Five Years from Fifty -- What I've Learned In 45 Years On The Third Rock From The Sun

I will be turning 45 years old tomorrow at 6:40 a,m. It's hard to believe how much things have changed in my life in the last half decade since my fortieth birthday. Had someone told me on my fortieth birthday I'd be married, retired from one job and be in college on the dean's list before I turned forty-five, I'd have told them they were crazy. Sometimes I can't believe how lucky and blessed I am. Lucky and blessed -- words I probably wouldn't have used to describe a large portion of my existence here on Earth ten or so years ago. Lots of stuff that I used to dwell on, obsess about and allow mental dominion over my thoughts and actions seem meaningless now. The thought of getting older and the ideas of what that might look like used to terrify me. Facing old age alone. Old fears of not being good enough. Old thoughts of being trapped in a life that wasn't mine. All of that crusty baggage given to me to carry and I used to carry it with me. Everywhere. It got so hard to see who I really was. Lost and not sure what was going to happen to me.

I've come a long long way from August 2009, sitting outside of the East side Walmart with three suitcases of my belongings and maybe $30 to my name. I'd walked away from a monster. I had had enough of being used and abused. I didn't know what in the hell I was going to do, or where I would end up. But my relationship to my ex was poisonous, as toxic as cyanide, and I finally had my fill of it. All of it. Two decades plus of allowing someone else to reap the benefits of my life while I begged for scraps of happiness. It was a sick way to live. I was sick with a disease called lack of self-worth. Dying of cancer of my self-confidence. Sounds crazy, but it was true. Do I sound melodramatic? Maybe, but it is quite an accurate description of what was wrong with me. Something deep inside me blossomed once I got away from all of my ex's crazy, batshit life. I got my life back.

Today I'm happy. Really happy. Lucky and blessed really are the perfect words to describe me now. How I got so happy was accepting three simple truths that I would like to share now with you.

Simple Truth #1 -- You are responsible for your own happiness.
Simple Truth #2 -- Nine-tenths of your problems and heartaches have only your fingerprints on them.
Simple Truth #3 -- Love yourself first so you can love someone else best.

I wish I hadn't taken so long to figure these truths out, but I probably had to figure this out in my own way. For someone so allegedly intelligent, I seem to enjoy the long road to wisdom called mistakes. I've made tons of them. But if it weren't for those mistakes I wouldn't have grown into who I am.

Mistakes can only hurt you if you allow them to define you. If you can learn from them, they will become the scaffolding that will elevate you to where you want in life. But forgiveness of self is the only way to do that. Forgiveness of self is the only way to handle your mistakes, otherwise they will drag you down, without exception.

Five years from fifty and I am the happiest I've ever been. I have so many reasons why that is, but the biggest reason for my bliss is asleep in our bed. Michael, I love you so much. You have no idea how much you mean to me and how much our love has given me wings to fly. You are my lucky star, the constant source of love and light in my night sky. To the Moon and back, my love.

Noah

All The Stars In The Sky
by Noah Moore-Goad

There are a million reasons why

My love is my gift to you

Like all the stars in the sky

Like a comet trail sailing by

Across my telescope lens view

Among all the stars in the sky

Waited a lifetime oh me,oh my

To bathe in starlight so true

You, my favorite star in the sky

All the love to me you supply

Brighter than sunlight or moonlight blue

Glowing more than all the stars in the sky

Oh wish I may, Oh wish I might

My wishes for us will see us through

The only star I wish to see tonight

So on this birthday,just us two

My love, my gift I give to you

For so many million reasons why

Like all the stars in the sky