Category: For The Journey

17 Oct

Living Up to Expectations…

Written by UrbanVox 4 Comments

I have a confession to make… I am 31 years old and I still have no idea what I want to do when I grow up…

No, wait… that’s not right… I do know… And I know I can do it… I have all the sets of skills… and the knowhow to make it happen… I am good at it… Or so I’ve been told… quite a few times actually… And I quite often get paid to do it so that should be more than enough proof of that, right? RIGHT???

I am usually my biggest critic… So save from very few people, critics come not just easy on me, but are often encouraged… I believe in improving… Always.

But for some reason that I can’t fathom, the opinions of me and what I do carry a huge weight on me when they come from this very small group of people that comprises of my family and a few other VIP in my life. Their encouragement is usually all I need to climb the highest of mountains… And it usually works for a while… Until I figure that what I am doing I am doing for all the wrong reasons…

Sounds bad… but is the truth… I was talking about that to a friend today  and she is the one that called my attention to that… that made me think about it and as much as I hate to admit it my track record really shows that I am always trying to please others and up abandoning things that are important to me, forgetting about what I LOVE and what I am GOOD AT to meet with someone else’s expectations…  something that I can only bring myself to do for so long… Which is where I tend to jump into another train in search for myself.

My whole career has been like that… My whole life…

Does it make any sense?!?!?!!?  No??? Yeah… I didn’t think so either…

My sister was mad at me earlier today because she says she wishes I had de ease to grasp things like I do and I instead waste the chances just like that… She went on ranting with my mother on how I was accepted in X amount of universities and dropped out of Y number of courses and how I waste  my potential in doing things that are beneath my capacity and how I should do this or that which then fuelled my mother’s rage at an argument we had today about me going back to studying and me opposing to it because I have other priorities and have no time or place of mind to going back to it… Yeah… things were kinda ugly, specially when I decided there was no point on hearing to any of it anymore…

Doesn’t what I consider a priority for me right now make any sort of difference?

The fact is that sometimes is hell in my head… I have ideas and random thoughts flowing in my head all the time… And I have a hard time coping with those most of the time, let alone trying to accomodate everyone else’s thoughts of what and how I should be doing things… I’ve tried that… it doesn’t work… Plus I am stubborn…

Doing “the right thing” isn’t always right…

I know they mean it with all the good intentions and that they really want to help… Most of the ideas and suggestions are good in principle… but they distract me from what I need to focus on… And believe me… distracting me is not that hard a thing… I think it is time I focus on doing MY THING without having to accomodate all other ideas into it as well… I’ve tried that… it doesn’t work… If I don’t have my heart on something it will eventually lose my interest…

I need to try to do my thing without adding up to it to satisfy other people… Just this once…

And if that means I need to learn to say NO every now and then then so be it… I am awful at saying no… But is time to stop feeling stuck in the middle…

Things aren’t rally going RIGHT so far… so I thing I’ll try and go LEFT. 

Let you know how THAT goes as it goes… ;-)

EDIT: A valid point was raised… if any of my sons ever decided to drop out of uni to pursue his dream/follow the path he thinks he needs to follow if I’d support and encourage him… well… I didn’t have to think about that much… yeah… I would!!!! And if that didn’t work for him I’d be there for him… I try to raise them to think for themselves… what sort of example would I give if I tried to stir their lives for them?!?!? Sure, until they are old enough to take their own decisions I am more than happy to stir the boat… but even I know when to let go and let them swim on their own… this is life… we raise our kids for the world… not for ourselves! Rant Over

08 Oct

10 Things (or more) to do Before I Die

Written by UrbanVox 1 Comment

The other day I was driving home and listening to one of my mum’s CDs (it was on the CD player and the radio was boring) and one of the songs in that CD kinda made me cry… the name of the song is Live Like you were Dying by  Tim McGraw… It was a good cry tho… The sort that makes you think “WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING WITH YOUR LIFE?!?!?!” sort of cry…

Made me realise I have 2 alternatives: Either wake up and leave the whole depression business behind and get on with it… there is still too much to be done and those things won’t do themselves (yeah… I know… it is harder said than done…) or put a bullet in me head and end up my misery (hard to do as well as you can’t really buy guns in the UK can you????).

Well… As you can say I have chosen the 1st alternative and I have decided to embrace it with all that’s in it, the good the bad and the ugly… And I have a plan…

This plan has a few steps… and one of them was to elaborate a list of things to do before I die… I started ambitious and my first number was of 100 tasks and got straight into google to get myself an idea of how to populate that list… Well… it seems to me that this would be harder than I thought… and the main reason of my difficulty in that is… well…

I’ve done most things on the lists I found on google:

I have sky dived, I have crossed a country in a bike (okay… maybe not crossed, but have you seen how long the BR101 in Brazil is? is kinda like crossing the UK), I have gone mountain Climbing and have abseiled down a 50mt waterfall (and down one of the sides of the Twickenham Stadium), I got married (and am getting divorced) and have 3 beautiful children… I have been a Stay at Home Dad.  I have been successful in my profession and have worked for myself after that, I’ve lived in New York and lived in a beach town… I’ve surfed and ridden a motorbike. I have travelled and lived abroad… I have spent time in a shanty town aiding  in the community, I’ve gone bungee-jumping. I’ve climbed an active volcano and camped on top of the Andes under snow… I’ve gone scuba-diving AND snorkeling. I have had classes on piloting a small airplane, I have driven a Ferrari, a Mustang, a Camaro a Montecarlo and have street raced a tuned car. I have Photographed amazingly hot women wearing nothing or next to nothing and been paid to do it… Oh… yeah… I took up on photography… I’ve had photos published in magazines and newspapers in 3 countries… I’ve been on TV, I’ve had a newspaper column and I was part of a band and we have performed to a full audience… I have danced a tango in Argentina. I have competed in Adventure Races… I have shot a gun (1st class sharp shooter me…). I speak 3 languages fluently… I have participated of a public protest more than once… and almost been arrested for it once. (even took a can of Tear Gas in my head once)… I have kissed in the rain and I have been to a nudist beach (colony even… was fun!)… And that is just the stuff that crossed my mind now and not adding the naughty ones… *blushes*

Yeah… I’ve been quite busy ove the past 31 years huh?!?!

Now you see my predicament?!?!?! For me to have a list of things to do before I die that will actually challenge e the stuff in it will have to be bloody BIG! But at the same time realistic…

Only thing is I need ideas… And that, my beloved reders, is where you come in in the plan (well one of the ways). So far what I have is:

1 – Write and publish a book

2 – Expose my Photos in a gallery (or similar)

3- Leave a legacy for my children

4 – Put my feet in every continent in this world (Done North and South America and Europe… only Asia, Africa and Australia to go… (think Antarctic is doable?!?!!?)

5 -  Throw a big party for twitter friends… but not just any party… THE PARTY (ummmm… that gives me an idea…) Would you come?!?!?!?!? ;-)

Yeah…. I know it’s not a lot… but that’s what I have in mind at this precise moment… the list will grow… and there are 5 more items to add to it…. so well… I would like to count on ya to help me fill up the spots on the next few days and when I have all the positions filled up I’ll start working to cross one by one (in no particular order) and I will be blogging every step of the way…

THAT is my challenge… yours is to find me 5 more things that I HAVE to do before I die… More if I think is well worth it… You can leave it in a comment, email, SMS, call me… whatever way you want… just give me ideas and let me know why you think I should do it?!?!

Looking forward for that one… :-)

25 Sep

2 months on and a letter to my Littlest Monkey…

Written by UrbanVox 9 Comments

Hey Monkey…

Today you are 2 months old… I wish I could be there to hold you tight and kiss your little head… To give you a big daddy bear hug and see you smile like I’ve seen that one time last time I saw you…

It’s been 1 month since the last time I held you… I can only imagine how much you have developed in all this time… It is harder and harder to get news from you… I wish me and your mum could have stayed friends if nothing for your sake… but God only knows what goes on in that mind of hers… I won’t say anything more about that… There is nothing to say honestly as she won’t even reply to any way I try to contact her trying to organize things so I can see you… So I can hold you in my arms again… spend time with you…

Tommy asks about you every time I go see him… He wants to know when he’ll be able to see his Connor again… It hurts every time he asks that because I have no idea when that will be… I wish (I hope) Alex can get to know and grow in contact with you more often… Vovoh Vera (that’s how you will call my mum if I get to teach you some portuguese) asks me almost everyday if I have news from you… It is getting hard to have to explain to her every day that I don’t… I really do wish your mum would be a little more reasonable…

I was chatting to aunty Kathia the other day… showing her your photos… Sha asked me how I’m feeling… She was worried that I didn’t get to bond with you much… less than 7 hours since you were born 2 months ago… is not  much to go on… I don’t know your habits, I don’t know what makes you simile… I haven’t even ever changed one of your nappies… My answer to her was simply that I love you just as much as your brothers no matter what and her asking and making me think about it only came to confirm that…

Things are not to good today… But I promise you they will be better soon… I promised you I’d always be there…. and THAT is a promise I will do everything in my power to never break…

I dream of the day when I’ll be able to hold you again… Soon my littlest monkey… soon…

It’s hard not to keep my head over the water… hard to keep afloat and not drown… But everything will be alright…

I just need you to know one thing: DADDY LOVES YOU!

THAT will never change… I am not giving up on you my son.

Hope you can feel the big daddy bear hug I’m sending you now…

Love,

Daddy

01 Sep

Don’t push the red button

Written by UrbanVox 2 Comments

I haven’t been sleeping much lately… I tend to wake up at some stupid hour in the middle of the night and go wide awake for hours… That doesn’t help at all when I can never seem to be able to go to sleep before 2am anyway…

But that has given me a lot of time to think and examine myself… Or torture myself as I end up doing most of the time anyway… I have an incredible capacity to self-destruct, and I am at my worst when I am at my happiest.

I am the biggest saboteur of great things in my life.

Yeah… It is stupid… I know… And I hate the way my mind works… And in special, I hate the way it affects everyone around me, the people I love the most… Specially as when it does happen I close myself and never let them help pick up the pieces… I don’t know how to let people help me… Yeah… I do open myself when I can’t handle it anymore, but I can count in my fingers of one hand the amount of people that knows how to reach me when that eventually happens.

I NEED to be able to trust people… And I will do it given half a chance… Until a small crack taints that trust and casts doubts over simple things… If I don’t trust you, you won’t know what’s between the lines of the open book that is my life.

I fall in love daily, more than once… and out of love almost at the same speed because of that too…

I love unconditionally… But that is rulled by terms and conditions…

I was talking to Vic the other day… she was surprised about a recent development in my life… After asking me why I hadn’t told her before she thought better and  said she shouldn’t been surprised really as I haven’t really told her much in a long while… Even after a year she still knows me better than most… That made me smile..

My mind is a strange place to be at times…

But I guess we all have this unique crazy little thing that makes us who we are…

I’ve found LOADS of them over the past year or so… Hou about you? What makes you tic? Ever stopped a second to think about that?

 

29 May

Inspiration

Written by UrbanVox 0 Comments

We find inspiration in the most unexpected places… But if you are reading tis blog you probably already know that.

Today I found mine waking the kentish tracks and fields and hills and talking about building databases and corporate politics with my step-dad.

We went out for an afternoon stroll (in his terms… in my terms aI call a 5mi walk up and down the hills through little paths that you can’t always see a bloody hike… am I right??? ;-) )

One way or another it was a great walk. It gave me time and the inspiration to clear up some ideas I had for Action Stations… And get an outsider’s view about some plans I’ve head turning in my head for quite a while… Things that might veer the direction of the company to a whole new way…

It cleared up some stuff I had in my mind on a personal level too…

Incredible what a walk in the fresh air can do to you… I need to remember to do that more often… Breathe…

Related Posts with Thumbnails

Read more ...

« Older Entries