SOMEONE ELSE'S LIFE
March 20 - what a fitting day to be admitted to Dallas Behavioral Hospital, on this most terrible of anniversaries. I can’t seem to escape this date or the upheaval it consistently unleashes on me. It’s of little significance though, as I’d just as soon be dead as a broken man at a mental facility. Everyone was right: my life is in ruins thanks to my delusional inner promptings.
And yet, my initial discussion with a therapist has me wondering whether this breakdown is a necessary first step in a new direction. She has an uncommon inner authority, with the demeanor of a person who’s actually lived what she proclaims. After our initial sharing, she’s concluded I’m not living my own life; that I never have. I’ve fled from one secure environment to another, in exchange for living life on my caretaker’s terms. She advises that someday, whether it’s of my own volition or not, I will inevitably make a run at living my own life.
She asked me how I would manage were this independence thrust on me tomorrow? I would be utterly petrified. I embrace novelty, adventure, and the unknown, but am terribly afraid of facing it alone. I crave guidance, validation, and solidarity and experience a sort of inner vertigo in its absence. This need has prompted me to live life as a pleaser, a “good Brian,” doing what I thought others would want, what I thought it would take to keep them near. I'm one person with my parents, another with my wife, another with my friends, and another with my colleagues. Since I am everyone, I am no one - like water taking the shape of its surroundings. It’s time I stop and just be Brian and allow the world respond however it will.
Reflecting upon the last seventeen years of my life, I achieved more than I ever allowed myself to dream. At the height, I had a lovely wife, two wonderful children, a comfortable house, an upper-management position in the holding company where I worked, and an enviable salary that afforded us a suitable lifestyle while aggressively saving for retirement. Had that been consistent with my deepest desire, were it an expression of who I truly am, I would have been content. I was not. Despite everything I've achieved, I’m still left asking what’s the point of life, and I ask because the life I'm living isn’t my own.