The Art of Starting Over Part 8 – The Fear of Moving Forward

Harrison spent his whole childhood believing he would be a Marine. The men in his family wore that identity like a badge. They stood tall, walked rigid, and talked like the world needed more structure than softness. His father was the only man in his family who didn’t join. He put on suits instead of uniforms and played golf with clients instead of training camps. 

The uncles on both sides called him weak for choosing corporate. Harrison heard it growing up, the jokes, the comments, the backhanded pride. He didn’t fully understand the weight of it, but he understood enough to decide that he would not be “the weak one.” He wasn’t going to be his dad. He was going to be a proud Marine, like his uncles.

That decision followed him into high school, but after graduation he decided to take a gap year. Not to backpack in Europe, but to play video games with his friends all day. He got caught up quickly. The wrong crowds, the wrong girls, the wrong escapes. It started small, just vaping and hookah on weekends, something to blend in and loosen up. Something to avoid the feelings he didn’t have the language for that came from childhood trauma. 

That’s why the girls he dated were more trauma bonds than relationships. They needed rescuing, fixing, saving, and the Marine in him wanted to be a hero. But the little boy in him needed to be saved too. He didn’t see that part yet. 

But then came the pills, the ones passed around like candy at parties and pregame circles. His “Marine strength” told him he could control it, beat it, hide it. He couldn’t. Two years into this young adult life, he was making childish mistakes. Costly ones. He got pulled over for going 100 miles an hour on the highway. Turns out he was high. 

But the costly ticket and court cost didn’t scare him enough. He kept using.

A few months later he could no longer hide it, not even from his parents who were also in denial, but kept him coming back to hypnotherapy. They knew he was hiding something but couldn’t figure out what. They also weren’t sure they wanted to know. And just like that, one day they did. His secret was out. No warning. Just a crash to rock bottom. He tried cocaine and afterward he wasn’t the same. 

He went three days with barely two hours of sleep total. His body shook, his thoughts blurred, and one day he became delirious, panicking in an airport on his way to a hypnotherapy retreat with me. The flight was delayed and he had no access to anything. No drugs, no alcohol and not even the nicotine vape he secretly puffed on all day long. 

He sat in that airport waiting on the flight. Each delay made him more and more anxious. When it was finally time to board, fear of the 4-hour flight overwhelmed him emotionally. That was the moment everything cracked. But it was also the moment everything started. Rehab became the only option. Three months inpatient and nine months outpatient. Rehab didn’t just save his life. It rebuilt it. 

After a year clean, he became an addiction counselor. Helping others helped him stay anchored. Then he decided to go back to school to study psychology. He wasn’t a Marine, but he found another way to serve. To protect. To matter. But it wasn’t until he and a friend decided it was time to move out on their own, that the fear of the real story began. The thought of making a decision on his own was terrifying. He’d made decisions before and they got him in trouble. 

What if he wasn’t ready? What if he forgets everything he learned in rehab? All the grounding tools, all the coping strategies, all the progress. What if he relapsed? What if he disappointed his parents? What if he failed again? What if he wasn’t the hero he had worked so hard to become? And worse, what if the people from rehab—the ones who looked up to him—found out he wasn’t as strong as they thought?

He didn’t trust himself, so he came back to hypnotherapy. 

Together we rebuilt his launch plan piece by piece. We talked about how he had to Control the Controllable. We talked about how mistakes were coming, and how perfection wasn’t required. “Even a 90 percent is an A,” I told him. That means you got ten percent wrong. He said he could live with that. We also realized he didn’t need an A in every area of his life. Some areas could be a B. Some could even be a C. He laughed, but the simplicity of that idea freed him.

Moving out of his parents' house felt like a restart. A grown-up kind of starting over. He wasn’t late. He was right on time for who he was and what he had been through. On one hand, he wanted freedom and his own place. On the other hand, letting his parents make all the decisions and pay all the bills felt safe. 

After all, they didn’t make adulthood look fun. No hobbies. No balance. No joy. His father played golf, but it was more of a work event disguised as leisure. Even at skybox football games, he was networking and prospecting. Harrison had no interest in that life, but he still wanted to be responsible.

So we built a daily routine that grounded him. A morning rhythm. A night rhythm. Structure, but without the uniform. He’s not losing sleep anymore. Sure, he stays up late sometimes playing video games with his roommate on his days off, but he knows his limits now. He has tools. He knows how to reset. How to start over without falling apart. And even how to come back to hypnotherapy when he needs a boost.

And maybe that’s the point of these stories. Most people start over two or three times in life. Sometimes more. Starting over isn’t failing. It’s living. And Harrison is living. For real this time. He’s learning being on your own doesn’t mean being alone and it doesn’t mean being perfect either.

If you’re losing sleep, thinking of starting over, or wondering how to control the controllable in your life, start by downloading the free sleep tool that I use with all of my clients. As simple as it is. It works. 

You don’t have to solve everything tonight. Start simple. Start by getting a good night's sleep. Try my free sleep meditations. It can help you fall asleep faster, stay asleep longer, and wake up at the right time feeling refreshed.

I’ve helped more than 6,000 people restore their peace, and my goal is to help 10,000. Will you be one of them? The tool I created is free, easy, and could be the first step to reset your rest. You deserve to sleep and to have a life that fits who you are now. 

Click here to access it.