Ola from Cuba!

This journey of 1000 steps had to start at some point with just one. I’m not talking about my life journey, that’s a whole other one running simultaneously. We have so many journeys and so many first steps all running at once, the more we take on, the more we grow. That’s really all it is. We already getting ready to get ready. Getting ready to start a new journey, getting ready to take the next step in that journey, getting ready to end that journey, getting ready to start another journey. It’s really a never-ending process of getting ready to get ready to get ready. And this was my first step in Man Finding His Edge journey.

So I said yes. Wth, I’ll go to Cuba. This might not seem like a big deal, but in my world it’s huge. I’ve always avoided travelling to resorts cause I see it a thing for couples. Even being in a hotel room for me somewhere makes me think, I need a girl there with me. Whatever happened to me when I was younger has led me to this line of thinking. So I’ve never gone anywhere. I didn’t even have a passport before I met Christie (the ex). Which btw I’m sure grateful happened or else… Well or else 100 things, one of them is travel. So anyways. The only times since then, which has been 12 times in 2 years, that I’ve gone down south was with her or to meet her there. This time was gonna be the very first. And I didn’t expect that arriving here would be such a trigger for me but it was HUGE!!

Long story but the place I wanted to go, all the flights were booked, so had to take a different flight to another city and cab it the 4 hours to where I wanted to be. That was… Very interesting. I can’t speak Spanish, at all! I was in a cab with a man, his wife, and his child. We made lots of stops. And neither of us could speak a lick of the other’s language. Made for a lllooonngggg trip. But I really got to see a side of Cuba I bet most never get to see. And there’s not much. Literally. Shrubs, small trees, and this blood-red soil. But lots of cows! Everywhere. Cows, goats, horses…. Everywhere! I could literally count how many people I saw in cars driving on the road. It seemed like we had the whole country to ourselves. Not what I was expecting.

We arrive at the hotel, I’m met by my uncle and his Cuban wife and her family. 2 nights here, then we take off to the village and live like real Cubans live. That’s tomorrow so I’ll update when that happens.

So I check in, get a quick tour, and head to my room. I walk, close the door, and break the fuck down sssooo FUCKIN hard I can’t even describe the emotional anvil that dropped on me. Every trigger at once. The plane, the crazy cab ride, the hotel (which was a resort, even worse), the room that’s meant for 2 people with only 1 in it, the smells, the sounds, the little tiny things that looked exactly how our place in Belize looked. I just wanted to turn around and get on a plane and get the fuck out! But I knew I couldn’t. I would never let myself quit, fail that hard. But it was like being at a 7, walking into the room and dropping to a 1. I was so far out of my comfort zone, so far over the edge that I was panic mode, unable to digest everything around. At this point it wasn’t healthy, it was me dangling over the edge holding a rope. Not standing at the edge looking down, still in full control.

So I did what most men don’t. I asked for directions. I called Tracy. (If you haven’t read my stuff you won’t know who she is but Tracy is my landmark seminar manager. And quite possibly the most amazing woman I’ve ever had the pleasure to meet.) So she starts off the call with “why the fuck are you calling me from Cuba”?! I reply with, “I know, right”?! So I start talking and I’m getting so choked up, eyes welling, almost unable to make words come out of my mouth and when they did it was like a flood of gobbledygook. She slows me down, and we go into the most amazing conversation. Well, all our conversations are amazing. Legit, I go from a 1 to a 4 in 1.5 hours. And by the end of the night, I was at a 7 again. But it took help.

Why? What happened there? How did I sink so fast and come back up? Well, it’s all perspective, how we choose to see something. If 2 people had a mug in front of them, sitting opposite each other, how would they describe that mug? Or a pad of paper. Or anything really. Perspective changes with where your standing. Literally and figuratively. And when there’s something we can’t, we need a spotter to tell us what’s going on so we’re able to maneuver around or else getting out would take so much longer and would be so much harder.

For me, I needed Tracy to point some things out to me. My journey is that of rediscovering the masculine man I am that all but withered away during my 2-year relationship with the ex. I turned soft. Unsure of myself. I stepped so far back from the edge I couldn’t even see it anymore. I get like that with people I’m afraid to lose. And it’s because I give them more value than I give myself. And I had to learn to take that value back and give it to the only person that really matters in my life. Me. And that involved me stepping just far enough out of comfort zone where I felt the fear but not so far out that it gripped me. Tracy helped me to take a couple steps back and be in a place where the fear was there but not overwhelming. How? Appreciation. Being in the moment and appreciating the place I’m at as a place I need to be to grow, that was huge. It’s like the story of the crab. The crab only knows to shed his old shell and take on a new, bigger one, when he feels the discomfort of growth. It has to happen or else he’d be a little tiny crab his entire life. That discomfort is the edge. Doing something we know we don’t want to do due to fear and discomfort. We do it anyways. Let the fear be our friend. Be with the fear till it becomes an ally and not an enemy. Then and only then can we live life fully, not being pushed around by the person we “know ourselves to be” based on all of the past experiences. That person lives in the past. To be the man that lives into his future we must drop all understanding of who we think we are and allow greatness to pour into our lives from places we didn’t even know existed. What will show up will confront us, trigger us, place us on the edge. To the point that we want to step back. But we don’t. The man that lives into his future self will have to learn to have discomfort and fear be a friend, a guide, showing us that this is where the growth lies. This is the direction of our mission in life, whatever that is. The mission that will have us sacrifice even the most perfect relationship, let alone a relationship that was based on circumstances and fantasy.

So I went out with my uncle and his wife, I was in full appreciation of where I was and the brand new experience I was experiencing. Got back to the room, slept like a baby. Woke up to breakfast, coffee, and the beach. And I was good. But the goodness comes from constant work. We can’t go from a 1 to a 9 overnight without the work. The reason is that 9 isn’t insta-bliss. Without the groundwork laid down, 9 is torture! The man that is able to face his demons having done the work will be the man that laughs in his demons face, puts one arm around their neck and says… Let’s grab a drink. The man that’s at a 4 would shit himself at the same occurrence. Life happens in the work, not the destination. The work is where life fully shows up and where we fall in love with ourselves. It’s where we learn our worth and our value. Where we learn to never give discounts. You think there are discounts on a Bentley? No! Hell, they don’t even advertise! You know what your getting and they will not give you discount to bring you in or keep you.

So there I was. In the place that floods me with triggers and I was so appreciative of so much. Like not having to see if she wants to go to the beach, I just go when I wanted. Not having to leave cause she wants to. Not worried about wearing my sandals inside the room cause of the sand I track in. Taking a nap when I want. Eating/drinking when and what I want. Not having to compromise. I’m just happy I’m on a beach in nice weather. She would be complaining about how this place isn’t that nice compared to other places I’ve taken her. The whole time I’d be running around making her happy and forgetting my own happiness. And now it’s time for me to get back there. Eventually, I’ll get back into a relationship, but by then I would have learned a lot of valuable lessons. Like the lesson of, your mate should be your best friend that you have sex with. Seems obvious right? Not really. We don’t treat them or behave the same way around our gf’s as we do our best friends. Why? Well, that’s a whole other blog post! For now, enjoy the journey!

The year of growth

2016 came around and I met, who I thought would be my future wife. I was already seeing someone and had to break it off with her to be with this new one. Not an easy task since I was in love with the girl I had been seeing. Even though we only dated for 3 weeks, I was in love with her. But it was an easy decision to make. This one was my future. She had everything for I ever wanted in a girl. Worked out, entrepreneur, smart, gorgeous, exciting, going places. And she was a virgin at 23! True unicorn. So I bit. Dumped the old one and had my second date with the new one on the sunny beaches of Belize. Off to an amazing start. Till I started losing confidence in myself. And it went downhill from there. A year later we break up. 3 months later we get back together only to break up again. Reason? The love for myself had all but disappeared and got replaced with love for her. I needed her now. I held in on such a pedestal that I couldn’t even see what was happening. And what was happening was I had become attached to her in such a way that I needed her to give me all the things I thought I now lacked in myself.

This girl is very strong-willed. Selfish. And had to be her way. And I attached myself to her in a way that without her I couldn’t live my life anymore without her. From her, I got my importance, my validation, my love, my independence, my freedom. And now I was afraid to lose her. Cause if I lose her then I lose all the things about me I want. The way I’ve always wanted to be. With her I was strong, independent, loved. But I was using her as a crutch to fulfil the things I no longer thought could on my own. A terrible place to be. What ends up happening is me operating from a place of fear and not a place of love. In that fear state, I was very afraid to lose her so I let her get away with everything. And in the end, she ended up walking all over me and eventually out on me. I’ve only been dumped once before in my life, the very first girl I’ve ever dated and I said I’d never let myself get to that again. Also not healthy, cause that in itself is operating from a place of fear. Preventing me from so many amazing experiences. A year or so before meeting this latest girl, I met a girl who made me see that I was walled off, never allowing a girl to penetrate to my heart. So I vowed that I would open up and love like I’ve never been hurt before. So I did. And it was both an amazing and a destructive experience. And I wouldn’t change it for the world.

After every time this last girl broke up with me, I was able to see something about myself that I had never seen before. 2016 came and I thought it was the year of growth, I grew so much with her. 2017 came and we broke up and I regretted not taking on all the growth possible with her. We broke up and not 2017 was the real year of growth. Definitely a year I grew a lot. But now 2018 came and were back together and I thought it would be the year I make it big. Turns out I had not grown enough. Something was definitely still missing. That “thing” that was in my blind spot I still wasn’t able to see still existed. As long as we stayed together I got what I wanted out of life, even if the “thing” hasn’t shown itself to me, cause it obv wasn’t that important. Well turns out I was wrong, and I’m not wrong often.

After this breakup, I can now say without a shadow of a doubt that 2018 Is the ultimate year of growth lmao. Sound funny? Cause it is! It’s messed up. Cause 2019 will come and will REALLY be the year of growth! The truth is that the thing I’ve always wanted in life was growth. And someone to grow with, grow together. But the reality is that growth isn’t something we can do with someone else. That’s where the smoke and mirrors of Hollywood comes in to play. We can only grow alone, and when we have grown to be the best version of ourselves is when that one that we have been searching for comes along.

“WE ATTRACT WHAT WE ARE AND NOT WHAT WE WANT”

So what has 2018 given me for me to make it my “year of growth”? Well, the piece of the puzzle that baffled me. The cause of the breakup of this, and every other relationship I’ve ever had. Lack of self-love. And from that lack of self-love comes lack of self-confidence. This is a strong woman that wants the strong unrepentant man that will protect her, provide the space she needs to grow, and yet put her in her place when the time comes! And I didn’t do that. And she even told me that at the end. “I wish you had put me in my place more”. Why? Cause women don’t really even know what they want. But what they always want is a man that’s confident and powerful. They need the chemistry. Without it, it doesn’t matter how amazing you are, she will walk out every single time and look for something exciting, even if it’s not the best thing for her.

Why is it that when I don’t like a girl all that much she won’t leave me alone? Cause I don’t let her get away with anything. She always knows where the door is and is always welcome to use it anytime she wants. She knows I won’t chase her and it drives her crazy! The reason this girl was so interested in me to begin with is cause we matched on tinder and I didn’t message. So she messaged me and I didn’t respond. So she added me on Instagram. I was hard to get. I want available to her like most guys would be. And she wanted more. And then once I had her I gave her all the attention in the world. And it pushed her away. I gave her respect and she didn’t want it, she wanted love. She wanted chemistry. She wants what most girls want. Well, what most humans want. The thrill of the chase. And I was in a cage now and no fun anymore. And I’m still not out from under her spell. Anyone else and they would be so done. But I keep wanted to spend time with her. And it pushes her more and more away. And it’s ok, cause this was not “the one”, but she did show me what’s available to me out there when a man like myself has total confidence in himself, and what it’s like when that man loses that confidence. And so it’s time to get the confidence back. And not for her, but for myself this time. For my present and future life. And not for my past life. This girl was amazing while it lasted, and from her, I’ve learned a great deal. And now it’s time to give myself all that love, and in the process find my self-confidence!