When you find a good friend hold on to him or her. Good friends are hard to find and very easy to lose.
For the past few months I've found myself pretty isolated. Surrounded by nothing but space and, at various intervals, I've struggled to feel anything for myself other than disdain, partly because in the past three years, since I walked out of the closet so many people have used it as an excuse to walk out of my life, partly because I have got myself into some stuff it has become increasingly difficult to escape from and partly because I have made some mistakes that I have since been paying a copious price for.
I'm not innocent. I have been defensive. I have been guarded and on many occasions these things have manifested themselves with disastrous consequences but in spite of it all, I am still here.
The more things fall apart is the more things fall into place and the more I move away from those who no longer matter (or they move away from me) is the more I realize I was right to do so (and so too were they). Our alliances had become unproductive, displeasing, inefficient and unhealthy and had affected the fluidity of our friendship. Now there is only silence I can hear that still small voice telling me everything that has happened to me and everything that has happened because of me will be the makings of me. Though it is difficult to accept, I understand that I deserve more and I deserve to desire a better life for myself and I deserve to be surrounded by advocates rather than assassins.
Assassins! You know those people. The ones who listen to others but refuse to hear you out; the ones who make up their minds before asking what you were thinking or even if you were thinking; the ones who judge you when they promised they would always love you and then leave you even after insisting they would be there until the end (of your friendship, not your life). They all have one thing in common - they are people and though their greatest success in life may seem to be pointing out the failings of others, they are not wrong; they are completely within their rights to dismiss you and denounce your efforts because, in spite of the years you have accumulated, they do not owe you anything, but you owe yourself peace and it is that you should be doing everything in your unfathomable power to uphold, not people and their opinions.
The peace that will allow you to bypasses all misunderstandings.
I've worked in the entertainment industry for over two decades. When I was younger I would often make the mistake of thinking people I worked with would work with me through my dilemmas and my dramas but I was wrong and so are you if you think people are obligated to love you because they love what you do.
Then there were the family members, the people who shared blood who find it so difficult to share love.
Like I said, I am not innocent.
I have been treated exactly as I expected to be and while it burns in places, for the most part there has been nothing more liberating than being freed of people who attach themselves to you out of some distorted sense of duty rather than a desire to be there through the shit and the shame that comes in the struggle towards self-actualisation.
I'm moving into a new phase of my life and as is the case with all unknown territory, it is as frightful as it is fascinating. You know that point right! Where you either proceed or perish and if you do proceed you must do so unapologetically, which means having to break bad habits and the baddest habit and the hardest one to break for so many of us is trying to please others; trying to fit great talent into small spaces; trying to follow trends rather than set them and trying to hide your light rather than letting it shine.
Now's the time to have faith in yourself and in your ability and in the ability of your god or the universe or the love of that one good friend or that devoted family member to help push you into the purpose you went through all that pain for.
Choose life and live it, because in spite of everything you had to lose to find yourself, you still have everything to gain.
Be encouraged. I most certainly am.