Tell me more about Powering Up

For many years I sleepwalked through life, falling naturally into the relentless pursuit of unhappiness that our world encourages. I lived thoughtlessly, and I suffered for it.

Realizing there was a problem was the first step in solving the problem.

I am in a better place now, but the hard times will always be a part of me. They began early on, when I had difficulty connecting with my dad as a teenager. He did not understand my love of music. I nearly flunked out of high school, and he threatened to break up my band and send me to military school.

Two years after I left the police force, I took a job at the most unethical law firm you can imagine. It nearly cost me my life to get out1. Not too long ago, I played a sold-out show in Japan with a bad case of food poisoning and a borrowed guitar2. The things I have seen, done, and gone through could power the plots of a dozen movies, and not all of them the kind with a happy ending.

As my friend Bob Dylan's grandmother once said, we all are fighting our own hard battles.

There is no silver bullet. I occasionally face serious struggles even now that I am self employed as a martial arts student / blogger / musician3.

In fact, I am writing this very post on my cell phone, from inside the trunk of a stranger's car. My head hurts and I am exhausted. I want to go home.

So it goes.

I don't know how I got here, who drugged me, or what they have planned, but I do know I will face whatever happens next as it is rather than how I want it to be. That mindset will be my greatest asset4 once they finally stop and open up the trunk.

The world is full of people who think strength is power, but they are wrong. Knowledge is power.