Attraction Echoes

My life has been strange.

I was allocated a Bipolar lottery ticket at birth.

I didn't ask for it but won all the same, it was a real surprise lol.

People ask me to describe what it's like, I tell them not to worry, there are people out there that are in a far worse position than me. I point them to the quote that says: "If you put each man's pain in a collective pot, and then each took out an equal share of the whole, most would long for what they held in the first place..." I believe in that completely; it rings true to me.

Well, I am 45 years old now, and bipolar disorder has seemingly left me. It gave me no prior warning; no correspondence was sent lol. I thought that that was kind of cold as it had been part of my life for so long, one more lover gone. What would I say to it if I met it on the street? I would just say goodbye and wish it well. I would hope that it's happier with whomever it is now with. I bear it no grudges. I couldn't have changed it if I tried, I know this for a fact because I did so doggedly and repeatedly.

It may sound strange to most people, that someone would not follow their own instincts, dreams, and desires, but that is the way it has been for me. I have always done what other people said, I have always put people ahead of myself. Now, for the first real-time in my life without the fog of my illness, I had been given true clarity of thought, a chance to think on my own terms. I am old enough and wise enough now to realize I might not get another chance, I would not waste it, so I sat and waited.

I sat still and had the most valuable and most non-productive year of my entire life. I realized in the end that I really was in a position to do anything that I wanted to do in my life, that my only limits were the ones that I created and made up inside of my own head. I realized I could change the whole direction of my life, and that I had the power of choice, I was free.

And so, in equal measure of fear and excitement, I chose to live a life of art, finally realizing it was the one thing that brings me the most joy, that it was my core. I weigh my happiness in my art, as I always have done, I don't know why it is that way but that it is, I’ve been that way since I was a child. Why should I chase and do anything else given this chance?

I don't care if I'm poor, I am poor.

I don't care if I'm alone, with art, you can never be.

You are what you are and you.

Don't let anyone tell you differently.