Closure. It’s a hell of a thing. Many chase finality in order to close a chapter of their lives. To me, closure is hunting for resolution so your heart and mind can both finally be at peace. I’m convinced closure is no where near the same as ‘moving on’. There is no ‘moving on’. To ‘move on’ is to not deal with ones past.

I think this is what I may have been doing all this time. Trying to ‘move on’ instead of truly wanting closure. Closure is more like ‘letting go’. It is accepting and embracing change and this is something I historically do not do very well.

For years I have repeatedly prevented myself from achieving closure with help from a lot of mental sabotage along the way. Deep down I knew what the closure I needed would ultimately mean. It would mean I would need to lose part of myself. More specifically, losing part of my past. I would need to hold myself accountable and go to the edge of my ego or pride to sever the mental attachment my mind would not let go of.

Going to the Edge

These last two weeks, I went to the edge. After years of trying and failing over and over again, somehow I finally reached the precipice of this fucking mental mountain I’ve been climbing in my mind. There’s a physical strain you feel in your chest as you traverse up this mountain. Like air is getting thinner or gravity is getting stronger.

At the top, you take some time to rest, facing the sun as it rises from East. For the entire day you sit there in your mind and contemplate your life including memories, regrets, mistakes, your past. Then you look out over the side of the mountain into darkness. You stand up, back up a few steps and then you run off the edge into closure, finality, peace.

David Goggins

When thinking of closure, I have been gravitating toward videos of David Goggins for some reason. It’s crazy how he seems to have a deep, personal relationship with pain. When he speaks, it sounds like he has mastered closure by living in pain and controlling his mind.

This section of the video below resonated with me.

“And going back to all the hard parts over and over again. I told myself, after the first time. I knew it was going to be a long journey there. My body was breaking down. It was just how it was going on. I said, you know what? This is my new norm. So my mind said, it’s like going to work. You go to work, and put your suit and tie on. I go into suffering everyday. Everyday. Suffering. Being Broken. Duct taping my feet up. Stress fractures. Shin splints. Being broken. This is my new norm. And your mind says if we’re not broken this ain’t normal. We’ve got to be broken. So then your mind starts to get tougher, and tougher, and more accountable… I became hell. And that became my new norm. I gave myself no way out.”

Toward the end of the video below, he talks about finding peace.

He says:

“You don’t find peace first… I found peace on the opposite end of finding myself”.