Almost a year and a half year ago, I was a first year in college continuing down a bad stretch of depression. I was depressed through most of high school, and my first semester of college had left me in a pretty deep hole. A few weeks into my second semester, I saw one of my favorite bands in concert: Angels & Airwaves. Front man Tom DeLonge stood on stage and said this: "I wanted to create music that made you feel like you were lifting off." That night, my life changed. I stood there in the crowd and realized I had not been living any sort of life I really wanted to. It was then I decided to change my life, and so I have.
Life since then has not been all whiskers on kittens. In fact, it’s been a pretty rough year and a half, with a lot of ups and downs. I’ve had my heart broken twice, once just recently in addition to being served the ultimate, heartless, passionless betrayal. Filled with anger, sadness and hopelessness, I was dreading the start of my junior year of college, especially since I was supposed to live with the backstabbing asshole who betrayed me.
Leaving Desolation
I had come to the realization a few weeks before school I couldn’t change the past, or how my ex-girlfriend started dating my “friend”, a week after telling me she wanted me and only me. The only thing I could change… was how I felt about it. A fundamental part of Buddhist thought is based upon changing how you feel about things, and living here and now. I have since adopted this as one of my most dear pieces of wisdom. The things in life you cannot change are not worth worrying about.
I managed to switch housing assignments have since moved on. I have a nice new roommate, but he’s never around. Things are looking up and I’m a lot more confident about things. Tonight, I came across an old interview with Tom DeLonge. In it, Tom discussed one of my favorite songs, Start The Machine. In the final line of the excerpt I read, Tom says, “in leaving the desolation and negativity behind, you find something beautiful.”
I audibly gasped when I read that quote. Only by leaving desolation and negativity have I been able to move on, and I’m finding beautiful things. This blog is about love, and how powerful it is. I am an optimist, but have had to accept I will have good days and bad days. My intention is to explore these thoughts (among other things in life) with the hope of finding a balance that will make me happy.
No comments:
Post a Comment