The Difficulty I Have Sharing My Story

I’ve always been a very private and quiet person. That is just my nature. I think most of my friends would say I’m pretty entertaining when you get to know me (if sometimes annoying), but in most unfamiliar situations I am often painfully shy. To give you an example, once I was asked to read something at high school, and another student yelled out “speak!” – because I just very rarely said a word, ever. I would just hang around and listen – or in my later years when things got worse, hide away in any place I could find. This would often be sitting eating my lunch in the toilets at lunch-time. It was that bad.

So, writing my story publicly is not something that comes easily to me at all. I’m not even a well-known writer and it is already causing me a great deal of anxiety just to share my story on Facebook and Medium. So it was always going to be difficult for me to write what I wanted to write. But this became much worse when the story I was going to tell became much worse.

You see, I had just quit my job as a gardener to pursue what I thought would be a career in writing because for some reason it felt like it was what I was meant to do. I had no idea whether it would work out or not, but I felt like I had a lot to say, and I felt that it was important that I share it.

Then, as any of you who have read my first blog post, “My disastrous spiritual awakening” will know, my story suddenly became much worse.

I was no longer – as I had anticipated – just going to be writing about science and spiritual awakening and the extraterrestrial reality – I was now going to be writing about a horrible event that happened in my life.

This made me question whether I could even be a writer. It took me nine months after the event to finally put my fingers to the keyboard and start typing. The ironic thing was, I was just about to sit down and start writing when the event happened nine months ago, so it really wasn’t something I was expecting at all.

I spent a long time in hospital with nothing to do but ruminate over what had happened and question everything about what I was doing and what led me to that point in my life. I initially thought my blog would be a hopeful, inspirational blog – a tale of suffering to triumph over suffering through spiritual awakening – but now my story contained this very ugly episode. I thought, “I was meant to be on a path of greater understanding and bliss and wonder, and I ended up assaulting my housemate and spending three months in a mental hospital – how did my “spiritual awakening” go so horribly wrong??”

My story is difficult to share in a number of ways. Firstly, as I mentioned, I’m a painfully shy person. I hate being the centre of attention, and if the attention is negative attention that’s twice as bad. Secondly, my story now contains something horrible, which, if I’m going to be an open and honest writer as I intended then I have to share it. Thirdly, my story contains weird stuff that a lot of people won’t understand and will likely judge me for. Hell, I would have judged me for it five years ago. And lastly, a lot of people are going to think I’m just some crazy loon.

That’s a lot to deal with, especially for someone like me. It’s why I’ve been smoking, drinking, and taking anti-anxiety pills like there’s no tomorrow in order to cope with the angst of it all. I guess I’m just going to have to get over that and get used to it.

But I’m still going to write, even though I’m terrified of it, because I still feel it is what I am meant to be doing. Nothing else in my life makes sense except to write and tell my story as openly and as honestly as possible.

I still believe that spiritual awakening – and by spiritual awakening I mean recognizing the oneness and interconnectedness of all things – is the most important thing in the world, and probably the only thing that will save humanity from itself. So that’s enough of a reason for me to get over my own internal fears and keep writing. Because I believe this to be true.

It’s not going to be easy, but I’m still going to do it. All I can hope is that people see my intention is always positive – that I am doing this because I believe it’s the best way I can contribute to society, and that all I’ve ever wanted is a more open, more loving, more connected world to live in for everyone. A world based in understanding and compassion instead of division and hatred. One based in love instead of fear. And I believe it is possible. I’m not even there yet myself – it is still a challenge for me to always try to maintain that state, but I truly believe, to end with the words of Arundhati Roy: “Another world is not only possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing.”

As always, with love,

Will.

For more stories like this, including mental health, extraterrestrials, and spirituality, please subscribe to my blog, follow my Facebook page “The Ostrich and the Elephant”, or find me on Twitter @willkenway, Medium @willkenway, or Instagram @will.kenway. Thanks!