It's time to bring the podcast to a pause for a while. Call it season 1.

As a friend mentioned, sometimes you need to unplug from things to concentrate on other things. This is something that I really enjoy, but I need to unplug for a while to plug back into life, a healthy life. Getting off this damn roller coaster is proving to be more difficult than I thought.

I'll be back when I can move out from beyond the shadow of the roller coaster. I try to explain it in the episode.

It may be a month, two or three, but I'll be back.

Until then, you can check out the book, "A Walk in My Shoes: A Journey Into Depression." The ePub is now available on Amazon. The paperback will be out in a few days.

Be kind to every everybody. Be kind to yourself.

Aloha

Workaholic. It definitely is something to be. But it is not the right thing to be. It is one of the things that led to my fiery burnout a few years ago.

My body and mind are as ripe for it as a newly tilled field in the spring. New business. The challenge. The rush. The way it can push everything else outside of my head. The escapism.

It is also a part of who I have to be. Business owner. Income earner.

And it is exciting. I do enjoy what I do. I enjoy seeing the results of what I am doing every day. I'm engaging in a profession that I am good at it. It really is exhilarating.

But I know it can bring the emptiness back. I know where this path leads.

How I not return to that place I was a few years ago?

By allowing the parts of who I am to grow as well.

Balance.

Why do people stay in bad relationships? I dive into myself, and into some songs, to look for possible answers.

Bad relationships is a spectrum, not a black or white thing. They can abusive marriages, empty marriages, unhealthy workplaces, or even something as mundane as my continued following of the University of Miami football program. I remember better times.

There is something about comfortableness, something about the fear of the unknown, something about being seen.

Rob Thomas helps with this one. Anybody know how I can get in touch with him? Anyway...

Like LL Cool J sang: Don't call it a comeback!

It was difficult making my way back to the podcast, creating an original one, but I am there now. I'm still not at my best, still not really mentally settled, but this was necessary.

So, you are welcome to follow me as I skip along the yellow cobblestone street in Philly, "Lions and tigers and bears oh my!" And then stumbling because some asshole stole the friggin' cobblestone street. Somebody really did that. He stole a few blocks of it, in broad daylight, before he got caught.

It's a Philly thing?

This is a rebroadcast of Episode 17, with a special introduction.

I'm back in Philly, back home, and answering many of the same questions. I don't mind talking about it but it may help if you read the damn book. Or listen to the podcast.

I'll get back into new episodes next week

This is a repeat of Episode 5 with a special introduction.

I'm a mess right now, traveling cross country. I had started a new episode but it did not get done. While driving, though, and thoughts tugging at me, I realized I wanted to repost Episode 5, The Mental Health Triangle with the special introduction.

As I evolve, the podcast evolves. Episodes 5 and 17 come up the most in my thoughts and new scripts, so with everything going on, I thought I would get them reposted as I travel and then get set up somewhere.

My last podcast had me thinking about things, breaking down the subtle signs of depression. A column that I just wrote, "Lessons Learned from a Bar Fight," was a mixture of the podcast and reactions to posts I am seeing. That led me to Robin Williams in Good Will Hunting.

All that led to this podcast. It is about something I have been saying for years in various forums and various lectures on many different topics. "Don't screw up like I did."

Learn from my mistakes. Please. If you do, it makes my mistakes more bearable, gives them purpose. I wish I had learned more from other's mistakes but that has not been my way.

From posts I am seeing, I imagine that many people were disappointed by other people in 2022. I am reading a knee jerk reaction, about how if we don't have expectations, we will never be disappointed. All of the memes and posts are making me facepalm. Often.

Umm, no. Don't do that. It is all about a bar fight in SW Philly.

I delve deeper into some columns that I wrote this past week to try and untangle depression from my life.

Dedicated Regina and Vivian, the first who asked the question that set me on the path to the answer and the second who provided a billboard to the answer.

I use Writer's Block as an example. I realized that my life had unknowingly become writer's block and show how the depression infiltrated every facet of my life. I know now and can begin the path to healing.

Freedom is still a journey ahead of me, healing, but I am taking the steps I need to take.