For a long time, the picture I kept of my dad was him in a hospital bed.
He died in April 1998. I was 22. Those last few weeks were only a small part of his life, but for years they were the part I carried. Whenever I thought of him, that is where my mind went.
It took me a long time to see what else was in that room.
There was humour. I remember him asking the nurse for more morphine, and promising her he wouldn't drive. Even then, at the end, he was still trying to make someone laugh. There was care in that room too, and love from him.
The facts had not changed. What changed was the story I chose to tell about them.
I have had my share of things I could file under "this harmed me". I was violently assaulted as a teenager, walking home through Southampton. My parents divorced. My dad lost his business. Then he died. I have been through two divorces of my own.
I could tell every one of those as damage.
But I don't think that is the true story. The question I keep coming back to is this: did those things harm me, or did they shape me?
For me, the honest answer is that they shaped me. I've carried the lessons, but not the mistakes.
I didn't lose my dad. I carry him with me. I carry the memories of the great things he did, and the lessons from the things that weren't so great.
That second part took me even longer to understand. I admired my dad so much that part of me wanted to be him. But I am not my dad. He was my parent, and he is not me. I can never be him. All I can be is me, with what I learned from him. Some of those lessons came from his example. Some came from things I don't want to repeat. In those moments he was less an example and more a warning.
Which brings me to the thing I say more than almost anything else.
Everybody's life is one of two things. An example or a warning. And you get to choose.
I have been both. I think, deep down, most of us know we have been both.
You can't choose what happens to you. You can choose which of those you make your story.
If something in your past still sits in the "this harmed me" column, I'd love to hear what it taught you. Drop me a line.
