The Lowest of the Lows

I am writing this as a confession — I am currently at my lowest of lows.

It all started with a series of bad decisions about handling money and my career as a freelance writer, researcher, critic, and independent spiritual counselor.

Now, I am broke. I am being chased by loan sharks, with no money in the bank. While I have been paid hefty amounts of money during the electoral campaigns as well as in my other writing gigs, I wasn’t able to save for the rainy day. I pinned myself to the false hope that my endeavors will be rewarded and money will flow as if it were a stream. But I was wrong. Now, I am reaping the consequences of my bad decisions.

Now, out of desperation, I am actively (and desperately) looking for a job that will give me a decent salary, not only to pay my outstanding debts but also to support the needs of my family. And my wife has also been looking for work to help with the family’s needs.

I have read Margaret Wheatly’s essay about addiction to hope and the way that incapacitates human reason. And I saw myself as one of those people who cling to hope as a coping mechanism. The result is often devastating and awful.

Yes, we need to be hopeful and always hope for the best but this kind of positivity is toxic, if not, dangerous. This is simply toxic positivity.

This kind of hope serves as a mirage and hinders us to see the real situation. Hope isn’t enough to cure any bad situation, particularly those which are the result of your negative thoughts and actions. As I have mentioned earlier, I am broken and hurting as hope and despair are faces of the same coin.

Nevertheless, this situation makes me realize that most of the time, it was the ego that gives us false hope. It is the ego that creates that illusion of achieving something great just from hoping.

As I write this short confession, I am doing the best that I can to overcome this adversity. And I know, through the help of God, I will overcome.