The Puzzle of Life - Human Nature

A footnote to my recovery:

Personally speaking, this phenomenon called Human Nature continues to puzzle the hell out of me.

Especially when it's dealing with certain humans from the past. Humans who, except for Facebook, are no longer a part of my current life and now live many miles away.

My question to my self these days, is why do I continue to attempt to " make nice " to certain humans who do not believe that I have changed..or that I will ever change?


It also seems to me that some humans from my past seem to be happy that I am no longer around them or "their family."


So, it's a lesson that I have yet to learn.


I have to learn that doing the best I can for me and my recovery, and attempting to make amends to people from my past, isn't always going to go as planned. And that trying to be a nice guy on social media, but not in person, to a certain family of broken females, well meaning mothers and daughters that I have so-called "left behind" and continue to leave behind, is not always going to be accepted and appreciated.


Yet, it seems to me that some of their current pain is not mine to fix. And, there are some things I cannot fix. So, no matter how I see myself these days, some humans from my past will continue to see me as the guy who, for a very short time, came into their life and ruined everything.


The way I see it is certainly not the way they see it. To me, it seems I'm still an easy target for their current problems. If their life is not going well, it can still be easily blamed on someone from their past. A guy who let them down, "left them behind."


To them, I'm still a monster, or at least someone who once involuntarily hurt their feelings.

Forgiveness is out of their current reach. And they seem to enjoy that fact.

So, I guess sometimes I have to add these certain humans to my Facebook block list. And, don't get me wrong, it's not because I don't want to have contact with them, but only because they simply are not on the same page as me. And, also because I refuse to be an easy target for their current life-problems.

I guess some pieces of that old unfinished puzzle will never fit right..no longer slide easily into place. Maybe those broken and discarded pieces never did fit.


Maybe I wanted them to fit so badly, that I bent and twisted them and made them fit. And now, maybe they are so torn, damaged and twisted that they will never fit correctly?


And, if I choose to stand back and and take a good look, with clean and sober eyes, it's not a very pretty picture. Certainly not a complete picture. Not the complete family with the house and white picket fence.


Looking back, it's a puzzle made from pieces that just didn't fit.


No matter, even nearly 20 months into recovery from poisonous chemicals, I continue to fool my self by thinking that, If I just turn them a certain way, this time they will pop perfectly into place and the picture will come together beautifully.


That's my current problem.


I guess it's still my puzzle to figure out.


It's the puzzle of life...and human nature.


Thanks for reading.


~ GWM


1 / 23 / 2019

- 6:18 AM

" I'm not following your frame of mind
Complaining about this life all the time
Surely something good here as the world spins by
Could you please stop being so mean
This will never work out that's what you say
It's the end of the world again yesterday
When I see you coming at me I'm gonna walk away
You need to stop being so mean."


~ Mean - John Mellencamp

Religion is not True Freedom

Happy Holidays.

I am feeling blessed today—whatever that means, and grateful to be alive. 

However, I've never been able to pin myself down...or subscribe to any specific religion.

I hate Labels.

I don't even like the negative terminology used for people like me, Agnostic..or Atheist.

The reason being, that once I pin a religious label on my myself, metaphorically speaking, I then become a large human target.

At least that's how I would likely feel.

The Christians are at war with the Atheists, the Muslims are at war with the Christians..the Jews hate the Germans...and with good reason. 

Adolf Hitler wanted Jewish people eradicated from the earth.

I guess my point here, is that I have no desire to become a large human target for some other group to "cast the first stones" at.

Important here to note also, that I've been thoroughly schooled in religiousness by friends of Bill Wilson, (AA religiousness) and also by relatives who are fully immersed in Christianity. 

They all seem happy to glorify and dwell in the lord while ignoring the obvious divisiveness of the Baptist, Jehovah Witness, and Pentecostal churches. 

I was sent to Sunday school when I was a toddler. 

And, although I am interested in the wisdom and philosophy of all these ancient sects, it is my opinion that they all lead to heated arguments, further divisions and bad feelings..and, most of all, they all desire a large percentage of a man's hard earned wages. 

It's all about the money...it always is. 

We are all free to worship..you say?

A belief in God is not free nor is it true Freedom.

I feel that, as the great Krishnamurti once stated, "..'truth' is a pathless land and it cannot be reached by following any path."

That being said, I am following the path of Mother Nature.

I feel that following mother nature is the way to True Freedom. 

Some say that is the true God.

And that Nature is the road that leads to a full and fulfilling life.

Even if it is only "simple living."

Even if it is living toward an old age and then wilting away like an old growth pine.

At least it's a natural process.

Nature leads all living things back to dust.

And that, to me, is God.

And that, to me, is True Freedom. 

 GWM/12/27/18

Quotes from Krishnamurti: 

Quotes

It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society.

We all want to be famous people, and the moment we want to be something we are no longer free.

I maintain that Truth is a pathless land, and you cannot approach it by any path whatsoever, by any religion, by any sect.

Clean and Sober - Living Guilt Free

Even though we live hundreds of miles apart—and the times that I've seen her in her short 13 years of life have been precious and few—I want my daughter to know that I love her unconditionally and instinctively.


I cannot regain any of the lost moments and special occasions that I've squandered, nor can I buy my way back into any of my children's lives through money, lawyers and family court decisions.


That would be an exercise in futility at this point.


And I also think it would do more harm than good.


However, thanks to Facebook I can maintain some second-hand contact and honestly tell them that I'm truly sorry.


AA taught me that 'Making Amends' is about being truly sober and having an honest willingness that includes ridding myself of the past—and being free of guilt.


I have lots of guilt.


The two boys are in their twenties now. And the one female is in her early teen years. So there's nearly 30 years of guilt built up.


To all three mothers, I owe you all an apology and a gesture of love and gratitude. And some also to my own mother.


I have been drug and alcohol free, clean and sober since June of 2017. My brain is taking a long time to thoroughly heal.


The pills did a real number on my mental health also..but at least my typing and writing skills have returned. (Smiles)


I still have my dream of one day writing and publishing a real book. Not just internet blogging, but something I can actually touch and feel. A hard copy. No idea yet what it will be about.


I will have Seventeen months of non-stop clean-living on Dec. 8.


At first, it was hell...sick and tired..withdrawal, guilt, remorse, self hatred...and wanting to commit suicide.


Now though, I've stopped poisoning myself with government controlled chemicals. And time does heal all things.


Sometimes I think, this feels too good to last. Usually, I've relapsed by now—but sobriety is starting to feel so good I want to stay this way.


Thanks to everyone on Facebook from Dartmouth, my former hometown, who is still following my progress on here.


I left AA, and today I am sober by finding an inner power; through mother nature, silence, looking within,and simply breathing in and out.


I will keep breathing.


Love you all.


Thanks for my life.


Garth William Macintosh.


November 27/2018 - 9:55 PM

Ramblings of an Alcoholic

I am an artist of self-destruction, suicidal sometimes, yet I am also a lover of life.

A student of  my life.

One who has learned from 50 + years of experiences, that, in the end, as in the beginning, win or lose, we are all cut from the same perishable cloth, and likewise, all destined to have the same meager possessions when we leave this world.

We all get a shiny slab of polished granite carefully placed above a manicured six foot hole in the ground. 

This is the extent of what I know for certain, the rest is like an unread novel. One that I will read once and then pass along.

So, that being said, why do so many of us focus our entire day on goals and financial gain?

As the greatest writer who ever lived, William Shakespeare, once stated so eloquently, and I will paraphrase, what comes between the date of our birth and the hour of our demise is known to no-one. At least not until it has been played out upon the stage of life. 

We think we have hope, but hope is a mistake, an illusion. Too smart for our own good, we go on kidding ourselves that we are living the good life, when in fact, we spend most days dreaming of an unattainable future.

I am a skeptic and a pessimist who dreams of one day writing pages and pages of terrific tales of war and peace, like Tolstoy, just not that famous.

In truth, I am an alcoholic and drug addict of the lowest form.

I have hurt hundreds of people with my words and my actions, and if I could indeed kill myself, I would do it in an instant. 

Unfortunately however, at age 56, I am alive and well, and sentenced to live out the rest of my life on a tiny peninsula located on the Southern tip of an eastern Canadian province. A final breath of fresh-salt-air in what has been nothing more than a life of depression and despair . 

I'm hoping that when the end does finally come, it will be swift and painless. Perhaps, in his famous ballad called 'The Gambler' the folk singer Kenny Rogers was right. The best that we can hope for is to die in our sleep.

Thanks for reading my weekly dark thoughts, My writing skills that were apparent to some, ten years ago, seem to be returning quickly. I may have once again found a voice and a desire to be real—and if my uneventful life is all I can muster to jot down at this moment, then so be it.

My drug and alcohol soaked brain is seeming to be finally repairing itself day by day. 

I will write more soon. The choice to read this depressing garbage is entirely yours.

~ Garth MacIntosh

He Who Fights Monsters

All Churches will hopefully someday be abandoned.


They are much more beautiful looking like relics of some lost and forgotten age.


An age when small innocent children were indoctrinated into a cult-like following and then molested with impunity by Priests who hid behind the cross for protection.


They called them Alter Boys, Choir Boys, but they were actually easy prey for the corrupt Catholic Church.


An age when Honest People were brainwashed into believing that, depending on how much of their salary they gave, they would be exalted into the sky after death and land in some sort of afterlife paradise called Heaven.


The sad part is that most churches are not abandoned, and forms of asinine religious beliefs still rule the United States Government, and their pathetic voting process.


A process where the end result has recently seen a dictator, an oppressor, a glorified Real Estate agent being thrust into power by ignorant humans. - Garth MacIntosh


"He who fights monsters should see to it that he himself does not become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." ~ Nietzsche