What is Your Motivation to keep Going?

What is Your Motivation to keep Going?

This question was recently asked of me by my Aunt.  She has followed my struggles over the past few years, and knows in more detail of my ups and downs, then I have put on this blog.  I was at first taken back by the question, but I guess I should help explain why she asked the question in the first place.

My aunt, like many people today, is going through a rough time of her own.  In fact, for the past five years she and her husband have been struggling to get out of bankruptcy, refinance their home and to keep their business alive.  They live in California, so that may help explain why she is having a rough time.

She has commented to me a few times that she sees me as an inspiration for her, which for me is a bit bizarre for me to understand.  She’s a few years older than I am, and so I can’t see why a younger man, who has not lived a very successful life could be an inspiration.  But as I have been thinking back over the past few years, I have done my best to keep living.  And that is the key, and why I believe she sees me as an inspiration.

My family never had money, we were always just above the poverty line, well most of the time we were.  My mom had worked hard to earn a living and support my sister and I.  Not an easy task for anyone to do.  She never had the opportunity for college, so like myself, we could not advance through company structure as one with a college degree can do.  No matter how smart she was, and she was very smart in her industry teaching her male bosses how to get things done properly, she never really earned enough, nor was given the opportunity to advance.  While I’m no genius, I do have the knack for learning things that I want to learn, and excelling in my own way.  But again, one of my perceived short comings is no college degree.

Even so, I have seen people worst off then myself, even now as I am homeless.  I see others on the street barely surviving.  I see people who have good jobs totally losing it when something bad happens to them.  I watch the news and read about people who commit suicide because they believe their life is not worth living for.  And yes, I too had those thoughts at times.  I mean, who wouldn’t.    You lose all physical belongings, a place that was considered a home, your income and faced with little to no help or the possibility for help.  Why continue to live?

That’s the thing, while you may have lost everything, you haven’t really lost it all.  Just look around and you will see people in worst shape then you are.  The homeless, the uneducated, the ones that seem to be kept down by others, and so much more.  In addition, there is one thing that NO ONE can take from you that really does make a difference; Your Spirit, Your Soul!  Until that is taken away from you, then life is worth living for.  Even if it seems like you are in hell. 

While this is cliché to say, ‘from the ashes rises the Phoneix’, ‘God only gives you what you can handle’, ‘from this, you will become stronger,’ and so many other sayings.  It’s true!  But it all depends on YOU!  Do you want to become stronger, better, wiser?  Do you want to survive?  Do you want your life to mater?  Even if your answer is a small squeaky yes, it’s worth trying.

So while I continue to look around and see people who are in worst shape then I am, I am grateful to be where I am, and to know that I am moving forward.  There are times that something happens to me that makes me feel as if I have gone backwards, but even in those times, it is only temporary.  I am 54 as I write this, and I do not believe my life is over.  I do not believe that I do not still have something of value to give to this world to help make it better.  I REFUSE to believe that I am done!

For that reason, Life goes on...I go on