My darkest day began quite abruptly on a cold February morning at my home in beautiful Whistler, BC, just after Valentine’s day. I was picked up out of my bed by my shirt, thrown across my room and repeatedly punched in the stomach while being screamed at by my infuriated assailant! (Not the best way to start your day.) He was actually one of my roommates (there were 6 of us in a massive house at the time) and while this may seem crazy, it wasn’t really that out of line, as the night before, during a rather crazy house party that we had, I had slept with his girlfriend. Whoops. Needless to say, a little cocaine mixed with copious amounts of alcohol can lead to bad decisions.
To make matters worse, within the previous week, I had done the same to another friend too. That one was with a friend’s ex, but it was a recent ex and he wanted to get back together with her.
The previous summer I worked hard so that I could take the winter off of work and devote my time to skiing and pursuing my dream of becoming a professional skier! I was working out at the gym. Skiing every day and trying to learn new tricks and get better so that I could do more filming, get more sponsors, and hopefully start to get paid to do what I loved!
Early in the season, while tree skiing one beautiful powder day in January, I caught the tip of my ski on a tree stump buried beneath the snow that I couldn’t see. My body kept moving forward, but the tip of my ski stayed in the same place. My ankle and leg were wrenched fiercely out to the side and I was flipped onto my back. You’d think that while contained in a big solid ski boot your ankle would be pretty safe, but despite this, I managed to badly tear a few ligaments in my ankle which resulted in my season being cut very short!
Since I had set myself up to not have to work that winter, I still had money coming in, but without being able to pursue my passion, or walk for that matter, my days were quite depressing. This was before I knew everything I now know about nutrition and exercise and I basically just sat around every day playing internet poker and slipping deeper and deeper into depression.
There was one day in particular that will be forever burned into my mind, where I spent the entire day sitting at the kitchen table, playing online poker, and watching over 16 inches (40cm) of snow accumulate on the railing of our deck in front of my eyes. If I were able to go out and enjoy this snow, I would have been incredibly happy! Instead, thinking about what I was missing out on, and about having to crutch through it if I were brave enough to leave the house, it was one of the more depressing days I’ve ever experienced.
Fast forward back to me being my roommate’s punching bag. After he had finished with me, he left me there lying on the floor, beaten and broken (literally). I crawled into my closet, shut the sliding door and started crying. It was by far the darkest and most disgusting moment of my entire life. I had just completely destroyed two friendships, my dreams of becoming a professional skier were fading by the day, I had alienated myself from my entire friend group, and to top it off, I was suffering from the blinding self-hatred that typically comes with a cocaine hangover.
So what did I do? Did I do the mature thing? Man up and approach my roommate and deal with all the problems I’ve created? Of course not. I was an extremely depressed, hungover, beaten, broken 21-year-old and I did what I’m sure many people in my shoes would’ve done … I ran.
Eyes swollen from crying so much, I hobbled around and packed up my stuff and left that very morning! I caught a taxi into town and hopped on a bus to Vernon, BC where I had a couple friends that were outside of the group I’d just alienated myself from. I spent the next few weeks battling the fiercest depression I’ve ever experienced. Everything sucked. I hated myself. I didn’t want to go on…
I don’t know specifically what shifted or why, but at some point a few weeks after the original incident, a thought came into my head. The thought was that if I was ever going to be happy again, I needed to forgive myself and choose to be happy. I needed to start focusing on the positive and deal with my current situation. I realized that my roommate wasn’t going to forgive me, but that didn’t have to mean that I couldn’t forgive myself. I’m not saying that it was just a poof, all of a sudden I was an excited and happy person again, but once I started to forgive myself and choose to be happy things slowly did get brighter.
After another month of building myself back up, I went back to Whistler to clean up the mess I’d made of my life. I slowly dealt with everything and started to put my life back together.
While this event was an incredibly dark and painful time in my life, I am very grateful for having experienced it. For it was this experience that taught me that happiness truly is something one has to find within, and even in the worst of times, it is possible to do so. This idea of choosing happiness has stayed with me ever since and was one of the most powerful lessons I’ve learned in my life!
Thank you so much for taking the time to dive into a little piece of what made me who I am today.
Namaste
“When I was 5 years old, my mother always told me that happiness was the key to life. When I went to school, they asked what I wanted to be wen I grew up. I wrote down “happy.” They told me I didn’t understand the assignment. I told them they didn’t understand life.” – John Lennon
That is the foundation of Dave Weale’s beliefs and what he teaches all of his clients. Dave is a happiness coach. His clients end up being able to free up their time so they are able to focus on pursuing their passions and truly live a life they love!
He does this by teaching about mindfulness and meditation and works with people to help improve their Health, Wealth, Love and Trust. He helps people reach peak health, make more money, create more love in their lives, and trust that we are all in this together and that everything is working out perfectly!
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