“Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results” Albert Einstein (Part 2)

But I picked myself up and dust myself off, like they say, but still I wondered Am I insane?

I was overdue to finish this post but for me it´s so hard to open up and I always need more time to reflect on what I want to share, what I need to let go and maybe help someone on the way.

Well these two weeks were a test, a really hard test that I was obligated to endure and figure out if all my training in self control and patience were really working out. I have to tell you, I was so scared of what could happen to me if I lost control; I freaked so much I wanted to give up and leave my house so I could avoid conflict. Well, I decided I shouldn´t, I have been working on myself so much, trying to be more forgiven and patient, so I owed it to myself; I realized this was part of my path to reach the next level, and I needed it. I hanged on tough and I felt incredible! When I felt the pressure, the provocations that used to make me blow up didn´t worked anymore, I smiled proudly in the face of the enemy and relaxed at last, I felt at peace. Since then, every day I wake up and feel amazing, I don´t feel sad and empty no more; I swear to you I feel the presence of my grandpa, stronger than ever, here on my shoulder supporting and watching me, I feel powerful. I am no longer scared of the future or what may happen because I had the proof I am in the way to become who I want to be.

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Now here´s the lesson I took from this experience: if you want to be happy, but really truly happy, you just need to want it more than anything you have and will ever want in life. But I really mean it people, you might think “what a cliché”, it is but it couldn´t be more true. I tell you more, I was sick for 6 years of my life (I was just 17 and now I am almost 24), I was so sick I didn´t even realized how much. Most people judge me for the time I “lost” but that is just ignorance, depression is real and it hurts like hell. It took me 6 years and the lost of my dad to realize I had been dormant, I hadn´t been living at all; I was crippled because I blame it all on others but mostly I blamed it on myself, and that was always there putting me down. Oh I was stupid; I totally made myself insane with all the pain I had let fill my heart, for all those years; and this last year I finally open my eyes to reality and saw that I needed to deal with the truth. You can´t change what you don´t acknowledge; you have a disease you need to treat it, like in the AA, and this was the beginning of a long journey of self discovery and recover. I dove in all the dark places I had hidden all my sorrows and turned them upside down; I felt injustice had befallen me, I felt I was betrayed, felt rage, hate, unbearable pain, loneliness, I felt all of this over and over has I walked through every single thing that had stopped me from living my life (part of it was noticeable on all my previous posts). It was so awful to realize I had wasted years hating myself for things I had no control over, and blaming people for their choices and the way they affected me in the past. Why do we focus so much in what it could be than in what it can actually be? It is just the way we were raised to be, I think. And this is when I introduced Buddhism into my life; I needed something to help me understand what I was doing wrong, and consequently the reason why I felt down every single day. And that is the journey I am still making on my own, and that I intent to share with you, step by step.

So now I wrap it up with my conclusion on this particular topic. Insanity is a tricky word, and it shouldn´t be used lightly, but the reality is that sometimes people make you feel crazy because they can, and you shouldn´t let them. Doing the same thing over and over again will not lead you into the path of happiness, open up your mind and reevaluate your life; let the bad things go and once you reach the point where those don´t bother you anymore, that is when you know you´re being successful in turning your life around. This applies to everyone. And I will share some interesting things you are probably doing and shouldn´t and could definitely make a difference.

“Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results” Albert Einstein

For my first post of 2014, in English no less, I decided to begin introducing you to my world of “recently found” inner peace; meaning my journey through the Buddhist philosophy. Now don´t you abandon me here, I am not trying to spread the word of the Lord (nor am I trying to insult your religion or belief)! This is me, my belief and my life´s philosophy, I expect no one to follow me, and I just want to put it out there that there are other paths to happiness and serenity. Since I find that most people with less than a high school education are very narrow-minded, at least here in Portugal, I decided to discuss my system of beliefs in English - mostly to avoid being labeled “the infidel” of my hometown (Yeah that happens). (Note that I said most, I know a few wise adults that don´t need to speak English to accept me, since education is also practiced at home). For you my “better” educated friends: read and interpret as you like.

Like I have said in my last post, in Portuguese, I am thankful for 2013 because even though I lived in hell for most of it - and believed me, I wish no one the task that was bestowed upon me - I came through alive. Oh my friends but it was more than live that was pounding inside me, it was something I haven´t felt since I was a little child: it was happiness. Not the happiness you feel when you have a particular exceptional honor/present/day, or when you fall in love, no no no it was that amazing no-reason-why-but-truly-pure happiness. Have you ever felt that? Think hard is not as easy of an answer as you might think.

So, how did I achieve that holy state? you say. Well, I have a story bigger than life for you, and I will tell it (because I will write a book about it, and it will change life´s, or so I hope). But for my first step into the spotlight I will discuss a particular live lesson I learnt and have been reflecting upon a lot, the past couple of weeks. The concept of insanity that entitles my text today is a “nice way” to put it, has we do use the term “insanity” very loosely and it actually isn´t. If I were a psychologist I would probably say it is a very serious disease and it should not be used as slang, but since I am a “thinker” (you know I have an ego, let it go I have come to the conclusion that a grand percentage of “insane people” are actually the most sane and happy ones. Now think about it: they live in their one world, they are actually are happy and content there but we are so afraid of the “crazy” that we must pump them with pills and tell them they are the ones in the wrong. Who´s to say what´s what? Have you seen “A Beautiful Mind”? I know the dude eventually contributed immensely to some physics theories but he went through hell and back! All that pressure from a world that wanted to make him feel absolutely bunkers, at which they succeed grandly, reducing a genius to a human mop in no time. It took him years of self control to finally be accepted as normal! That is completely absurd to me, who wouldn´t like to be evolved in a great conspiracy? and who´s to say he wasn´t and the govern was actually trying to cover their prints? I am just saying, open up your mind a bit!

But what does that has to do with me? Well, because I too was led to believe for years that I was a bit insane, not for professionals but for people close to me and whose opinion was oh so important in my mind. It is easy to fall into other people´s opinion of us, and interiorize it as being the absolute truth, and I admit I was too weak to rebel against the tide so I was washed out by the waves.

(End of Part 1)