Dan Daiquiri

So to kick this off, recently I went through a phase of around 7 months of being in an extremely harsh and low slump. This manifested in around September and from this point I kind of lost my way, my goal and in essence direction. Since that time, I have managed to rekindle exactly to where I stand in comparison to my surroundings but also in my interactions with others and how to deal with my own thoughts without turning to anything to “take the edge off”.

I am a firm believer in that when one support from your life diminishes, a few more follow and that’s the exact situation I found myself in. I made a decision to move house little did I know this would somehow kick-start a long journey back through my mind, trying to rewire myself but most times only scratching the slight itch and falling back down again. It’s difficult to pinpoint one moment where the ground falls from beneath your feet and the comfort surrounding you quickly diminishes but for me this was the beginning of a long mental journey full of self-deprecation and substance abuse.

Now lets start by dropping a bit of backing, I’m no stranger to substance misuse and have been over that stage in my life long ago, however over the past 7 months there has been countless situations where this spiralled to an extreme point where I remember a few times I was taking large quantities of stimulants to myself in my flat by myself over the space of 24 hours, this was of course whilst drinking at the same time and I can tell you it was an intensely eye opening experience. The only way I can describe taking that level of drugs and drinking alone is that by obviously being on a full-scale stimulant whilst experiencing slight hallucinations is that all you want to do is speak to someone the whole time. Through this the music goes up full blast hoping to hear some sort of relatable lyrics in a song to plan to base your motto for life off of, however you also almost get lost in a virtual world, messaging anybody you can in hope that somebody somewhere cares- not in an attention seeking way but more the hope that somebody kind of may have a feeling you are behaving uncharacteristically. But like I suppose from this scenario I can take the realisation that this kind of feeling is the one of which I want in normal life although it may be amplified when on drugs- the ability to talk. To further describe this, I am a highly sociable and interactive person who can be quite a deep thinker and a very good talker, however this does not mean I am an open book. I believe there are various dimensions to my mind and my thought processes many of which I or anybody else will fully understand however that is what I believe makes me the way I am in regards to being so open. This sometimes resulting in either others feeling unappreciated or a feeling is unreciprocated

Don’t get me wrong, I have friends and I have really close friends who I care about so much but not anyone I know has the full picture, neither do I. But what I do know is that my closed mentality and the multi-faceted personification of myself is the element in which has resulted in me never being able to experience a real, genuine and loving relationship aside from friendship and that is another part of my foundation of which fell at said point in time. Like so in terms of real relationships I suppose I’ve never been in much luck, I always find ways to distract myself and end up seeming uninterested. At the time you always think that the feelings you have are genuine and that nothing can be better than these moments but after loss of that opportunity you soon realise that sometimes it may possibly be “situational love”, one that is the result of a particular pattern at any point in your life and for both of my “real relationships” these “loves” blossomed through getting drunk or in some other way intoxicated regularly together. Which I know now is unnatural and untrue, it does not paint an accurate picture of an honest interpretation. Only now have I realised the error within this and as such any future pursuits will be that of an organic romance and not one built on a foundation of predominantly intoxication

Around the same time, I had just begun my honours year at University- of which I left in November, and although to this day I say I disliked university and the style of academia- I still deep down know that the reason behind it was in fact moving to a new house at that particular moment seemed to impact me in an extremely negative way. It’s strange how literally moving location can utterly warp your entire mindset and then begin to impact all areas in your life. The fact that I started blaming absolutely every other part of my life for me feeling shit when I know straight up that happiness starts at home, and if you do not feel right somewhere then really in reference to Maslow can you really better yourself and bring yourself to that next stage?, the sadness is that if referencing Maslow’s belief of which I entirely agree with- it means that even the lowest of human needs are being accomplished and as such probably explains the severe impact mentally which can also explain the extreme decisions I almost made in consequence. So firstly, I left University, although since doing so I have realised that my true calling is focussing on my bar work and progressing in that direction rather than dragging myself for the extra months I would have had to finish with a terrible degree which would have looked worse than leaving with my BA. Anyhow so after leaving the course I started to find other things to blame and started to pin all my frustration on my work, from this I started looking for new jobs and not feeling fulfilled in my role because I was always craving more. I was on the brink of leaving my job behind too, the one which developed me to this level within the bar industry- I may not be the best bartender or the best mixologist but I know that my skill combined with knowledge and my methods of customer interaction through understanding of basic psychology is a very good mix. However, without the help of my colleagues I would not be at the level I am at now, at a level where the only route truly is to focus on developing myself out of work time and others in work time and I know that my current place of work is where I’ll be for the foreseeable future.

However, over this 7 months of absolute madness and depression I can now safely say that I am over the low point and over my years this was the deepest dip in my psyche, as the saying goes “the more you have, the more you have to lose”. I truly never thought I’d see the bright end to this period of my life, on a daily basis from around December there wasn’t a day went by I didn’t at least think about how others’ lives would be without me, some days better than others- with others being utterly dreadful. And looking back that seems like an utter million miles away however it just can go to show how important it is to keep going. To remain focused on what means the world to you, don’t let one thing ruin or even potentially destroy you. Because in the end we have all had a lot of tough shit to deal with over the years but what matters is you made it to this moment right now in one piece, take a second to think of everything you’ve pulled through until now.

Doesn’t seem so bad looking back now does it? I can assure you, those times were dark, but I now know that great times are ahead and I look forward to every minute of it.