From ‘nice guy’ to ‘asshole’ and(hopefully) back again: a pissing match with God (Part 2)

Love… (Photo credit: maiptitfleur)

I want to talk a bit about love. I know it sounds strange to drone on about love in a series dealing with anger, but it was love which led me to so much anger, and not in the way you’re likely guessing at.

Paradoxically, Love’s light, as the line in the Coldplay song Fix You says, will eventually guide me home {btw, I strongly recommend Yellowcard’s awesome cover}.

So love…yeah.

Love, that odd and at times painful, seemingly undefinable and unmeasurable something; core deep and always looking for a target (and, often, looking for trouble), love led me to an existential crisis. Yes, I know, you’re wanting to say ‘how cliché, bud’.

Fuck off, I say. Crisis of “self” are no joke. In my case a very confused love caused me to have “a personality transplant along the way”. This turned me from a ‘nice guy’ to an ‘asshole’.

There’s a reason some of the best tunes, novels, life tales and, yes, even the most deadly wars have their roots in crisis related to love and to the dénouement of such crisis.

The nurturing of my inner ‘asshole’ (leave it alone, keep the puns and jokes to yourselves) began, I must admit, with love for…God.

I can already hear the thundering “huh?”s and “WTF”s, so I’ll explain.

When I was young – and well into my teen years – I had a soul deep love for God and for Truth. I always wanted and looked for answers to deep, difficult questions. Seeking these Truths and answers out I’d turn to Scripture. This quest caused me to ask even deeper questions. When family trauma and doctrinal disputes with our faith leaders threatened my Identity and also brought chaos into our home, I sought answers elsewhere.

Thanks to my family’s emerging crisis I now had serious, down to earth problems to find solutions to. I chose to avoid finding those solutions in lieu of blaming God for what seemed (to my young mind) to be more crucial problems.

In true cliché fashion I blamed Faith and blamed God. I began to blame Him for much, actually.

I sought Truth and began looking for answers elsewhere – and I began to blame myself when I failed to find those answers in the sources I dug into. Foolish, yes. Surprising? Not particularly.

These were my most formative years. Rather than dealing with school, with adolescence, or with practical life issues; instead of living life and having fun – rather than building Identity in things I cared about – I sought Identity and Self in the quest to Know and to Understand. I tried to bring God, the Universe, and The Big Problems down to my level – to bring these to my own understanding and to me, rather than raise my understanding and lift myself up to them. Of course I kept failing.

I blamed myself for every Answer I failed to find. I blamed God for each Problem I failed to find solutions to. And then in the most painful way possible and, when I least expected it, Love and Truth met. They collided in a way I could not have anticipated. In the wake of this collision I discovered anger and guilt over my failure to find Truth. I began to identify the targets for both my Love as well as for my resentments.

In the strangest way I could imagine Love found me, I found what I began to suspect was Truth, and I began to experience the inkling of what would become genuine fear.

I began to walk the path which turned me into an asshole.

In true cliché fashion ‘Asshole’ started with a smoke filled room and a game of cards.

I swear though, it ain’t what you think.

To die for: suicide and survival

From ‘nice guy’ to ‘asshole’ and(hopefully) back again: a pissing match with God

From ‘nice guy’ to ‘asshole’ and(hopefully) back again: a pissing match with God (Part 2)

From ‘nice guy’ to ‘asshole’ and(hopefully) back again: a pissing match with God (Part 3)

From ‘nice guy’ to ‘asshole’ and(hopefully) back again: a pissing match with God (Part 4)

From ‘nice guy’ to ‘asshole’ and(hopefully) back again: a pissing match with God (Part 5)

From ‘nice guy’ to ‘asshole’ and(hopefully) back again: a pissing match with God (Part 5.1)

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• Speaking the Truth in Love (lanternhollowpress.com)
• The Nature of Blame (aphilosopherstake.com)
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