Let’s be real, let’s cut out all of the BS for a second, let’s take off the “kid gloves” and be really "REAL" for a moment—EVERYBODY, (repeat) EVERYBODY HAS A PAST, EVERYBODY! You, me, your man, your woman, every one that you know. And for the past 15 years or so, I have been fighting my ass off to get out of the shadow of my very own. Trying my damndest to separate myself from the person that I “used to be” from the person “that I am”, the person “that I am becoming” –that person that I want people to see and shine through. But how can I? How can I or how can anyone really know how far they have come as a person without looking back at where they used to be? Can there really be a now if there was never a then? The answer is simple, HELL TO THE NAW (shout out to Whitney, love that saying)! I have tried to outrun my own shadow now for the last decade and a half and not only is it tiring, it is fruitless.
Although I am truly not proud of a lot of the things I have done (most of them), I can’t deny that I did them and I can’t deny that when I was doing them that I didn’t enjoy them. There was the usual lying, cheating, lying on the lies, out-cheating the cheats, underhanded dealings, sneaking around, and an overall ”Sewing of The Wild & Royal Oats.” If it was worth doing, I did it, I mean, I let “My Freak Flag Fly”, I mean, I REALLY let it fly high! I had some fun, hell, I had a lot of fun, too much fun, regretted a lot of the fun that I had and I actually saw the beginnings of the lessons that I am learning now. Did I heed them then, no, but I did see them. In the process or shall I say, during the process, I did more scandalous shit than I can recall, I missed-out on a lot of opportunities, I hurt a lot of wonderful women, (DUMMY) broke a few hearts, (including my own) and I burned a lot of bridges that I can never ever repair. I live with that guilt on a daily basis, but what can I really do about it now besides, apologize sincerely, (trust me, it doesn’t always work, in most cases it doesn’t help at all, it actually worsens the situation) acknowledge it, grow from it—real growth, not that fake crap we all do when we have drank way too much and we promise God (while our head is leaning on a cool toilet boil in the back of some shady-ass club) , understand it and little by little step out of the shadow of my own shadow.
I can’t and won’t lie, it has not all been the deep and dark shadows of the “underbelly” of morality and I am not glorifying it by any means, but just like ending a bad relationship, when you look back, you tend to focus on all of the negative things. Has my own past made me a bit resentful, guarded and a little cynical about love…I have to say yes, it really has? I have had many years of guarding my own heart from the very things that I have created; the mistrust, the hurt, the anger and the uncertainty of it all. It even made me a little resentful of people that are in those healthy and happy relationships that I once had, destroyed and am looking for in my current quest. This endeavor, with its various revealings, ramblings, heartaches, lessons and whatever the hell else it can provide is a means to break down those walls. And, as Samuel L. Jackson said in Pulp Fiction “I Am Trying Ringo, I Am Trying Real Hard To Be The Shepherd.”
I now understand my past and the role that it plays in my future, rather the role that it does not play in my future. I can’t outrun it, I don’t embrace it, but I do acknowledge it, its inglorious splendor and I am thankful of somewhat being freed from it!
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