Face Your Demons

My personality is composed of a few parts. I’m the savage warrior enduring fatigue and discomfort every single day, eager for hardship and challenge, knowing well the intangible benefits of their friendship. I’m always hungry, always looking for an opportunity to improve, to grow, to strengthen.

I’ve sharpened my axe—today and each day before—ready for the brutality of life to spring upon me.

I put in the work.

I’ve tasted victory and stacked a few accomplishments.

But there’s something else in there. I’ve also got some fucking demons.

They prod and poke my hunger, they dull my axe when I’m not paying attention.

They’re failures, faults and inconsistencies in my character.

They’re traumas and pains of the past, and worries about the future.

I’d be lying if I said they weren’t real.

I’d be lying if I said I didn’t know their names.

I’d be lying if I said I could make them go away.

They’re as real as my blood. Their names are plenty. And they aren’t fucking going anywhere.

Good.

Gives me another item to check off my list every single day. 

Face My Fucking Demons.

That’s at the top of my list.

It’s a complicated task, hard to visualize and harder to execute. It’s the recurring decision to violently put these demons to sleep, to neutralize their efforts on my will. A lot of people give in to their demons, let negativity and shame and hopelessness fester into a despicable victim complex.

Fuck that.

Not in my head.

Not out of my mouth.

Today I’m going to stand in front of my mistakes, my failures, my anxieties and apprehensions, my illnesses and weaknesses and shortcomings, and I’m going to show them how to hurt. I’m going to give them something else to do: they’ll cry and beg for me to slow down and ease up and quit here.
And their begging and crying will be muted by my pounding heart and heavy breaths, by the banging of iron in my coliseum.

I’m not going to lay down and die.

They’re not going to win.

My life fucking depends on it.

Don’t slow down. Don’t ease up.

Never Fucking Quit.

Face Your Demons.