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			Epiphany
	October 26, 1999
	Did you ever have a moment of realization about yourself? A truely brilliant thought that changed your whole outlook of yourself? That second when you realize you aren't who you think you are? Or maybe you just realize you don't like who you are...or that it's time for a serious change? I had one of those. Today in fact. Hours ago. Maybe minutes; seems like days. Anyway, I guess I actually had two seperate epiphanies, but one stemmed from the other. I realized today that my mouth gets me into a lot of trouble and that I don't like that about myself. I realized that I often speak before I think. That is not a good thing. I got myself into some trouble today. Caused myself some unnecessary grief and it upset me a lot. I realized that if I just took an extra second to think about things before I speak/respond that life would be a lot easier for me. I also realized that people get the wrong impression of me because I am always so blunt and I always say what pops into my mind. So I was thinking maybe I should keep a lot more of my thoughts to myself. I don't like to censor myself, but it appears that is necessary for me.      And from that thought came another one. I need to simplify my life. Yes, I know, most people think that from time to time, but I really like my life in general. Or at least I thought I did. And I guess I do, but well I think I might like it a lot more if it wasn't so complicated and dramatic all the time. I would like a day or ten where nothing major or life changing happened. I realize that my life will never be average and I am ok with that, but maybe just a little more mainstream would be nice.      So, where do I go from here. I am not really sure yet. I am going to work on the thinking before I speak thing. As for the simplifying my life, I am not really sure what needs to go and what needs to stay. There are some relationships with people in my life that I have been holding on to in hopes that they would go somewhere or develop into something more, but they haven't. So do I let them go now or do I wait a bit longer. Difficult decision there. There are events where I devote much of my time that I could maybe remove from my life. But which ones? Not really sure. Some things have to go, but which things?      This is why people "say" they are going to simplify, but never really do. It is not going to be as easy as I thought. Hopefully, through all this I will grow as a person and discover what is really important to me. Maybe I will be able to let the things go that hold me back and stand in the way of me being a person I want to be, a person I like, a person I can look in the mirror everyday and respect. I want to really like who I am. I want to be proud of myself. I want to feel clean, and healthy and happy as many days as I can. I guess that's what we all want though isn't it?      Well this will be a journey. A renewl of my life, my soul, my heart. I'll keep you posted on how it goes. Maybe some of you will be beginning a journey of your own and you can share your story with me.