I like what [MENTION=418370]canklecat[/MENTION] said - and from my perspective, I don't want to offend any of you, -- here comes the "but" you knew was coming - but ... this discussion makes me think many of you are giving up on living to the fullest in some way. And the "I don't need it" is the back door rationalization. It sounds "old" and it sounds depressing and like "settling."

To each his own, I'm fine with that if there is a simplicity there that puts people in their zone, and happy to be wrong about my comment above. But, I'm fighting way too hard with my own demons right now, centered around themes of what I've lost versus what potential I have in my life. What I read feels like settling. I've settled far too many times because it was the safest way or the fastest way out of a bad situation - and been sorry after and hated myself for not fighting for my rights, for myself, or for my chance to become better. Right now, and really for some time now, I have been on the precipice of choosing life or death, and at this point I really don't care who knows that, what they think about me or that knowledge. Dismiss me as crazy, embrace me as human with problems, I don't care either way, I have that same internal debate myself constantly. Even when most of me feels like just giving up and saying game over, bye, there is still that little part that says no, today was bad, or today was brutal, but tomorrow I can be better than I was today. I'm working my a$$ off every day to make the right choices, fix it, and be better tomorrow than today. Even when it's really hard.

You are all deluding yourselves if you think you don't have to fight 24/7/365 to just hold on to what you have, and then fight even harder to take one more inch of ground from the enemy and hold that too. Life is war, war is Hell, but there is no alternative. Fight or die.

I'm 51. I have everything, every advantage, but it means nothing because it doesn't stop the pain of my past. If you want to know why I'm so messed up, ask my father, who is if there is justice has been burning for the 19 years he has been dead, since he bought himself an early grave from the cancer sticks that always dangled out of his mouth; at least when he wasn't screaming at me, telling me I was worthless, slapping me hard across the face or head or punching me in the jaw or gut, pointing a gun or knife at me, or worse I'll leave it there. (C)PTSD much? You betcha. It took me almost 50 years just to put a name to it. I finally knew I had turned a corner the morning I sat on a fishing pier at 4 am with a loaded pistol, his pistol, in my hand and figured out it wasn't death I actually wanted, I just wanted life on my terms, without that albatross around my neck. All of the bazillion times I've wanted to off myself, well, it was never wanting death, it was just the cyanide capsule every commando carried into his mission in Nazi-occupied Europe - escape on his own terms before they did much worse.

So now, all of this **** comes down the pipeline at me, and I still fight. Even though a lot of days the thought of that cyanide capsule still has some draw, I fight. If I don't, he wins. The last time he hit me, I was 24, and as usual, something I did wasn't good enough. It was the last time, I sucked up every bit of what little courage I had and called 9/11. Not much really came of it except months of extended family drama, but he never hit me again.

In a previous job, I shared an office with a coworker about 15 years older who listened to the "Oldies" FM radio station softly all day, every day. For about 6 years. It was the same set of a couple hundred, maybe, "biggest hits" from the 60s to the early 80s all of the time. Same day after week after month after year. Yellow Brick Road, check. Rhiannon, check. Hollywood Nights, check. Eleanor Rigby and Yesterday and Silly Love Song, check, check, check. Always.

I really wanted to gouge my eardrums out with an icepick after a few months of that. I listened to 6 years of it to be polite and respectful to an older coworker. But hated the fact I settled for disregarding my own needs or desires. A few hours of silence or something by Coldplay or Daughtry or U2 would not have killed him.

How depressing. You only grow by taking risks and by pushing your boundaries. I only have the hope that I can improve, change, grow and actualize potential to keep motivating myself forward. If I can do it, absolute trainwreck that I am, anyone can. Keep your excuses to yourself.