oh crikey!  that was deep.

It made me think of this:

Demons

Not the video, the song.

The demons left a few days ago.

They leave quite a trail in their wake. I guess most good people would stand up, start tidying up again, get back into what they need to do.

I can't do that. I need to clean my wounds. I need to look at the devastation they leave behind and I need to take it in. I need to see how much damage they can do.

Because surely.. to me, if you just go on with life, if you don't look at what they've attacked, you can't truly appreciate how much needs to be done about them.

Unfortunately I don't control the demons and I never will. They arrive without much warning, only the screams in my mind that tell me that they'll be here soon. And I wait, and they come, and in my darkest moment all I can do is wait with my baseball bat and grit my teeth.

Years ago, I was very ill. In fact, I was dead.

Now I know that for someone to be dead, a doctor has to pronounce it. It's the end, it's where they give up completely, so I guess that's not entirely true.

But I stopped breathing, and my heart stopped. Even though it's not clinical, you could see it as dead anyway, I guess.

I often asked why I survived. What plan was there? Obviously I was meant to be alive, meant to carry on. There had to be a plan.

So I drove myself into work. I knew I was needed somewhere. I was a miracle, someone who had been given life again. Someone needed me. God had a plan.

Maybe you could call it delusions of grandeur. But I felt that I should be someone special. Someone amazing, someone who could make a change to the world. A leader. A figure.

It didn't matter to me that I lacked the strength. My illness had made me weak. I knew that. I just knew I had to go on, become something. Become something special.

But now the demons haunt me. Ever since that day, the day I died, the demons come to me. And every visit, every time they come, they're stronger. They knock me down and it takes me a long time to recover.

So I sit amongst the wreckage, I look at what they've done.

I know I'll have to fight them for the rest of my life. I'll have to ward them off and I know I can never let them win.

I realise now, if I make that my life, if I make my life about ignoring that the demons are there, then they'll always control me.

For years it just made me want to be someone special even more. Imagine what they'll say! The man who fought demons had gone on to do so much. Imagine the hope that would give people!

The more I think about it, the more I realise.

Hopes and dreams.. they're not about being someone special. They're not about being the best, being strong, conquering all just to show others you can do it.

It's not about becoming a leader. Nor about becoming someone that others can look up to.

Do you think perhaps the demons have won? That they've crushed my spirit, taken away my hopes and dreams?

Like I said, I don't like to just carry on after each time they come. I want to see what they've attacked. Because there is where I am most weak.

It's not about being special any more. I have nothing to prove. Delusions or not, they were grand. They were of my life, of becoming someone who could stand up and sacrifice his own life for the good of others.

No, it's not about that any more.

The demons left me paranoid. They left me scared, but I will not paint over the stains. I will not hide their marks they leave on me.

I will embrace them. I will leave them as a constant reminder that even in my weakest areas, even where they can strike the hardest, I can defend myself.

It takes me a while, but I get there.

It's not about being what you think people will find inspirational.

It's about living.

The reason why I was saved? Why I didn't stay dead? Was because I could live.

And I think that's the most inspirational thing someone can ever do.