BREAKTHROUGH

Before Carol died I had plans. I had goals. I had dreams. When I moved in with her in 1997, I was full of dreams about doing this or doing that. My mind was always coming up with this idea or that idea. Most of it was nonsense but once in awhile I came up with something cool. It was this drive that lead to me going to school to get my MBA. It was this drive that lead me to a job fair that lead to a job in software development. Up until Carol died my mind was always thinking about something.

Then it stopped...

Gone...

Empty...

Nothing...

Like a channel has gone off the air and all you hear is static. I learned to live with it. I was given an opportunity to return to my old program and travel for them. I was able to capitalize on my experience and on site support for problems or issues that would come up time to time. I have a very broad skill set that enable me to travel and do multiple task normally associated with different people. I would sit and wonder to myself sometimes, "what happened to my dreams, goals, and plans"?

I would think about doing this or doing that but there was never any energy behind it. No motivation or creative ideas that would come to me like opening a water facet. I had given up, resigned to the fate of going through the rest of my life this way. I wasn't happy about it but my attempts to force the issue failed every time. It was just gone.

BREAKTHROUGH

My program recently laid off about 50% of our team. I was fortunate to dodge the layoffs but it got me thinking about what I'm going to do now? There is a good chance the contract will extend three more years. I started thinking about what can I be doing to be in a competitive position in three years.

Before Carol died I had flirted around with the idea of getting my PhD in Information Technology. I would come up with crazy ideas of what to do research on and I wanted to teach at a university part time. But the time and commitment was too much for me to realistically take on with Carol being sick. After she died I thought about it some more but I had no drive or ambition to do anything. Plus my mind had been short circuited from the loss and I knew the academic demands would be too much for me. So I gave up and moved on.

Recently I have been talking to people about it again. Still no spark but at lest I was talking about it. Then things started to happen. Slow at first but as each idea start to spark another idea it started to take up momentum. I looked into a couple of local PhD programs but they all wanted GMAT or GRE scores. I looked at a few sample test and felt a wave of disappointment. There is no way I could take or pass these exams after being out of school for nine years. It would take me a year just to get up to the point of maybe, just maybe getting the score needed.

Then I remember talking to an online university while I was still with Carol. I found the original email and asked if the person was still there. She was and we started talking again. Before I knew it I was submitting my application for the PhD program in Information Technology with an concentration in Project Management. I start November 8th. There is a high probability I can complete my dissertation by December 2011.

That's not the best part. The best part is once I started thinking about going back my mind seemed to break free and ideas started to come to me. One built on top of the other. Before I knew it I had a clear idea of what my thesis will be on. For the first time since Carol died I feel normal again with respects to how my mind worked.

I have dreams again...

I have goals again...

I have ambitions again...

I am alive again