Demons

No one is perfect. Everyone makes mistakes.

While I hate speaking in absolutes, those are two lessons I am trying to impart on my kids. Words like always and never and no one and everyone are often clues to exaggeration, but in the instances of error these statements are universally true. No one is perfect. Everyone makes mistakes.

This is my hope for my kids, that they do not grow up believing they are not good enough or are incapable of doing anything right. I want them to know they are capable of greatness and they are not defined by their failures. I want them to be beacons of light and inspire everyone who knows them.

Maybe I have too high of expectations. After all, we live in a world that is burdened by our perceived inadequacies.

We live beyond our means, swimming in debt so that we can have nice things and keep up with our neighbors who seem to have it all. We binge through every fad diet and infomercial exercise invention to conform our bodies to an artificial standard of beauty. We convince ourselves to abandon our dreams because they're too scary, too audacious, or too far out of our grasp. We give a megaphone to the negative voices of our past.

We live in resignation and mask it with our vices. Breathing. Existing. But not really living.

These are our demons. Chemical addictions. Depression. Lust for power, wealth, fame. Insecurity. Pride.

We all wrestle with demons. A good friend of mine has been clean for almost two years and he is now trying to figure out how to live life in sobriety. After a devastating divorce, one friend felt like she would never again find love but she is now in the early butterflies and goofy beginnings of a wonderful relationship. Another friend is mourning the death of her husband after an ugly battle with cancer. All three of them are bravely fighting and winning their battles.

We all wrestle with demons; I choose to wrestle with mine in a public venue.

This blog first evolved into a quick and easy way for my out-of-town family to keep track of what was happening in my world. Soon, I began to treat it as a farewell gift to my kids so that if I were to go too soon they would have an option to know who I was.

Along the way, I have trudged through what makes me me and embraced my God given identity. Within the past couple of years, I have developed a platform marrying my faith to my nerdy ways. My heart wants to cheer for the freaks and geeks, the overlooked, the left-out, the last ones picked. I can think of no better place to do that than in this corner of cyberspace.

So I fight my demons here. My greatest fears. My most embarrassing moment. My insecurities. The joys and pains of raising a son on the autism spectrum. Similarities between me and Charlie Brown. How I struggle in conversations.

Words are my weapon and I will bludgeon my demons until they fear me. I wrestle with my demons here and shine the brightest light possible on them because darkness runs from the light. I fight so that my kids can see how I refuse to be defined by my mistakes and failures.

No one is perfect. Everyone makes mistakes. We all wrestle with demons.