Soul Forgiver

What I wouldn’t give for just a moment of peace. My name is Giver and a year ago I sold my soul. By the way I don’t mean that as a figure of speech, it’s legit. After years of life weighing down heavier than it ever has, I decided to throw my soul in the ether.

No matter how much I’ve ever done, nothing that I do in life is ever enough. It’s like I could do a million and one good things, but the one slightly bad thing I do is all that matters. I try to be a humanitarian, be selfless. I can’t act like that hasn’t been working out, I’d like to think I’ve made a positive impact in that regard. It just seems like every time I’ve tried to be the good guy hard times just always show up to overwhelm me. Every time I try to be a better person life just proceeds to sabotage my efforts with hardship. I understand that life isn’t all French fries and hot sauce, by the way that’s an odd combination, but it’s also one that I love, but I just wish life wasn’t so hard all the time.

I wish I didn’t have to work so hard just to obtain something that’s always gonna be taken away from me. I wish my will power wasn’t always being tested just to see how I can handle difficult situations. It’s like even when I conquer the hard times I just end up being tested with even harder times just to see how I hold it together. What’s the point of these test of will and even faith? After I pass them my reward is an even bigger challenge. I’m tired of being tested all the time and I’m tired of everything I do never being enough.

Well after years of enduring such frustrating agony I decided to choose an unconventional method of alleviating the pain once it presented itself to me. One day on the way home from work I ran into this man at the gas station by my house. He was sitting outside of the entrance as I was walking out. It’s like he was waiting for me. There were absolutely nothing interesting about this guy, he wasn’t dressed in any special attire, he was dressed very subtle, pretty much conservative and he had a very soft demeanor to him. He was also very soft spoken.

He approached me very slowly and asked me who I was and after I told him my name he read me like a book. He said I was a selfless good person, but I’m also always emotionally drained. He knew I was suicidal and was looking for a way out, then he made me an offer. He said if I was willing to sell my soul he would give me one year of peace, but after that I would burn for an eternity. At first I was dumbfounded because I’m like why would I sell my soul just to burn for an eternity? What’s to gain from that?

But then he brought up how I was about to kill myself and destroy my soul for an eternity anyway. At least with his offer I could get something for my efforts. Then I thought to myself “well he does have a point, so after giving it some quick thought I decided why not and shook his hand selling off my soul. I didn’t feel anything in that moment of hand off, but I did feel something the next day.

So I woke up the next morning to a bright and sunny day, which is funny considering that I remember the weather saying it was supposed to be a cloudy rainy day that day. Clouds and rain always put me in a downer mood, but sunshine and clear skies always lifted my spirits. I guess this was my first gift of the trade off, nothing to put me in a bad mood. I went to work that day and had a 100% cordial and productive shift. Normally things were shaky, but on this day there was no turbulence. It worked, the trade off of my soul for the perfect year was in full effect and I was loving every minute of it.

The rest of the year ironically felt like the longest time ever. So many great things started happening for me that I became overwhelmed with good fortune. While moving up professionally I ended up being surrounded by a lot of beautiful people, for the first time in I don’t know when, I was actually part of a healthy circle of friends. Furthermore I ended up reconnecting with my family. We all hadn’t been on good terms for awhile, but now I was visiting them and having quality family time and loving every minute of it, I mean, we were actually creating beautiful memories like we hadn’t in a long time, what a family we had become.

My interactions with people I dealt with on a daily basis had changed drastically. I wasn’t arguing with coworkers or crappy neighbors, as a matter of fact, crappy people of all backgrounds no longer existed. All I had was friends in the shape of close acquaintances and even complete strangers, yep, I had no haters in my surroundings. It was nothing but love between me and everyone I crossed paths with, like Heavy-D.

I think the best thing to happen to me in all of this was I no longer had to jump through emotional hoops that tested my will power. I was making good choices without bad occurrences finding me to throw me off track to see how I’d hold up. I also didn’t hear any complaining about who I was or was made to feel like I’m not good enough no matter how much good I enacted, I was genuinely appreciated.

Even my financial stability and living conditions took turns for the better. My bills seem to be lower or not piling up as much, and I wasn’t having any car trouble for the first time in years. So what was my life in that moment? A life where I could go to sleep at night with no anxiety to eat me alive and I didn’t wake up in the morning with depressive thoughts. I had no reasons to frown for 365 days. Life wasn’t just beautiful, it was perfect.

As those 365 days neared their end the reality of the choice I made to sell my soul really started to set in. Yes, I was given a year of peace, but the price to be paid for that was an eternity of suffering. My soul is getting ready to burn for an eternity and there’s nothing I can do to change that. I didn’t think this choice was gonna matter all that much to me at the time, but I guess reality has a way of catching up with you when you realize that you’re about to spend it burning in a lake of fire to no end of time.

When I first made the choice to sell my soul it seemed like it didn’t matter what choice I made considering that I was on the verge of ending my own life, but as I look back I realize that ending my life isn’t something that I had to do. I most likely wasn’t even gonna really do it, I was just in a funk, but I guess I needed to tell myself that it’s what I was going to do just to justify the fact that I wanted to sell my soul. As hard as life was it’s not like it was the worse thing in the world, even if it felt like that at the time. I could have changed my perspective on life and maybe looked at it better than I did before I made the choice to give the devil an eternal kiss.

Maybe everything that found me when I sold my soul would have found me in time if I hadn’t sold my soul. Maybe better days we’re coming. I always claimed to love the Lord, but when times got hard I always played the drama king card and turned my back on him, perhaps he was just trying to strengthen me for a meaningful future that was supposed to await me. I really did it, I really sold my soul for thirty pieces of silver. I just cursed myself with an endless purgatory of suffering, just for temporary satisfaction. I’m no different than an addict who buries themselves in addiction just to tune out the rest of the world. Jesus, what have I done?

I sit here in this park in my neighborhood down the street from where I live. It’s almost midnight and my 365 days are moments from being over. I can feel it, the hellfires are coming, the air is still, yet it warms as hell’s hounds are tuning up the band awaiting my arrival. What awaits me on the other side? Endless torture in which I will be surround by the screams of countless individuals who made choices that parallel my own. My heart is racing and my mind is filled with thoughts of regret, wishing a million and one times that I could take back the foolish choice that I have made. Fear doesn’t begin to describe how I feel.

Oh my God, I’m going to hell and there’s no turning back. The ground begins shake as the air becomes even more heated with a mist of red flames forming in the atmosphere around me. In front of my feet the ground beneath me begins to open up. Something is starting to arise from its depths, what is it? Or better yet, who is it? It’s the man who made me the offer to sell my soul that day. He was even dressed in the same attire he had on when we first met. I realize now how calculated his plan was for me. He came to me in the subtle form that he knew I would find appealing and used that to rope me in. He played on my emotions and desires and it worked.

With the same subtle smile that he had on his face from when we first met he looked me I the eyes and said “it’s time.” All I could do is look to the sky and scream, just like I will be screaming for all of eternity.

Was selling my soul worth it? Absolutely not, but what else can you tell a fool who lives on emotion?!