A Leap of Faith; the Lessons of One Year

3:36am, listening to Omarion – Ice Box and enjoying the taste of double apple sheesha.

This is the life.

It’s been a year since I’ve moved into this condo with Cam Adair, and I have no idea where the year went. It seems that time flies when you’re embracing the present moment, enjoying every “second” that you’re here on this world. I’ve come to lose track of time, hours turning into minutes, minutes turning into seconds. The present moment that I find myself immersed in keeps me distracted from the idea of time, and only pulls me into the energy of the moment.

Above is the journal entry I wrote on my first blog, one year ago today. I remember I tried to start a blog on my own, http://briangamblemark.blogspot.com/. I can appreciate the place that I came from, and I know that I am where I am today because of my ambitious efforts. My ego exists though, and it validates its identity through memories and vision. I want to be a man validated by process, thus this piece of writing comes to life.

The piece below is the journal entry that I wrote a year ago today.

October 27, 2010: A Year Past

Someone told me that without goals there is no direction. Below included in this writing are a list of all my goals; short term. My daily decisions can then be influenced by whether or not the outcome of the decision will bring me closer or further away from my goals finally giving my young life some direction. So much can be learned by the successful people who carved their own path before us, so it is now my turn to derive some purpose for my life and head in the direction I want to go.Short Term Goals:

Move into my Condo with Cam

I’ll do this by saving up my money, not spending it on useless shit (drinking, smoking weed) making smart, conscious decisions with ALL of my money.

Gain 10 pounds of muscle, lose my fat

Commit to working out with Cody every day after Jamesons (4x per week)

Go out three times per week and approach at minimum 3 sets per night

I’ll stay in set until they literally walk away or tell me to fuck off. I feel I’ll learn the most from sticking around and listening to them talk, consciously keeping notes in my head of how the interaction is going.

Keep a daily journal

I plan on writing a daily story about my day. This will give me loads of material to use in field and dynamically improve my storytelling ability. 500  word minimum for the first month

                Those are my short term goals in a nutshell. Looking at them right now I can tell my life is going to be very busy with little time for distraction. This means that I’m only going to hang out with girls on MY time, my nights out at the club. I  am going to live a very busy lifestyle, and if they can’t fit into it that’s they’re problem because I’m going to keep living my life. After all, I am a man with goals and ambitions and now a man with a sense of direction, where I want my life to go. The more I live my life with purpose the more attractive I will be to every female who meets me. This isn’t my daily journal this is my short term goals commitment to myself.

There is never a path to an unknown destination.

I want to talk about the lessons that I’ve learned over the past year. It’s been a whirlwind of growth, success, failure, self realizations, and valuable lessons. This year was more than I would have ever imagined it, and there are times when I step back from the moment and appreciate where I am at this very second. I owe who I am to the people who have created my environment; Cam Adair for working through our relationship struggles. Kevin Choo for being my mentor; pulling me back down to earth when my ego is out of control. Daniel Fexa for being my best friend, supporting me through thick and thin and pushing me when I felt weak. Mikey B for inspiring me with his love, his passion, his integrity. The Kingpin Social crew for leveling me up with their individual talents and skillsets. I owe who I am today to the people in my life, and this piece is for them. For that, I’ll write until the sun comes up.

“Lessons Learned 101” was the title of my first self – run blog. I was ambitious, driven, determined to make a difference. I wanted to write, I wanted to get my name out there, but I didn’t have any idea about success. I came from an environment in my childhood that caused me to have a low sense of self worth; inspired only by the relatives that supported me with my pursuits. I can remember back in Grade 8 when I decided to start running, and shed the weight that had plagued me for the longest time. At 13 years old, 170 pounds, 5’1 I found myself on the streets of my trailer park running laps 2 – 3 times a week. Although I had no idea about physical fitness, I was inspired to be more than the computer screen that I played in front of. Runescape ran my life at the age of 13, and I wish I remember the tipping point when I decided that I was sick of a low self – esteem. I felt like I didn’t deserve anything, and as a result, achieved nothing.

Running gave me that sense of self worth that I so desperately searched for, and through it I managed to land my first girlfriend. Amanda was her name, and she was a beauty. I can remember liking her for her individuality, and for liking me for who I was. I was scared though, I had never had a girlfriend before. My first girlfriend in Grade 8, and I was scared. I remember when her Dad came downstairs and busted us making out on the couch, how frightened I was. I ran out of the house and never came back, calling Amanda to break up with her over the phone. I liked that girl, but I was scared. Not only of her father, but of the relationship. I felt like I wanted to abuse my newfound power; I had gotten skinny, I was getting attention from girls in my school and I wanted to take advantage of it.

This habit lasted until 3 months ago, when I fell in love with Social Dynamics. My entire life, up to this point, besides the relationship I had with Katy, I had taken advantage of the power that I had. I had worked my ass off, gotten skinny, and the people that ridiculed me, now were the ones who were seeking me. This validated my identity, and I felt like a pimp. The fact that I felt like a pimp, meant that I felt like I had to live up to that image that my mind had created for myself. This caused me to have short term, external relationships based on nothing more than sex. I never pursued a relationship afterwards, because I lost all interest after the same old physical connection. Different girl, same physical connection. It became meaningless, and it lead me to my first lesson of the year.

Love Always Wins

Lesson # 1 of this year was that internal connections are forever, external connections are meaningless. My whole life, since I started taking myself seriously, I was in search of external connections. I was in search of the next girl that I could sleep with, completely dis – regarding the emotional connection that she may feel. I had no idea about the awareness of emotion, and I was so focused on my low sense of self worth that I forgot to think about the idea that the other girl may feel something for me. This last year I’ve come to realize that internal connections, emotional connections, mean much more than a physical connection ever could. The best part is that I can’t describe an emotional connection. I can talk about a sexual connection, describing every detail and painting a picture in your head that you don’t want to see… but an emotional connection can never be described. An emotional connection is only something that can be experienced; however it can be re – created. Social Dynamics is about creating emotional connections with people, any people, and if that emotional connection leads to physical than so be it. That is not the quest anymore though, I’m in search for real, emotional connections… based on passion. Based on doing what you love with your life, because those who love what they do, live in the moment and experience what they do.

I find that most people live their lives and do what they do, but don’t live in the moment to experience it. If you’re working at a job that you don’t like, it’s likely that you’ll want to be distant for that job. Retreating into your head to think about your dreams, your problems, your boyfriend, your girlfriend. To live in the moment is to experience it, and if you don’t love what you do… experiencing the moment isn’t a good thing. In fact, it’s repulsive coming to the moment only to realize that you don’t love your job.

I’ve heard that people do it for the money, and I used to do the same thing.

Presence is Power

Lesson # 2 that I’ve learned over the course of the last year is that this moment is the only moment that ever exists. The past and the future do not exist in reality, they only exist in your mind. “The past” is simply a reference to moments previously experienced, these can be recorded or simply exist within your mind. The future is a mental projection, an idea, of what this moment will look like in “X” amount of time. The funny thing about the future is that we create the future, through the mental projections that we have. I find that the mental projections that we have are caused by our self esteem; a healthy self – esteem has positive future mental future projections, while a low self – esteem has negative future mental projections.

“The Future”, the mental projection that your mind creates, is created through the thought processes that you carry in your mind. This happens in 3 ways; the first way is that your mind lives in the past, thinking about things that have happened to you. Positive or negative, not having a harness on your mental powers and choosing to think about the past creates a future with mixed results, sporadically manifesting things that you want and you don’t want. Thinking about the past means that you’re going to end up somewhere where you don’t want to go, because a destination unknown means a path unknown.

The second way that this idea comes to fruition is not having control over your thoughts, and allowing them to run rampant with your emotions. Your emotions create your future if you do not have control over your thoughts, because your emotions control your thoughts. This is a cause an effect. However, you can flip the switch backwards and cause the effect to be the cause; fixing your thoughts means that you fix your emotions.

The best way to create this idea is to have a vision for your ideal future. Either way, your mind creates your future. The future doesn’t exist, it only exists within your mind. The results that you achieve in this moment, in “future” moments, are a direct result of the thought processes that you have in your mind. Believe that you will succeed, and live in the moment, working on the process, and success is inevitable. Justify, procrastinate, fail to try, think about failure and you will fail. Your thoughts in this moment create the future in your mind, the future in your mind becomes this moment that you live in right now. The most valuable lesson that I’ve learned this year is that this moment is precious, this moment never ends, the “past and the future” are simply recordings and mental images that my mind, and the minds of others create and record.

If you could be anything at all, and you knew that success was the only option, what would you be?

A Life of Passion is a Life Experienced

Lesson # 3 of this year is that passion wins over everything. Passion is the key to life. Passion is a direct result of love, which is a result of like, which is a result of experience, which is a result of open – mindedness. You must experience something before you know whether or not you like it. You must have an open mind to experience anything. Once you experience something, and you like it, if you do it over “x” amount of time and it gives you enough value, you start to fall in love with it. Love something over “x” amount of time, and love becomes passion. Passion is unlimited, passion spawns creativity, passion, in my case, is the cause of happiness. Why would you live in the moment if you didn’t love what you do? Passion is the cause of love, and if you are passionate, and full of love, why wouldn’t you want to experience this moment? It never ends, and experiencing this moment means that you’re experiencing the love that this moment creates.

The moment is easy to escape, because in the moment exists process. Process is difficult, language is easy.

Unmask the Truth of Language

Lesson # 4 is that the ego exists within the mind, and the ego only exists in language. The ego attaches itself to an identity (in my case, writer) and through language, validates it’s identity through language of memories, telling stories of past writing experience. The past does not exist, beyond the momental recordings of the past, so any story of the past is a story that lacks truth. Any story of the past that validates a current identity is flawed, is a lie, and requires another individual’s approval. The ego that lives in the present moment, validates it’s identity by pointing out the insecurities in others. In my case, I’d make fun of other people to divert the attention off of my flawed self. This is the case with all ego; for even the stand up comedian points out the flaws in others while instilling positive emotion into the people that he speaks of the flaw to. The ego that lives in the future validates it’s identity through language by telling stories of vision, plans for the future, seeking approval from the people that the ego talks to.

Language is a direct result of the mind creating the ego, and slacking on the process of achieving the identity. The healthy ego attaches itself to an identity, and works towards that identity through process. Process and language, they both exist in the moment. One is much more difficult than the other, though, and requires much more focus. The long term benefits are exponential, and are worth every day of the process. The process never ends, like this moment. The moment the process ends, the ego that exists within language begins to surface and validate it’s identity through language. The ego that validates it’s identity through process, an internal method of validation, exists without the need for external validation. External validation is anything outside of the individual that seeks approval; the story from the individual who slacks on the process of becoming their identity.

Become as Big as You Believe

Lesson # 5 of this year is that growth is forever. Growth never ends, and no power on earth can stop the idea of growth. An idea, once created, if great, exists forever. Religion, faith, hope, passion, freedom, these are all ideas that exists forever. Growth is the most important idea that exists, and it never ends. Like the process, and the moment, growth is forever. There are three types of people that live in this world; there are the people who think, there are the people who work for the thinkers, and there are the people who think, and work for themselves. We all have the potential to be the people that think, and work for ourselves. The man who thinks has men working for him, in our capitalist society, and benefits off of the creations of others underneath him who create the vision of the thinker. The man, who works for the man who thinks, trades in his ability to create for an hourly rate; while the man who thinks for himself and works for himself creates his own ideas and lives through them.

This man has unlimited potential, for an idea exists forever.

In order to grow, you must accept that you are not as good as you think that you are right now. This realization is easily clogged by the logical side of your mind, the ego, that justifies reasons based on past experiences, current flaws in others or visions that you have for yourself, reasons that you don’t need to grow. Truth is, everyone needs to grow. CEO of Apple, owner of an Oil Manufacturing Company, Web Designer, Engineer… it doesn’t matter. Everyone needs to grow, because this life is a process. This moment never ends, and any stories of the past, humor in the moment pointing out insecurities and stories of vision are all the ego, and the ego limits the ability to grow based on past experience or current “road blocks”. There is no such thing as failure when you are dedicated to the process, for every “failure” is a lesson to be learned. When one fails, it doesn’t mean that one is inadequate. It means that one isn’t ready yet, and unless the lesson is learned from the failure, one will walk into similar situations repeating the same mistake over and over again.

It’s been an entire year, since my first blog post. October 27,2010. Here I write on October 27, 2011 with an insurmountable, un – describable feeling of appreciation. This year has flown by, and within the next week I’ll move out of the place that has caused the exponential spike in the growth of my passion, my dating life, my emotional life, my social skills, my overall self – esteem. All I can say now is thank you. Thank you for everyone who has helped me grow to this point. Thank you for those who stick by when I lose the trust in myself. Thank you for the Kingpin Social crew, inspiring me to grow past anything I believed to be possible… and thank you to everyone who reads Kingpin Lifestyle. The messages I receive from you inspire me, and encourage me to keep pushing forward. I hope that on my never – ending process of this moment that I can inspire you, the way my environment has eternalized the idea of growth in my mind.

This one is for my friends, my family, and everyone that has helped me in this last year.I love everyone who has become a part of my environment, and influenced my growth in an in-measurable way. I cannot wait to write this same post in one years time, with lessons stemmed from the people who have influenced this post.

Kingpin Social Represent.