What was the turning point in your life? The one event that irrevocably altered the path of your life.
And do you think it made your life better or worse?
I feel that if a certain girl had not dumped me in my first semester of college, I would be a completely different person today. My life would have taken a totally divergent path.
Although it caused me YEARS of heartache, I am now glad for it. Because without her dumping me, I would have dropped out and eventually pursued a dream job, leading me to where I am today.
That should have read, “I would NOT have dropped out…”, which I did. Leaving school was actually the smartest thing I ever did, and it opened up a lot of doors for me.
When I decided to quit smoking. Seriously. Shortly after I signed on this board, I saw a post for quitting smoking, and I followed what they had to say. Now I excercise regularly, feel good, my brain is not starving for oxygen, and I actually have some self-esteem and have started activly following my dreams. All because of Ciggarettes, ok, more of the mindset that was allowed once I quit smoking, but still…
Somehow, I knew who had started this thread without even looking at the name…
I can’t think of an event that represented the cusp–I remember the transition clearly, but I still don’t know what triggered it. It happened when I was ten years old; it was summer, and much too hot to play outside (the Louisiana summers of my childhood were no joke), so I was sitting in my room amusing myself with my usual chaos of toys, books, and electronic flotsam.
Suddenly, for no good reason, I stopped what I was doing and looked up at the dust motes dancing in a sunbeam. They seemed to freeze for an instant, and take on new clarity–somehow seeming more real than they had ever been before–and I was struck by a sensation rather like being hit in the head with a hammer (a feeling with which I was not unfamiliar), but painless. It started a domino effect in my mind, as one thing after another started to click into place, and when it was done…I wasn’t a child anymore. I understood mortality, and knew that someday I too would die. I knew why the grown-up men and women played the strange games that they do (although I still don’t grok all of women’s motivations in fullness ). I knew how to count the cost of my actions. I even knew that I couldn’t show the changes I had undergone without unfortunate consequences.
I still looked like a child, and acted like a child if anyone happened to be watching, but from that day on, I was a miniature adult. I don’t know how badly high school would have warped me without that perspective–it was unpleasant, but I was able to maintain my dignity and self-respect. I never had the stormy relations with my parents that most teens seem to experience, a fact that helped me cope when my mother died a few years later, and which insured that even now my father is one of my best friends. I think it also kept me from “using up” my childhood, wasting it while I was still unable to appreciate it, since I can still find the wonder and fascination in the world that most of us leave behind.
Balance, that was a profound post. I was very mature as a kid also, but it somehow snuck up on me; I never had a moment of clarity like you did.
I’ve got a few turning points, the biggest of which was deciding to enter Air Force ROTC. I actually wound up in the Navy, but that’s another story. This was a good turning point. My earliest tp was a bad one. I was in 4th grade and was smitten by a girl named Jill. My brothers finally coaxed me into calling her up and asking her out. I still remember every word of the conversation:
[After Dad answering and getting her]“Hello?”
“Hi, this is flyboy. Will you go out with me?”
“No.”
[uncomfortable pause]
“Okay. Bye.”
What struck me was the lack of a pause as she considered her answer. It came right after my question. Didn’t miss a beat. It wasn’t the “no” but the lack of pause that changed my perception of how the world was and how people perceived me. If I could do over a moment in history, that’d probably be the one: Don’t listen to your stupid brothers!
I still await my cusp. I have always known what I wanted to do. I have always done what was expected of me. Nothing unexpected and life-changing has ever happened to me.
I’d love to talk more, but my boss expects me to have this data reduced by next week.
I’ve had several turning points in my life, but one stands out: I was 12 years old and in church. We were standing and probably praying or something. All of a sudden this thought popped into my head, “Wow. I really believe this stuff!” Or I did until that moment. Up to that time I hadn’t realized there was a choice to believe or not. I had always swallowed whole everything that had been taught to me by parents and other authorities, but suddenly I could question.
Not very unique, but mindblowing nevertheless.
My whole world changed because of that. Now I question everything, which is good or bad depending on my mood. Sometimes I wish I could go back to being sure of something.
My biggest cusp moment took place when I was 16. I was playing with my second band, the first one I had founded myself. And I had a terrible temper. I just couldn’t control it. I lashed out at everyone and everything around me. Eventually I learned that the guys I played with wanted to leave me, because they were sick of me. I realized that I agreed with them; I didn’t like myself too much, either. I assessed my priorities and changed my whole outlook. These days people call me laid back, which never ceases to amuse me. I really believe that if I hadn’t turned that corner, I’d have no friends at all today.
Hmm, haven’t had a really massive, “OMG!” type moment. The closest I came was when I was sitting in church one Sunday. The preacher was reading from a section in the New Testament (think it was the Sermon on the Mount), and I’d always had doubts about Christianity, but when he read a section in which Christ said that if a man divorced his wife and married another (or something similar), he was sinning before God. I sat up and realized that meant my father was going to hell. My parents had divorced several years before and I could understand why as my mother was not a pleasant person to be around at the time. Right then and there, I said the hell with it. If God would expect my father to stay in a shitty marriage when there was an alternative, screw God! From then on, I took everything I heard some “devout” person say with a grain of salt, and began studying other religions.
There’s two that I can think of, and I haven’t decided which one has had the more profound effect on me yet.
Turning down a college scholarship to enlist in the military. I didn’t know what I wanted to major in, so I thought 4 years in the military would help me focus my plans. Needless to say, I would be a very different person now had I gone to college instead of the Air Force.
The car wreck I was in after gettting out of the military. Broken left leg, broken left arm, 3 broken ribs, and a hyperextended right knee. You spend a lot of time doing nothing but thinking while in a wheelchair, able to only move your right arm. This caused me to definitely rearranged some priorities and change my outlook on life.
**
In both cases, I don’t know if it made my life better, but it made me better. During the Haiti invasion I learned how well I can deal with highly stressful situations and during physical therapy after the accident I found a physical and mental strength I didn’t know I posessed. Regardless what comes my way, after those experiences, I know I can handle it and that things could always be worse.
When my mom made me quit the junior orchestra, where I performed well and had friends, and join the track team, where I performed badly and was treated like shit.
When my best friend died.
When I got caught shoplifting.
When I finally realized that if someone went off on me, they were the problem, not me.
