You have the answer...

(Original Post Date December 1st)

Many readers often write to me with all the things they'd love to do, but they don't because of family.

Today, as I read my private journal, one post stood out more than others. Yes, I keep a blog and a private journal. In my private notes I can be brutally honest, write from the heart, and be as super cheezy as I please… but I'll share one excerpt for a few people who are currently going through what I went through:

July, 2007

San Francisco Bay, California

...but what value would there be in life if one were to bitterly slip into unhappy conformity as you watch your essence and what you stand-for slip away from your tired fingers. No my dear, nothing destroys the spirit like the disillusionment of a life not lived.

For a life full of dreams is not enough. You need to live the goals you've set for yourself, fill your heart with smiles and soak your lips with the taste of freedom in order to brighten your perspective.

True. Nostalgia is life's great rose-colored filter that tends to rewrite our past.

True. Goals and dreams are the great rose-colored filter of our future, blinding us of the real challenges up ahead.

But both are sometimes necessary during hard times if we want to numb the reality of our todays, as we hold-on for better days...

My life's love destroys my loved ones, and it also destroys itself… Becoming as worthy as that lovely dress in the store window whose enormous price tag makes it unattainably ugly and unworthy.

In the past, I've made the choice to cancel goals for my family's happiness, at the expense of my own.

Yes, if I go out into the world again, I may have in the future all kinds of troubles waiting for me, but I'm willing to take the risk in hopes that I can also have many of my desires, and during my last days when I look back and balance both, that smiles outweigh tears, that benefits outweigh costs, and that a love-filled heart and the fresh aftertaste of freedom still lingers, blending with the sweetness of a life well lived...

Despite the hesitation seen above, I made my choice to go forward. Family came around.
Easy? No. But I'm glad I listened to my self... otherwise, I would have had to live with regret.

This post is for a few people who don't have blogs, but have shared with me their current dilemma.

No matter what it is. All I have to say in response is to have good intentions, do your research, and listen to your inner voice. You have the answer. Life's too short to ignore your self...