TCspeakeasy.

         I believe in the concept that we are all one.  When I say “we” I am not referring to the human race, but all things, the sky, the trees, the animals and plants.  We are all one, from the darkest depths of the ocean to the farthest reaches of space.    I lost my faith in God at a very young age. From that point on I lived my life in a state of apathy. My outlook on life was very cynical, I believed that you were born alone and you die alone.  I feel that because I had lost my faith in God I also lost my faith in anything else. I felt empty inside and needed to fill a void. Today I’m aware the void I was attempting to fill was spiritual, at the time I had no idea and I tried to fill it with everything but that. At 17 I turned to crack and heroin, I couldn’t fill the void so I became numb to it.

           Around two years ago I was at one of the darkest points in my life. I was homeless and had burned every bridge with every friend and family member I had.  Every day I would wake up and want to die. Then something happened. At the time I didn’t really recognize it as the gift I do today but I like to think of it as something of divine intervention, which turned into a moment of clarity.  I got into a car accident. It was around 3 in the morning and I nodded out behind the wheel of a car.  I ran through a red light at a main intersection in Detroit and was t-boned by another car. I decided to run. The man who was driving the other car chased me down and proceeded to beat me up and threaten my life. Police showed up and let everyone involved go their separate ways. I woke up the next day with two black eyes and a knot the size of a golf ball on my forehead.

         At this point I didn’t want to die but I no longer wanted to live.  This was the start of my decision to change my life.  For the first time in years I was no longer ingesting substances in a desperate attempt to not deal with life.  There were a lot of times when I wanted to give up. I had put down the drugs but my life in no way had improved.

          This is was the beginning of my journey to finding spirituality. I often refer to the start of it all as a gift of desperation, which is an acronym for God. I am a stubborn person and did not want to change my ways but I was desperate to no longer feel the way I felt anymore. The left side of my brain tells me that the idea of God is ridiculous, but my right side craved something more, it told me that everything was connected to everything. It has been said that you either believe everything happens for a reason or everything happens by chance. I decided that my life finally had a purpose and although I didn’t know what it was, there was definitely a reason why things happened the way they did. With this belief in connectedness I began to look at science for answers. Through research I finally realized that not only am I in the universe but the universe is in me.  No matter where you look across the cosmos you will find the same 92 elements that are here on earth.  I believe that we are not human beings having a spiritual experience but that we are spiritual beings having a human experience.

         It’s hard for me to put such a comprehensive idea into words. One thing I can say with certainty is that we are all one. Every race, sex, religion, lack of religion, regardless, we are all one.  The most beautifully I’ve ever hear it put is a quote from a song by “The Beatles” off of “The White Album” and it goes “My mother was of the sky, my father was of the earth, but I am of the universe and you know what it’s worth.” It was only through loosing myself that I have found myself. Instead of constricting my connection with God to one specific thing I have chosen to trust in all things. We are all one.

What would you say if you had 60 seconds to talk a stranger out of taking his or her life?

How was your day? I want to help you if you let me.

• Why do we feel the need to create?
• Is a little bit of insanity essential for creative genius?
• How does your mood affect your creative output?

I think that creation is what makes us feel passion. For a long time I struggled with the concept of a higher being. The Creator. I think for a long time that fueled my desire to make things. It used to be my attempt at showing people I was all I needed. If I could create something and if I could destroy something. I was god and would never need anything more. I took a break from feeding my artistic ability for a  long time and have just very recently decided to reconnect with that. I have to admit even though I haven’t worked on as many projects as i’d like to, it’s fucking exhilarating. My first tattoo, that needle to the skin, drawing again, pen to the pad, writing, my fingers slapping against the keyboard. Its hard for me though to see how I can love something so much but at the same time just let my projects sit stagnant with no improvement. Its not only with art but all things in my life. Diets, Books, Friendships, anything. I always recognize I miss it, and make and remake start dates and finally I do and I feel great again but I always marinate in the suffering and recognition of me putting off things I enjoy. That could possibly be the bit of insanity needed to fuel my creative genius. While I don’t deem it as a necessary trait for people to have I do believe that all the best artists are. I feel all my best work is done in a state of manic depression. Unfortunately I no longer allow myself to fly of the fucking handle and stay there for months at a time so I do feel it affects my ability to create. I don’t know if I think it would be worth sacrificing my mental state to be in a state of creative bliss. I guess you can’t have your cake and eat it too.