The Calm. The Solitude. The Fight.

i don't quite know how to explain it. it may be that i'm ready. it is certainly not apathy. it may be my inner self preparing for some tremendous battle that is sure to come. it may be that i have finally come to terms with ...me.... i'm not quite sure. it may be a general understanding from within, that although i did not take the path that i was told to take, i have ended up somewhere that is truly great. i find myself at a crossroads. rather than angst and uncertainty, i see a beautiful set of options. i no longer feel that i need to pursue great wealth, fame or success to be happy. instead i can live life and enjoy the beauty in simply living. the uncertainty is no longer something i fear.

i know that the time for me to show the world who i am is near. i can feel it coming. i can feel the ripples of actions in my past pushing me forward. speeding up. like riding a wave. where it will take me i do not know. i do not care. i know that because of this sudden calm and strength that every thing i have ever dreamed is possible. i also know that many of these dreams were flawed. selfish. greedy. impure. i now have new dreams.i have found them in solitude. i have shed the loneliness. i have found me. in my past when i was lonely i would turn to anything to escape. seventy hour work weeks. a case of beer or a bottle of booze. a new relationship with someone that really didn't care. this time however-- i embraced it -- i allowed it. i made no phone calls to fight it. i didn't fight to continue a bad relationship. i didn't find a new chemical addiction to numb it. i didn't self destruct. by doing so, i found me. by finding me, i found  calm. the solitude, occasionally overwhelmed by painful loneliness, has conquered my biggest fears. i look at the world with a new set of eyes. i feel the warmth of tears in my eyes when i read some great act of humanity in the news. i feel at peace. i am ready.

now is the time to look ahead. i see It coming. i unaware of what It is, but i do know that It is nearing. It will will be the fight of my life. It may take my entire life to fight. It is most certainly near. It may come through occupy. It may come through work. It may come from a relationship unseen thus far. It is close. i'm ready for It. It will test me. i know not what the fight will entail. It may be a final battle against my inner demons. It may be the call for revolution. It may be simply settling down. It is going to be tough. It is going to test my fortitude. but i know It will not destroy me. i have already been destroyed. the world has hit me with all its might and lost. the world has taken everything from me. yet i stand. i stand tall. i stand strong. i stand ready.

i have found new strength that is dependent upon nothing and no one. from this strength i say bring It.whatever It may be. It cannot defeat me. It will not win. instead i will meet It with a smile. because no matter what It is, i am ready, and willing to face It. this strength is what allowed me to write this blog, my typically guarded feelings and emotions no longer need to be guarded. i suppose this is my welcome post to you. welcome to my world. my views. my fight. my certainty that evil will be destroyed by good. hate will lead to love. darkness will be followed by light. ignorance will lose to knowledge. war will fall to peace. despair will be replaced by hope. a man can live for a three day with no water. weeks with no food. but not for one second without hope. let us all dare to hope and dream for a better world. let us stand in solidarity towards a greater good. let us fight the good fight.

i know i am ready.

are You, my friend?

The girl I would have married

One of the beneficial things of being a Mormon boy was knowing, with out a doubt, where my life was heading and where I would end up. I knew that I'd do a year of school, go on a mission ,come back, date the girl I knew I would marry and move forward on my happy little path. I even knew the girl I was going to marry. It was all planned, lined up and ready to roll. I would graduate college, find a job at a Mormon dominated business and propel myself forward so fast that no one would know what hit them. When I left the church that plan shattered. I was left with no concise actions to push things ahead at a break neck pace.

Now I question whether I want to get married or have children, but there is one thing that I have come to terms with. The girl I was going to marry truly was a gem. She's smart, intelligent, beautiful and witty. Like me, she has her own qualms in life, her own issues, and her own way of viewing things. I want to thank her, for the amazing influence she has been and continues to be in my life. I know now that we would never be happy together in a marriage, too many conflicting beliefs, different priorities, and contradicting views of the word we live in. It is with this knowledge that I find true happiness in seeing her move forward, progressing on her own course. Fighting against certain social pressures that she has to deal with. Maintaining  her own beliefs withing the church she is a part of. The dream I once had is dead, not necessarily a bad thing, but it is gone. It will never be rekindled, it will never feel me with the fire it once did. In place new dreams have emerged, new hopes and desires. stronger and more passionately than before because these dreams are built upon my own thoughts and beliefs. But seeing her, talking to her, and keeping tabs on her has made me realize that there are parts of my past that I no longer have to keep pushed away in order to maintain my new hopes and desires.

I suppose I want to say thank you. I want to tell you that I will always love you. I will always care about you. I will always have your back. The day you get married I will be there, because I know that that marriage could have been us. I wont be there in sadness, but instead in joy, because I know you will find the right guy. I'll make sure he understands how lucky he is. I want to thank you once again for showing me that it's not all bad, that there were parts that I can embrace and hold close to me once again. I wish you the best, and I'm confident you will find it.

Bradley Manning

I hope to someday meet Mr Manning, to me he is like a modern-times Paul Revere. His assistance to WikiLeaks showed us all what we already feared. A terrible double standard of preaching freedom and human rights while practicing the opposite. How long until the masses awaken. Every day I see more and more people awakening, yet they're all so fragmented. The media portrays each group as hating the other in an effort to keep us from uniting. I say we stop the hate, it's merely a tool that the Elites have utilized to keep us fragmented. If I hate you just as much as I hate them then how can you and I work together against them. By portraying Occupiers as lazy self indulgent hippies and Tea Party members as racist privileged white people we will not unite against the corruption that has destroyed our nation.


Bradley Manning represents exactly what the OWS movement is fighting against in many ways. He shows us that denouncing war crimes is a crime. Protecting freedom is a crime. Transparent government is a crime. The NDAA passed  the Senate on Bill of Rights Day, a slap in the face to the "freedoms" this country was founded upon. Today I read articles from the far right that are directly on par with Occupy and found another previously written article by the same author describing   OWS as


 "the “Occupy” movement is made up of violent, foul, criminals, perverts and Trustifarians, who are far from the peaceful Tea Party movement. The terminally lazy and perpetually stupid who are not part of the criminal element are merely useless idiots who need to occupy a shower and a class in economics."

 It saddens me and frustrates me to see our nation so terribly divided. In the same article the author describes something that is very similar to the National General Assembly that Occupy is proposing. I'm proposing a ceasefire. Left and Right don't matter. Republicans AND Democrats are a part of the problem. Occupy has not been co-opted by the democratic party. BOTH political parties are a part of the problem.

It just gets old. Honestly, act like the responsible adults you claim to be, and find the common ground. Allow others to have their views just as you have yours. The Peaceful Tea Party movement was co-opted by republicans and and has faltered to produce much since then. The need for true democracy is there, a call for revolution has been issued by OWS. Drop the bullshit hate that the elites want you to have. Stop playing their game and come together with your neighbors to try and save democracy. Save freedom. Save human rights. Destroy corruption.

To Bradley Manning, what you did was noble. It has inspired me and millions like me to stand up and fight. To make my voice heard in the overwhelming noise of nonsense that is out there. Bradley Manning, although I've never met you I will always love you. Through you I found myself.

Have you ever had the feeling

that your world was about to crumble?

It seems as though my life has always lead to this point. the do or die, make or break, fight or flight, situations that have at times destroyed me and at times made me. I find myself once again sitting at this juncture. This time I'm fully accountable for the situations that transpired to put me here. Bad luck coupled with bad decisions and unfortunate outcomes has me grasping at straws to hold on. This time it's different though, this time I can identify the causes of my current situation. It's a strange combination of a shitty childhood, a destroyed and somewhat rebuilt social structure, and a new awakening. A strange realization that I have in essence lived different lives in my short 21 year time-span on this Earth. Through it all I have only had one thing, and that is me. The ONLY thing that I have been able to count on is myself, and many times I've let me down.

This time things are different, it seems as though I've successfully left my adolescent overwhelming need for approval and acceptance behind. I no longer feel as though I will violate my own morals and standards to belong with a group of people. My entire life has been one fight after another, I've lived in terrible poverty. I've lost everything I hold dear on more than one occasion. I've seen my own family shattered and rebuilt to only shatter again. I've been ostracized for holding different beliefs than most and then ostracized  by the people that I shared those beliefs with when I began to question them. I've experienced more in the past 3 years than I ever knew was possible. I've fallen in love to have my heart crushed, I've fought the law and lost. I saw firsthand some of the darkest parts of our society. I've slept in a tent with people that are homeless and seen the world through their eyes. I've pursued the girl of my dreams to only find heartache. I've had my words twisted and my ability questioned. I've been told I'm an inspiration and a self important asshole in the same day. I've truly gained a knowledge of what makes people do what they do. I've spent a Christmas in jail and I will unfortunately spend New Years in work release once again. I've given it my all only to have it all fall apart. Yet I keep going. Instead of feeling all is lost I see this as a point of change. If my world does indeed crumble I just pick myself up and start again.

I guess the point of this is mostly to console myself. It worked, because what I've written is true. No matter what happens I will still have myself, and with that I can progress.

You Call It "Entitlement" I Call It Justice

My biggest beef with all those that call the people of Occupy a bunch of people that feel entitled to something they didn't work for is that they fail to realize that the youth of the nation has been ROBBED. I work, and I work a lot. I've been employed with one to three jobs since October of 2005 when I was still 15. I've paid my FICA taxes like a devout citizen for over six years now. What exactly am I getting out of this forced tax? Absolutely nothing. Social security is beyond broken, yet they still take the money from the youth to try and keep this broken social safety net in place. They take my money, and give it to the elderly, with no hope of me ever seeing it again. Not only do they do this, but the fucking cap it. If you make enough money you cap on how much goes to social security, so the poorer you are the higher percentage of your income you pay into social security. I suppose trying to fix the mess that we inherited from the previous generations makes us entitled.

I say we have been robbed! We have been attacked! We are being forced into poverty as the rich grow richer. We no longer have the freedoms that they had in the past. Our votes no longer count. I say let us take to the streets. When your vote no longer counts civil disobedience is the only way to get your voice heard once again! WE ARE ENTITLED. We're entitled to a government that cares about it's people, not it's corporations. We're entitled to see our tax dollars benefit us. We're entitled to have our voices heard!

I will not stand by and let this country rot. Someday I would hope to have children, and I would hope that my children would have a future that is not dimmed by elitism and poverty. The wealth divide is growing. Every day that goes by the middle class gets smaller and smaller. Family after family has lost their homes while the bankers and elites robbed our nation of its wealth.

I guess you're right. I am entitled. I'm entitled to justice. I'm entitled to the rights that every human being should have. I'M ENTITLED TO FIXING WHAT THE GENERATIONS BEFORE DESTROYED.

The first attempt

I feel it would be impossible for me to completely explain my reasons behind this blog in one simple sentence or anything of that nature, partially because what I feel is so powerful I cannot put it into words, and because in all honesty, I'm not sure. I'm writing because I can, because we have that right, and because I feel my views should be heard. I suppose it's why I Occupy. I feel as though the individual is completely and utterly being destroyed by the society we live in, but I see Occupy as a rebirth of individual cognitive thought. I am me, and that's all. I know who I am and what I stand for. I choose to align myself with Occupy because it fits into what I have known and felt for years.

Life's not fair, I get it. I understand that to some people this might seem like some whiny bitchy blog about all the ills of society. I hope that over time I can evolve this into something that people can turn to for a different perspective. You may not agree with anything I say, and that is completely fine. All I ask is that you read with an open mind, understanding this is just how I feel, it doesn't make you right or wrong, it doesn't make me some demi-god whose opinions are the only ones that matter. It simply is, and by being it can become something. Every journey requires a first step. Here's mine.