Unsolicited Advice

My birthday is coming up and even though most people react in a Chicken Little (the Sky is falling) aspect, I always handle it a little different then I did before. I’ve never been one who gets excited about my birthday. No, it’s not because it’s another year older (some say wiser) and one more year closer to the decline of life (which is a morbid way to think). I’ve had incredible birthday’s which can not be replaced; I’ve had questionable birthday’s which did not live up to expectations; I’ve had all out horrific birthday’s that robbed me of what should have been a great day.

I’m turning 40 (there goes my 30's with no success!). I’m not scared of chasing those numbers. I’m not eternal; I will age, I will eventually have wrinkles and fine lines. What I am terrified, as I get older, is the risk of losing everything (mind, memory, concept of life). Writing allows for my stories to be captured, for the thoughts to be remembered, as a tool to keep those memories alive. I’m not going to push or strive to post every day/week/month. But I need to start to capture those memories and thoughts; because at the end of the day, I want to reflect back on them. I want to challenge myself to stay coherent as much as possible.

Which leads to this article, which is a scattered list of advice I wish to pass on too many, but mostly my nieces and nephews who will out live me. They may be good, they may be bad, but they have made me who I am today. I’m always going to be the student who strives to learn more, understand more, and mentally grow more.

In my own words, here are some of my Best and/or Worst bullets of (Unsolicited) Advice:

• Others will never have the same work ethic, tolerance and understanding as you do. (Also, never use your personal work ethic, tolerance and understanding to pass off a ‘better than’ attitude.) There are like mind’s, but not the same minds. Everyone conducts themselves differently depending on their past experiences, the lessons they learned from those experiences and how they chose to conduct themselves. I’m a work horse, always have, always will be. I don’t do anything half-assed because I love the gratification I get on a well-done task. Most others like to get paid to do nothing (which is okay) and that’s all they want to do. I’m not built that way. If I won the lottery tomorrow, that would be great, but I wouldn’t quit working. I need to keep my mind busy.

• Be careful using the word love, especially with your significant other. It’s very easy to say it without meaning and/or feeling it. As soon as you say it, you better feel it. In the past 30 years as we have grown as a society, we stopped using the true meaning and lost what stands behind those four letters. It is also very important to keep in mind that another person may use those letters loosely as well. Never rush to say you’re in love because you believe the other person needs to hear it.

• Infatuations and crushes can feel a lot like love. Even the break-up can feel like a heart-breaking travesty. But trust me, it’s not the same. The pain you feel in these types of break-ups are more along the loss of pride. Hell, sometimes you can manifest the idea of loss of love that you believe you truly were in love. But let’s face it, your pride is hurt. You hate the loneliness which surrounds you in the moment; you truly never miss or ache for the other person.
• HEARTBREAK HAPPENS! My advice: it’s going to hurt like hell until one day it stops; and one day, it will stop. There are so many words of wisdom out there, but most of it allows you to pro-long the pain; because in your mind, you keep replaying those moments by trying to understand the warning signs. Grieve the relationship. Grieve it until you wake-up and realize it was a distant memory. Only then, will you find your self again and understand anyone who causes that type of pain does not deserve an ounce of your attention. We as women can love more then the other person can sometimes. And we tend to carry that love for both people in the relationship. You will survive the heartbreak, I promise you. But it’s going to take time to let those cracks heal.
• Which leads into this next advice: It is never okay to hurt another to numb your own pain. Meaning, don’t rush to break another heart to try to feel something. This is one of the biggest regrets I’ve had in my life and I've left a damaged trail behind me. It wasn't until I realized I was left over pebbles on another's path of destruction that I realized to correct this behavior.
• It can take 20+ years to mend a broken heart and allow the darkness/shadow to fade away. I don’t get it or know why. Maybe it’s the burden, the bad blood, which no longer holds as strong of a presence in your memories. Maybe love truly does conquer it all. Maybe the memories that fueled the fire eventually smolders out, just leaving the opportunity to rebuild. So many "maybe’s" and "what ifs?". What I do know is that time makes holding onto the bad memories pointless. Somehow we accept (finally) that we can never change them. You can always dwell on them, but you can’t change them. Maybe that is the greatest answer to ‘the why’; because with time, we allow acceptance.

• You can’t control how someone is going to respond/react to your words, actions and emotions. Be conscious (Side bar: being conscious is to understand only, nothing more), but don’t ever change who you are to conform to an image they want you to be. It’s taken me a long time and wasted energy to fix moments where my anxiety peaked, and the other person took that energy and used it against me. I will no longer apologize for it; I will apologize for making them feel uncomfortable, but I will never apologize because at that moment I was so deeply hurt that the shield buffer of happiness dropped.
• It’s okay to walk away mad. Sometimes you need space to find your clarity before you lose your mind.
• The proverbial phrase ‘To err is human’ [Alexander Pope]. It’s human to make mistakes, it goes without saying. We live, we learn, and we move on. But why do we carry so much regret? We move it from space to space; our luggage we never unpack in our mind. So where is the advice in this line item? Regret is second nature which lives within your soul. You can’t see your soul, but you know it’s there, because it teaches you the good and bad. The point is, it’s extremely common to have regrets, but it’s not a good practice to live in those regrets. In other words, regrets are a path down a windy, steep, slippery path. They can take your heart and mind into the worse place; and many times, you can never find your way out. Find a way out of them, carry the lesson, but let go of the regret.

This is 40; this is what I have learned growing in the age of pre-technology. I've dated in the age before text messages, where communication is key. I've also succumbed to the new technology as we continue to advance and fall victim of spending way to much time invested on my cell phone. This needs to change.

Stick around, I still have so much knowledge to pass on and memories to capture. Visit often or visit once. For those embarking on the next decade of their lives, don't fear your pass or forget it. It's what made you who you are today.