Today, on a whim, I thought about blogging and came across this old blog of mine. Me and a friend came up with the name one night as we were venting and joking about how messed up life can be. That being said, I read my last post on dating outside of my race and I was pretty stunned at the stuff I wrote. Masking my disappointment with dark humor is so historically me but damn it was crude. I thought, “I’d never write this today.”

Then I went further back and found a separate blog from my late 20s and early 30s. They abruptly stopped right around the time I assaulted my stepdad for pulling a gun on my mom and sister. I could feel a familiar sensation: me wrestling and grappling with the way of the world – only coping through cynicism (and alcohol).

It seems I used writing as a way to dump all of my negativity into a remote corner of the internet where it was less likely to be found. It was a coping strategy more than it was a legitimate blog. To be fair to me – none of my previous blogs were actually about blogging. I think I was secretly hoping to share some frustrating thoughts and somebody somewhere would find them and be like “THIS!” and suddenly my blog would go viral.

I have grown up. I’ve managed teams, taught leadership, and I still search for who I am though I have found more pieces than ever before. Now is as good a time as any. Let’s run this back but this time, maturely. Let’s revive this blog, cut the crudeness, and add in the genuine wisdom I’ve gained from living to attempt self actualization.

I’m going to take this rough piece of me from the archives and reintegrate the dynamics herein but more refined rather than distance myself from them. Why?

Cuz I’m in my mid-40s, I’ve done the work, and I’ve even saved lives—yet no matter how much I’ve grown, the world has only gotten crazier, and the dissonance is enough to make me think I’ve overcorrected beyond what is mortally reasonable.