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Enabled: Child of an Addict

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Looking at me and what I’ve done with my life so far, you’d probably assume I came from a stable middle-class home, that I was given all the necessary tools to become a productive member of society, and maybe even that I had more than I needed. You might conclude that very little struggle ever touched my life. I have a gorgeous wife, three beautiful kids, and a stable career. I’ve never been in any serious trouble. I have a great network of friends, many of them affluent. I own a home, a few cars, have a decent savings, and I’m not in any more debt than the typical 41-year-old. This isn’t a brag, nor am I trying to rub anything in anyone’s face. I just need to paint the picture clearly for what I want to share going forward. From the ages of one through twelve, life was a rollercoaster that often felt flimsy and even dangerous. These are some of the most impressionable years of a person’s life, and for me, values and behaviors came in two extremes: one very moral and faith-based, and t...
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Job Interviews: A Beginners Guide to Landing the Job

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You're sitting in a lobby, waiting for someone to come out, shake your hand, and bring you back through the door that could lead to your future. Your palms are sweaty, knees weak, and arms are heavy (thank you, Eminem) because you know that the presentation of who you are, your skill set, and your drive to succeed can determine the course of your life within the next 30 minutes. Your mind is racing. You're trying to keep in mind the name of the interviewer, predetermine the answers to the questions they might ask, and think about the skills you’re going to present and how you'll present them to make it an easy decision for the hiring manager to pick you. When you walk out of the room you’ve been sitting in for the last 30 minutes, you shake the hand(s) of the interviewer(s), and everything you did wrong floods your brain. Two days later, you get an email saying they appreciate your time, but they are moving forward with another candidate. Your heart breaks, and you open you...
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Pornography: Innocent Pleasure or Mental Terrorist?

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Pornography is a subject that can seem very taboo. Many people still find it uncomfortable, and some may even consider it sacrilegious to talk about it openly. Sexuality is all around us these days. Modesty is almost considered a character flaw. You see women in gyms, or walking the streets, showing more skin than women in previous generations did in the privacy of their own bedrooms. Men are obsessed with building perfect bodies, having perfectly groomed hair, and strong jawlines—sometimes even resorting to plastic surgery to improve areas where genetics failed them. Winning the sexual attraction of the partners they prefer is the primary purpose for the aesthetics they are building or have already built. Yes, I'm sure the health benefits play a role in the desire to build incredible physiques, but the underlying benefit is gaining the attraction and admiration of the person(s) they desire. A healthy sex life is an important part of a person's life. You should never be ashamed...
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Pushing Weight: Living That Kettlebell Life

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You're sitting on your couch binge-watching Netflix, with a 44oz Big Gulp in one hand and a bag of Hot Cheetos in the other. Right before you pop another cheesy yet spicy treat into your mouth, you look down at your stomach, which is spilling over your medium-sized gym shorts—by the way, they’re probably cutting off circulation to your legs now, because they’re so tight around your waist—and grabbing your flab with your Cheeto-dusted fingers, you realize that something has got to change. Right then and there, you tell yourself it’s time to break this sloppy cycle. It’s time to start a journey to lose weight and become healthier. But how? If you're new to working out or trying to get back into it, getting started can be intimidating. Some people hire personal trainers, others watch YouTube videos to find a routine that suits their fitness level, and some dive right into the deep end, figuring it out as they go. All are great options. The important part is that you're making ...
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I Took The Plunge: Cold Water Therapy

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It's 34 degrees this morning. My body temperature is the lowest it'll be all day. I'm about to walk outside and do something that most sane people fear. I'm about to take the plunge! Stepping into 35-degree water when your body is already cold is awful. I know there are many proponents out there who advocate for cold water therapy or cold water immersion and will tell you that it's invigorating, or that they can't go a day without it. I do agree that it can become almost addictive, but I bet the fear is there for each and every one of them before they dip a toe into the arctic water. It's a bit masochistic if you think about it. I will say, though, it can be invigorating and stimulating, and it can also give you a sense of pride that you conquered the cold water and lived to tell about it. Cold water therapy dates back to ancient Egyptian and Greek practices, but in recent years it has been popularized by the "Ice Man" Wim Hof, along with many othe...
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DO YOU EVEN READ BRO? The Benefits of Picking Up a Book

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 It's around 9:00pm, the kids are asleep, the house is getting more and more relaxing by the minute, and after this long day I am lifting up the down comforter on my king sized bed about to lay down for the night. FINALLY, some much needed relaxation. About six months ago I would have reached for the tv remote and either put on the most recent show that I had been watching the night before, or scrolled for about 10 minutes through the vast universe of shows and movies on Hulu, Netflix, Prime TV, etc. I enjoyed my nightly routine. It was comfortable to me. Naturally I am a lazy person so this fit perfectly into my routine. If I'm being honest, I once didn't work for four days and I binged watched all six seasons of The Sopranos. Yeah I know, not really the makings of a successful person. So six months ago I decided to make a change. I've always been a really light sleeper, but my sleep had been awful for a few months. I felt so fatigued for the majority of my day, and th...
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Greed or Goals: An honest review of my life

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     January 23,2025 Wow, I'm 40. I've lived 2080 weeks. I've lived 14,600 days. God willing I'll live to be 80+, but if not, I've lived over half my life already. Writing this down or saying this out loud scares me. I'm sure it scares some of you too. I think it scares me because I haven't accomplished anything that I feel will leave me a legacy. Yes, family may remember me, and say sweet or maybe even sour things about me, but a legacy to span generations just isn't there on the current trajectory I'm on. Well, let me take you back a bit. My life growing up was filled with love and affection, but also filled with food stamps, alcohol, drugs, and some domestic violence. Don't feel bad for me. Everyone's story shapes them into the people they are. Some are perfect circles, triangles, or squares, and some are irregular hexagons. I feel like I teeter between a perfect shape and an irregular one. We were poor, but when you're young you don...
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