MY PAIN BECAME MY GAIN
The past year has been one of true awakening and blessing. I can truly say, for the most part, that this year has been extremely beneficial in the sense of getting my mentality and spirituality in order. There were many errors in the way I thought and acted towards people in my life, as well as the general society. Truly much has been learnt, as well as certain behavior & thought patterns rectified. My entire being has become re-shaped from the time of my experience until now.

On December 15 2007, one of the worst days of my life, I was charged with seven (7) major indictments stemming from an alleged unsuccessful robbery. I, myself, had no need to rob anyone, but in my twisted mentality at the time thought that I was creating some sort of karmic balance to the world by allowing and facilitating a crime on a certain person or element that I believed needed to be taught a lesson. It was extremely arrogant of me to make a judgmental decision such as this but at this time; I was fuelled by anger due to the unfortunate murder of one of my long-known friends from adolescence.

I was in a bad space mentally and emotionally. I made several errors around that time, and it appears my life was in some sort of disarray. Things were very good before then, but it seemed to come all crashing down at that time. I had worst times financially prior to this experience that I managed to work my way out of without resorting to anger and stress-induced temporary insanity. It dawned on me only when I was incarcerated and subsequently released that I had somehow lost my way. In fact, I would even say as far as into the 2nd month of my therapeutic treatment where I say that I had made several breakthroughs regarding my past behavior. It seemed in those seven years since leaving my home to go and become a man I had seen and picked up too many bad habits& behavioral patterns that subtracted from my usual overall positivism and spirituality.

After going through my sessions with Andrea and Dr DeGoias, I began to open up, and realized that I was being too arrogant, somewhat narcissistic and too absolute in my ways. They opened my eyes with several documentaries and movies that dealt with real-life situations such as “Crash”, “Alfie”, “The Counterfeiters”, “About Schmidt”, “Ray”, “Immortal Beloved” and “Luther” to name a few. However on a more inspirational soul searching level, I would say Dr. DeGoias volumes of psychotherapeutic tapes on dealing with self-knowledge, acknowledgment of the true self, i.e. the soul, as well as several books on logo-therapy and a meaningful existence are probably amongst the most influential aspects of my time spent with both professionals. They are extremely warm and spiritual beings, and I am glad I had the opportunity to meet them because they helped me put a lot of things into perspective that I once believed or was on the brink of accepting at that point of my life.

This entire event was a result of my corrupted thought pattern at the time of this ill-occurrence. I was dead wrong and I could have cost the lives of not only myself, but my own flesh & blood, and other persons who just happened to be there at the time.
Dr. DeGoias & Andrea made me realize that I am more than a young, surviving black man, or a black engineer struggling in a society I do not characteristically fit into. I came up rugged and rough, but my parents spent time ensuring that I developed in a positive, intellectual and enlightening way so that I could maturely function in the real word. Both of them made me realize that I am a soul, not a body, and although it was not a concept I was unfamiliar with, it struck me more severely than ever before.

The reason for this turn of events, an all the other negative habitual behaviors I exhibited stemmed from my ill-nurtured & underdeveloped spirituality. In essence, as a youngster, I had given up on spirituality to chase the materialistic aspects of life, i.e. the “fast life” or “good life”. Even though I found ways to support myself, I excused others in their negative ambitions to chase materialistic dreams. I rationalized things from the perspective that we were all from very humble beginnings, so we were absolved of anything we did to achieve certain things, e.g. robbery here was justified because I believed the person robbed was one of the problems with today’s “gangster mentality” society. The idea was that this guy was to be rectified by losing the symbol of his pride, humbling him from the arrogance he once held, and at the same time provide monetary benefits to the have-nots, which was represented by my family member at the time. It was absurd, twisted thinking, and we were absolutely dead wrong. Who am I to judge another man’s pride and arrogance? I had fallen from grace.

My regained spirituality was the key lesson I learnt from my therapeutic sessions, along with being less sensitive, more understanding, less arrogant and more humble in ways and actions, plus being clearer and more careful in thought. To not let emotions erode the ration of the mind, but let the struggles & strife that must be endured, enrich my soul – because the real key to life is spiritual empowerment. I realized that gaining maximum positive consciousness and spirituality will in turn help you deal with anything in this existence, whether good or bad.

To Dr. Albert DeGoias aka “Dr. D” and Andrea Hubai. I thank you both.
September 25, 2007