Most of you know that I do a great deal of volunteer work with homeless and abused children. All of my kids are great but this one is extraordinary and I know he will do great things in his life. This was written after one of our conversations.
It's funny when you look at things, at the course that you run to get to where you are, the decisions you had to make then and the decisions you have to make now.
When you grow up in a household where you are put in the position of making
decisions of right or wrong that have a gravity that most others don't understand
you decide early on to take a certain road in life.
I'm not saying that you have to have a childhood like mine or anything because
you don't. You could be totally ignored or loved too much and it have the
same kind of impact. You start to make decisions based not so much on how
it is going to affect yourself but how it is going to better or worsen those
around you. You do things that you probably would not have but you do them
none the less.
Where am I going with this? It is just something that I've been thinking
about today after working with some kids and thinking about the business
and such. I've got a kid that is using a fake ID and such to work and have
an apartment but he's also taking care of his little sister. They were left
in their house by their mom months ago and she has never come back. He first
went the route of crime similar to myself at his age, but used education
as a solace and reinforcement of better things to come.
He has already made the decision that his life will never be completely his own. He put it to me that way. He then expounded that he saw that in me and he doesn't regret his decision.
I asked him what he meant and he went on to explain that he looks at me
and the first thing that he sees is someone that made it out but also that
he sees someone who took the experiences in his life and has chosen to help
others with it and that even after deciding to take those experiences and
help others he saw how I have decided to take the knowledge I have gained
and help with companies both supporting and building ones that help others
on a larger scale.
This kid is much smarter than I was at his age.
We've spent many hours talking and today's was deep. He told me that he
figured that I went into the Army initially to get out of the lifestyle
I was in but that I went into the Teams not because it was a suggestion
from the drill sergeants like I tell but because I wanted to find a solidarity
and family that I gave but didn't have completely. He said he knew damn
well that I knew what was being asked of me when I changed from the Intelligence
track to the Infantry and then Spec Ops field. He is right I did know what
was expected of me.
He then went on to tell me that he had spent more time thinking of the times we would talk about how I would hate myself when a team member would die and how the death of my fiancée and son affected me. He said that he had thought about what it would be like if his little sister was to die, even if it was something that he would have no control over. He would hate himself for the fact that he had lived when she didn't, he said it's a role that you take when you decide to care for others more than yourself.
He then went on to say that it was logical that I choose the friends that
I do. That I choose to surround myself with people of a similar mindset
and if they don't necessarily have the same mindset then they would take
a bat to someone's skull if I asked them to.
This kid told me when we first met that he wanted to be a child psychologist
when he is older so I bought him a set of books with 10 psychology books
in it and since he has built his library to over 150 books on the subject.
Like I said he is much smarter than I was at his age.
We ended the conversation with him telling me that I was the only adult
that he has ever known that was completely honest with him. So with that
it made him think about the things in my life that would be comparable to
his and how he could learn from my experiences now instead of making the
same choices, mistakes and disappointments that I did.
It made me think about a lot and still has me thinking. It's not often
you find Sigmond Freud and Dr. Phil rolled up into a 16 year old former
street kid.
I live with a fear of letting down or disappointing my friends and family
more than I will ever worry about letting myself down. This may be normal
this may not be but it is me.
I would sacrifice to the detriment of myself in order to help a stranger
and would die trying to help someone I love. I have told myself repeatedly
that I won't do that any longer, that I will put myself first and that I
will think before acting but as he so eloquently told me it is a choice
that I made before I ever knew I did that makes me do these things.
He said that some people mistakenly call this a martyr syndrome; something
I thought was not a real term until he showed it to me in several books.
He said that it is a mistake to call it that because people with a martyr
syndrome will tell of how things happened to them and continue to happen
to them but blame everyone else.
I argued that I do talk a lot about the life I have led and find myself
telling myself to shut up because people don't want to hear it and I don't
want anyone feeling sorry for me but it comes out none the less.
He said that it is that attitude that makes it not the martyr syndrome,
that I tell of my story for the most part freely in order to make points
that things will get better, or to get closer to someone that may not open
up to others and things of the like. He also said that I lack the key component
of blaming others.
I admitted that there are times that I blame others and he said that I place
blame from what he has seen only when I am not of the ability to do the
task that was given to another and that the blame for the incompletion of
said task is rightly placed.
It was a very different conversation and one that humbled and shook me.
I told him that he like many others I know place me on a pedestal that I
don't deserve to be on, he replied with the statement that because I say
that makes me deserving of the pedestal that he has put me on and that because
of that the pedestal that I place him and some of my friends and family
on is all the more meaningful to them.
I guess my point of writing this other than to share the brilliance of one
of my kids is to say that while we may not think that our lives touch others
they do. While we may second guess what we do our actions are a reflection
of ourselves and therefore are touching many more than we think.
As he said, all of my friends and family affect me and in extension affect
him. That a comment or conversations that I may have had with a friend or
family member will touch him and then touch a friend of his or his sister's
and then someone else that person knows and on and on.
I have always known that there was a ripple effect but he actually gave me examples and it is humbling.
So thank you to all of you that listen to my story, that share yours with
me, that help, support, love and nurture the things that mean so much to
me. Without all of you I wouldn't have been in the situation to have been
having this conversation today.