can open our eyes, but we gotta be willing to allow it to take root. Once we do, the world will change for the better as we take center stage and show others how we did it. When that happens, more corners will vanish and center stage will be where all will desire to go. I did it when nobody thought I could, and so can you.
Ask for help, please. I need you to make center stage more important than those corners filled with nothing. I know you can do it. I know.