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Today is Fathers Day in the UK. Usually days like today make me feel a little sad. Mothers day is usually the worst. Y’see I didn’t really have the best upbringing. My mother died when I was five, and my father was an abusive drunk who was never really in the picture. He’d pop by every couple of years and show his face to remind us he was still alive and not face down, drunk in some gutter. Each time we saw him we’d get this speech about how he was changing. He was off the booze and had “found God” then a few weeks after we’d get a letter from some social worker telling us that he’d been arrested for some sort of loutish behaviour or had been injured while trying to walk on water or something. It sucked. I feel sorry for the guy now but at age seven when you’re getting wreaths sent to your house because he’s gone to one of his friends telling them I’d died and needed money for funeral costs when really he just needed to go on a bender… it kinda pisses you off.

Anyway, a lot of the time I’ve gone through life letting my difficult upbringing define me. I’d play the “poor me” card and blame all that on why I was so unhappy with my life. I won’t lie… it’s cost me years of therapy and anti depressants to get over what my family has done to me over the years but why should I let them hold me back?

Everyone has their story. Everyone has baggage from the past. But who you are today is not the person you were ten or twenty years ago! You can let the fact that you didn’t have much growing up shape your future or you can focus on all the you have now. How far you’ve come and what you’ve achieved this far. That isn’t down to what you didn’t or don’t have… thats down to what you have; strength, courage, determination and passion. If you have those four things you can achieve pretty much anything you set your mind to.

Many of the worlds most successful people started from humble beginnings. They worked hard to forge the life they wanted because they wanted change. They wanted to get themselves and their loved ones out of miserable existences and find their bliss. It’s not hard to do. These days, I still feel a twinge of sadness whenever I think about my past. But the key is to live in the present. What do you have NOW that makes you happy? Are you married to a wonderful person who takes care of you? Do you have children who are your reason for carrying on when times get tough? Do your friends support you and inspire you? I can answer yes to all of those. Sure, I don’t have a bulging bank account or that ten bedroom house I always dreamed of but I know that if I work hard enough I will one day.

Have a great day xxx

 

Image credit Milada Vigerova