The way I dealt with them; there?s the quick answer versus the real answer.

One of the ways that I?ve dealt with things, in the beginning, is denial. I just didn?t deal with it. I allowed suffering to take place in my life, which manifested itself in negative thinking, negative behavior and self-sabotage.

It?s the destructive things that have happened to me that really forced me to learn coping mechanisms and to seek out people that could help me. I surrendered to thinking I could do all of it on my own.

Pursuing spirituality was also a part of the solution, but there was no quick solution to some of my issues. A lot of it was life hit me with a ton of bricks, and there I was, squashed on the ground, figuring out, ?Well, I?ve got 2 choices: I either live in misery or I don?t.?

There are 2 types of suffering, as my friend Dan Sullivan said. "There?s short-term and long-term. You decide which one you want."

I have chosen, at times, the long-term route. What I do now is to hopefully have this sound optimistic. When something bad happens to me right now, I have a much better perspective, knowing that all of the lessons in life, all of the progress is only going to come out of things that don?t work.

Dan Sullivan is a friend of mine. I learn from Dan. Dan learns from me, and he says, "Life is broken up into 2 areas: things that work and things that don?t work. That?s it."

If you think about your life, we have areas that work and things that don?t work. The areas of life that we learn from really come out of those things that don?t work. Whenever I have a setback or something doesn?t quite work out right, heck, we?re human. We are constantly making mistakes.

Speaking for myself, I?ve made an ass out of myself numerous times. I?ve said things I wish I didn?t say. I?ve made decisions that haven?t helped me, that haven?t helped other people. I?ve done things that have hurt me. I?ve done things that have hurt other people. I would like to think whenever anybody has been directly or indirectly hurt as a result of my thinking, my behavior, my actions that it was not intentional. It was just me really not knowing what the heck I was doing.

I?m a lot less forgiving of myself now, because for one, I know that I?m human, and second, whenever anything bad happens, I now have a process for dealing with it. And that is, for one, realizing that if an area of life isn?t working, that?s kind of like God?s way of saying, ?Hey, pay attention to this. How could you do it over??

You can fail, but the only way you fail is if you fail to learn the lesson. So now, when negative things happen, I have a group of people, I have certain individuals in my life that I?m very close to, that I talk with, that I bring my misery to, that I bring my complications to, and some of these people, I pay. I have a client relationship with them and a lot of this is business stuff. Heck, I don?t consider myself a great manager. I seek out lots of training in that particular area.

Some of these things are small issues. Others are life issues that require very intensive, private godfather conversations with people, but I try to be resourceful. I was not resourceful in the beginning and the more that I go through life not being resourceful, the harder life is for me.

I went through a really tough childhood and adolescence and early adulthood, but truthfully, it was all self-imposed. It stems from my father and mother got divorced, and it?s the same old story. That?s not even, in most people?s eyes, worth getting upset over, you know. How could you let your life get destroyed over something like that?

I was 11 years old, I think, and it devastated me. I blamed my mother and I spent years trying to get back at her, trying to get even. I know that now and I?ve apologized to her many times, but I put her through hell, and I did it by ruining my life.

I got into drugs; I drank; I was constantly getting arrested. I was in trouble with the law. It was just terrible. I ran with the wrong crowd. I dropped out of school. I evaded the draft. I did everything that a kid could possibly do wrong, and I didn?t really know it at the time, but I look back now and I realize that subconsciously I was trying to get back at both of them, not just her, for ruining my life.

In retrospect, it?s probably the best thing that could have ever happened to me that they broke up. My father turned out to be something else.

The low point in my life; that?s what caused the low points in my life. It was that self-imposed self destruction that caused the low points, but when I actually hit bottom, I am honestly not really sure of the exact date, but I was homeless and starving. I was a very talented carpenter, but I couldn?t keep a job long enough to really eat or anything else.

I was feeding my drug habits and stuff more than anything. I was living in a van. I had an old, beat up van that had a broken shifter. It was terrible. It was pretty lousy, but as I said, it was self imposed, and at some point I just woke up and said enough is enough. That was it. I have never in my entire life believed or felt like I couldn?t do anything I wanted to. I just didn?t want to, and I knew that; on some level I knew that.

I always knew that I could do anything I wanted to, and at some point I got tired of beating myself up for no reason. It was just plain stupid and I knew it. So at some point I said, ?Okay, that?s enough. You?re done now?, and the day I did that, life changed.

I immediately went out and got a normal job and cleaned myself up, and before I knew it I was a general contractor and had my own crews. It was just a matter of applying myself.

I see it so often in young people. I think they are really subconsciously trying to get back at somebody else by hurting themselves. Somehow it converts into, ?If I hurt myself bad enough, you?ll be sorry,? which is just totally stupid, but I know that?s where I was and what I did.

Once I had had enough, I had had enough. My mom is one of the greatest women who ever lived. She is a very special woman. She went through all of it; bailed me out of jail; never really complained too much. She just took care of everything.

I had a brother and a sister and she worked three jobs to keep us in a middle class home that we couldn?t afford. She didn?t have to do any of the stuff that she did, but she felt it was her place in life to raise her kids and give them the best life that she could and just love them through it all.

I guess I did enough rebelling for the rest of the family because the other kids were perfect. You?ve met my brother. He?s an executive type; he?s got a Ph.D. He?s everything that I probably should have been.

I put myself through it and I know it was to hurt her and I am truly sorry for it now. I guess, in reality, it was something I had to go through to be who I am now. I wouldn?t put my mother through that for anything in the world again, but if I had it to do all over again just to me, I probably would do it the same way because, in truth, all the problems I had with drugs and alcohol and going to jail and getting in fights; all the stupid things I did made me who I am.

They made me know that I have experienced this for a reason and I have to help other people and I have to try and show people that there?s a better way and it?s stupid to do these kinds of things.

I know I can?t keep people from going down the same road I did, but maybe I can save one person. Maybe I can let them see that they don?t have to do what I did in order to redeem yourself to yourself. That?s really all it is.

The low point of my life was at some point in my 20s when I decided enough was enough and just hit rock bottom, and made the decision that that was it. I pulled myself in and it didn?t take long.

I don?t think anybody with any intelligence would ever take long to pull out of that. It?s just making that decision.

That?s what happened to me.

They really took care of my not by preaching but by teaching. There was some preaching in there but it wasn?t over the top. It wasn?t, ?You have to do this to be a better person!?

It was, ?Here?s what you need to do. Here is how it?s going to affect you if you do this. Here is how we are going to help you.? That was the lowest point in my life but I was able to regain it so the path to victory, so to speak, was the support system in my life.

Debra Berg: The ending of my first marriage of 17 years was my lowest point. At the time, I was running a business with lots of responsibility to others. I was a role model to a number of people. It was hard not letting my personal life and struggles get in the way of being there for them.

I learned from the experience and went on to acquire a whole new career, which involved a steep learning curve in the computer industry. If I had not learned those skills, I would not have been able to produce my book the way I did nor earn a good income in the software industry. While I was single for 10 years, I had the time to do the research for my book and to take care of an ailing parent. I also met my new husband.

People like that. Those are the more modern day people. Of course there are people from long ago like Einstein and who is it? Was it Leonardo? Da’Vinci. Socrates. There are a lot of different people that were great thinkers of old that were absolute geniuses. I love to study and understand the way that they think because their genius was not in their book smart academics but their genius was found in the way that they think.

I think some of the modern day geniuses are Anthony Robbins, are Joel Osteen. It is Mike Murdock. They’re completely different realms but if you look at them and you understand what it is they do and the way they impact people’s lives and how they do it, I think they’re geniuses.

What you do is you look at those people and you can put them up there as heroes. I do things like borrow genius where I’ll envision conversations, then myself taking on different things that I consider to be really good strong points about them.

Then looking at how those can be adapted to my life. Then bringing that together with who I am without allowing it to alter my own personality and what it is I’m ultimately to become.

So those are just some of my heroes, but there are many people because I read so many books. There are people who’ve written books that I wouldn’t be able to recall their name but their book has impacted me in a certain way.

So while there may be a certain group of people specifically, I leave myself open to wisdom, regardless of where it comes from, because wisdom is wisdom.

If it’s something that’s going to be able to lead and guide and direct your path, and help you to move closer to where it is you ultimately want to be, and provide even greater value to those that you’re providing value to, you might as well pay attention to it.