There is a Bigger Picture

Some of the most Bittersweet moments in my life have turned out in the future to be the very best. Usually I’m to stuck smack dab in the middle of it to be able to even glimpse any possible Positive Outcome, until much later.


For instance, take my divorce to Dumb Ass. While in the midst of it I felt nothing but the pain of Searing Flesh. The tearing apart of two people who had committed to be One in the path of Life. No matter how badly one or the other may want it or need it, when you tear the One back into Two, you are both left with wounds to lick. Some more than others.

Some 10 years later not only am I a happier and stronger person because of that experience but I can look back and laugh about the things that seemed so important in the moment. I can remember a month long fight between our attorney’s because I took the Tin full of Medicine. That bottle of Tylenol costing us both about $500.00 in attorney’s fees. It’s funny now, but was serious business back then. He wanted the antique tv. So I handed it over but not before I unscrewed the back of it and unplugged all the wires. He closed out the savings account. I threw all the dishes in the garbage & his underwear in the front yard. The hot tub disappeared to later be located at one of his relatives house. I took all the good furniture and left him with the broken stuff. And on and on it went. I can’t even imagine how tired my friends and family got of hearing my endless angry droning about ‘stuff’ that would mean absolutely nothing in the future.

If only we could try to envision the Bigger Picture and stop focusing on all the little details and things. How much more fulfilling and less frightening our life might be.

I’m stuck in one of those moments where I wish I could turn on the flat screen TV and see what it is I am supposed to BE. How much easier the journey might be if I had a freakin clue which direction to take.

I take comfort in Colonel Sanders. Not in the way you might think, mind you. Colonel Sanders dropped out of school in seventh grade and worked many jobs, including steamboat pilot, insurance salesman, railroad fireman, farmer, and enlisted in the Army as a private when he was only 16 years old. I also believe he was an attorney at one time, but don’t quote me on that. When he was 40, he worked at his Service Station and served his special chicken recipe out of his living quarters in the back. Quite innovative if you ask me.

What I love about His Story is that it wasn’t until he was 65 that he franchised his company KFC and really figured out what in the hell he wanted to do. In many of his speeches he said that was when his life began. After, he retired and got his shit together. Not his exact words. But close.

I want to be THAT guy. Not because it would make the mustache and chin hairs that much more acceptable, but because he never gave up on himself. He kept plugging away and trying different things until he stumbled accidentally onto his gift. And even then, he didn’t hoard his millions. He gave and gave and gave. Besides the multitudes of scholarships that he gave, the people around him became just as wealthy as he was.

He didn’t lose Faith in himself. He wasn’t afraid to succeed or to fail he just kept trying. He saw a Bigger Picture.


What a concept to Give more than you Receive. If only we did that with all our Gifts and Talents and Wealth, how much different Life could BE.