A lost boy from the country discovers the man he truly is
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A lost boy from the country discovers the man he truly is
Life as a kid seemed so simple. I grew up in small towns in rural Australia, where with friends I could roam the countryside until it was nearly dark, making fun out of the simplest things, building cubby houses out of unused building materials, having fishing adventures and finding ways to break through a wall of thorns to get to the wild sweet blackberries that grew in the surrounding areas.
Life was full and fulfilling; with six siblings there was always a lot going on. Days were filled to the brim with raucous family dinners, sport and friends; life was never dull.
When I was 14, due to relationship stresses, my Mother decided to leave our family with my baby brother and start a new life. This time for me was particularly difficult, as no one talked about why she had left; it was like everyone just shut down and kept to themselves, keeping each other out, as the pain was so great and no one wanted to face the reality of what was going on.
As there wasn’t anyone in the family who was communicating at the time, I spent more and more time with friends. This led to more time at parties where I started to get a taste for alcohol and drugs, as they could let me forget my worries for a while. Alcohol in particular played the biggest part, as I found I could write myself off and forget everything. I found that not only could alcohol be used for numbing what I was feeling, it also gave me the recognition from my friends that being drunk was not only ok, it was actually celebrated, and I was being rewarded for the behaviour. I was even given hero status for how often I drank, and the quantities I drank, earning the right to be nicknamed after a local beer label.
All my spare time and money was spent on alcohol and drugs at that time. It was a destructive cycle that I could see no way out of. I failed high school as I had partied the night before the end of year exams and so I was hung over and unable to focus on the exam papers. Alcohol became my best friend. I didn’t feel lonely while drinking and it kept all of the hurt I was feeling at bay.
From this time on I fell into jobs that of course would allow me to continue on the path I had taken. I worked on farms and timber mills where we worked hard during the day and the reward at the end of the day was to be able to drink, sleep, then wake up the next day and do it all again.
This went on for many years, with work and relationships moulded around alcohol. The thing was that everyone around me thought it was okay to live with alcohol; no one stopped and questioned what we were doing.
At the age of 16 I was moved to the city for a while by my Dad, to live with my uncle, presumably to allow me to have a better life where I wasn’t influenced by the friends I had in the country.
But I quickly found friends that I could relate to and drink with, so the cycle continued. Alcohol started to affect my working life too. I was working for my uncle at the time and there were times when I wouldn’t turn up for work as I was drunk. One time after a big day of drinking at the beach I was arrested on the train for being drunk and disorderly and put in jail until my uncle came and picked me up. For me in this moment, there was a deep feeling of despair and being totally lost. The final straw was me not showing up for work again after a big night out. My uncle was fed up, so he sacked me and asked me to leave work and leave the house.
This scenario continued for many years, using alcohol as a way of escaping from what I was feeling. When I was 24, I was in a relationship with a woman and she fell pregnant. At the time I was living on unemployment benefits and home brew beer, so no surprises that she left me. But after my son was born something changed in me. I could see how much damage alcohol was doing to me and how it was affecting my relationships with others.
The easy fix was to focus on something else, so I became obsessed and self-righteous with eating “healthy”, becoming focussed and rigid on a very regimented diet plan. I was still shutting others out, still not dealing with my hurts, but I had changed – right?
From the outside it looked like I was doing well as I had stopped drinking and this my body thanked me for, but I couldn’t say that I had dealt with the hurt that caused me to drink in the first place, as it was still running my life. It just looked different, in the form of a so called ‘healthy’ diet.
This continued for about 10 years until finally another relationship breakdown left me in a place where I could no longer deny that I was allowing my undealt-with hurts to run my life. At this time of rock bottom for me, and another broken relationship, I was living out of the back of my car and could hardly hold down a job.
After trying a few different counsellors, I realised that there was no way that I could keep on living the way I was, as it was destructive to my wellbeing and the relationships in my life too. This is the point, through a friend, that I met Serge Benhayon and the practitioners of Universal Medicine and for the first time in my life I felt that I was cared for and really understood.
The healing sessions, modalities and courses presented by Serge Benhayon allowed me to start to reconnect with the truth of who I am, my essence, my Soul. I came to feel the sensitive tender man I naturally am and always have been and started to live with and from the knowing of this truth.
From the very first session I received, I felt the unwavering integrity of Universal Medicine, never feeling imposed upon, or directed to, or pushed into anything and never receiving any marketing or follow up emails. Rather the choice was always mine to consider if I was to return or not. During sessions I could feel how I was held with such a deep care and support. Slowly my life began to change.
One thing that really stood out for me was the renewed commitment to living that I felt in those early stages. To support this, I walked. Every day after work I walked around a lake where I lived and through this found myself being able to connect more deeply to my body and feel the sensitivity that was there. I also found from these daily walks that I never felt alone. What I felt was a support from a greater source that was guiding and uplifting the more I connected to this sensitivity within. This was something I remembered feeling from a young age but had traded in to live with the abusive behaviours I took on to try not to feel hurt and to try and fit in.
Step by step I started to see that the issues in my life that seemed insurmountable and I was blaming others for were actually created by me. From this point there was a gradual letting go of the need to try and control life by withdrawing from it, and more of a willingness to see what was really going on behind the addictions.
From then on, my life has been nothing short of a complete transformation. I now have an amazing relationship with a new partner. I feel more vital, fit and alive than ever before. Gone are the abusive behaviours I thought I needed just to survive. I feel like I’m more engaged in life, embracing the learning that is on offer and more willing and open to understand life through feeling it.
I’ve become qualified as a Mechanical Fitter, something I dreamed of doing for many years but never felt I was able to accomplish it. I love working and feel committed to it and know the value in what I am able to contribute. I’m also involved in community groups and feel now more than ever that I have so much that I can now share with others, by sharing all of who I am.
Looking back now, the changes in my life over the last few years have been phenomenal, coming from a place of being disengaged from life and hiding from the world, to now living a life with joy, vitality and commitment; the contrast is out of this world.
I appreciate greatly the love and success I experience now in my life. The alignment back to my Soul has allowed the letting go of destructive behaviours and the building of ones that are truly supportive, for me and for everyone around me. What now is deeply felt is the support that is there for us all to connect to, through the alignment back to our Soul and the support from the many who have walked the same path offering their unwavering love, lighting the way.
Filed under
Alcohol, Family, Self-worth, Universal Medicine, Relationship problems
