Life truly is about the choices we make

Last night I had the privilege of attending the Caron Bermuda dinner honouring Brian and Nancy Duperreault and left feeling very full. Full of hope, inspiration and love. There were so many things said and done last night that confirmed for me life really is about the choices we make, the people we surround ourselves with and owning who we are in order to be who we are meant to be.

People gathered to honor Brian and Nancy, as did, I but ended up embarking on a journey of change and choices I had not anticipated but thoroughly enjoyed. Starting with the story told by a recovering addict who spoke with raw honesty and courage. Who bared her soul to us by telling us about the struggle she endured to get herself off drugs and the struggle she continues to go through every single day to not use drugs again. She stood on stage in her beautiful red dress and told us about the power she thought drugs had over her until she realized nothing had the power over her unless she allowed it to. Because what she realized after many years of being addicted to drugs was that she had to own the fact that she was a drug addict. She had to own the fact that she was heavily addicted and once she did, she was able to find her way out of the drugged, drunken and dark world she had lived in for many years of her life.

Once she owned who she was, she saw for the first time the harm she was doing to herself and the pain she was causing her family. She saw for the first time that she was where she was because of choices she had made and the people she had surrounded herself with. She realized in order to get better she had to make different choices and had to own the fact that she was an addict so she could get the help she needed.  And once she did, her world slowly became light again. 

Every day her world became brighter and brighter until she realized the light was always there for her but she just could not see it. And last night she was able to stand on stage seven years clean and brave enough to own her story and tell us with pride about the journey she had taken from the pits of hell to the point of glory she now stands in. Sending tingles down my spine.

Shortly after her, the guest speaker told us his story. The story of how he was not addicted to drugs but grew up in a household where his mother was addicted to drugs.  How he and his siblings managed to hide the fact that their mother was on drugs for many years. He told us how he could have been a drug addict just like his mother because there was no one that knew what he was really going through because he didn't want anyone to know that his mother, the woman who was supposed to love and care for him, could only love and care for drugs over everyone and everything else. There was nothing more important to her than the next high.

Eventually he became a drug dealer thinking if he supplied his mother, he would know where she was and what she was doing because he was trying to protect her from selling herself to get drugs. Or worse from being killed. Or overdosing on bad drugs. He thought by supplying her, he was protecting himself from the spoils of the world by protecting her until he realized he was not protecting her. Instead he was helping her to stay addicted to drugs by selling her drugs. So he stopped because he no longer wanted to aid her with her problem.  He told us how he had to distance himself from her in order for her to realize the life she was living.

He painted a picture of the surroundings he grew up in, the choices people around him made that landed them in prison or dead. How he decided he would use their mistakes as lessons of what not to do so he could avoid going down the same path as they did. 

In order to do so, his mantra became, “be where you are supposed to be” not where you think you ought to be. He realized from their bad choices that when you are where you are supposed to be, trouble tends not to follow you but when you stray off that path, you end up having to take the hard road, the road of hard knocks.

He turned his life around by choosing not to be the person that his mother was. By choosing not to make the bad choices his friends had made. By choosing instead to set goals for himself then put himself in the position where those goals could come to fruition. He ended by saying there is no way that he could have become the successful NFL player he had been without the hardships he had experienced as a child, without the mother who was addicted to drugs, without the darkness he had gone through before he saw the light and believed the light was there for him too.

Like the recovering addict woman that spoke before him, he had to make a choice about what sort of life he wanted to lead. And once he did, he had to own who he was, as did she, in order to be who they are today. Both stories though very different were alike in that they both had to make choices about what they wanted for themselves and feel worthy of receiving the gifts and treasures of the Universe so they could turn their lives around. So they could be the light at the end of the tunnel. And own it.

The evening ended with a movie about Brian and Nancy spoken through the words of those who have been in their lives. The choice they made some 45 years ago today to be together and stick together. The choice they made to share some of what they gained to help others. To not hoard for themselves but to share. And one of the tributes that stood in my mind was one that quoted by a friend about them from Winston Churchill, “we make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give.”  

Three stories united last night by the choices they made culminating in them sharing the stage last night without ever having met before physically. But paths that had been destined to cross once they understood the power of choice. Showing life truly is about the choices we make, the people we surround ourselves with and owning who we are in order to be who we are meant to be with gratitude, reverence and grace. What a night. So grateful to have been in  the company of such awe inspiring people.