I’m never going to have a happy childhood. And guess what? If you didn’t have one, you aren’t going to have one either. If you were abused, betrayed, abandoned, beaten, ignored or set aside so your parent(s) could tend to a terminally ill sibling that’s what you got. It sucks. But that’s what we had. As adults we have two choices about what we can do now. We can wallow in our pain and become a victim, blaming the world or our partner for our loss, and trying to recreate a scenario in which those around us reparent us. Or we can accept our loss, grieve it, pull up our big boy or big girl pants and move on. I choose to move on. I hope you will too.

I’m hoping that because there’s a much bigger chance of us finding happiness in the here and now, than in the past.

One, the cast has changed. The stage has cleared. We’re adults. We have the power, resources and wisdom we didn’t have as children. We don’t have to keep our mouths shut and accept the abuse because we can’t get away from it.

We’re adults. We have options we didn’t have at age five. We can make choices, take responsibility and do what we need to make ourselves happy. That’s what our parents were supposed to do, to prepare us for adulthood and a life of choices, freedom, peace and love. If they didn’t, and many didn’t, then it’s up to us to do it now. We aren’t three, or five or ten, or fourteen or whatever young, awkward, painful age we were when we were traumatized. We may be 20, 30, 45, 50, 60 or 70 years old now, but it’s never too late to let go of an unhappy childhood. You may have to get angry, to grieve what you lost or what you never had. But you can do it.

If you had a happy childhood - one in which the worst thing that happened to you is not getting the toy you wanted in your Happy Meal, but maybe adulthood hasn’t been good to you, the same thing holds true. It’s never too late to let go and choose happiness.

I’m writing a book called “Staying Hungry, Never Settling for What Life Puts On Your Plate.” It’s a how-to book for people who aren’t happy with the cards they’ve been dealt in life - no matter what those cards are. I got a pretty rotten hand, but I’ve seen worse. In 22 years as a journalist I’ve talked to mothers who’ve lost children, children who’ve lost parents, athletes who’ve lost limbs, and more abused, traumatized and battered women than I can remember. The one thing that remains with me are the things they learned or figured out for themselves about how to turn their lives around.

The idea and the name for the book “Staying Hungry,” came from the idea I sent Dan Pink for a contest he held in 2008. Dan wrote a fantastic book called The Adventures of Johnny Bunko: The Last Career Guide You’ll Ever Need
He asked his readers to submit their idea for the seventh lesson Johnny Bunko would learn. Of all the submissions he received, mine was one of three final lessons. I actually wrote my own chapter and brilliant and amazing illustrators and graphic artists Martin Whitmore and Meagan Elizabeth Morris gave it life. And we did it all in a week! See for yourself download the ebook here for free. Just click: stayhungry

Readers voted on the submissions, and thanks to Seth Godin’s promotion of the contest, my lesson *won.* I earned an all expense paid trip to TED Global 2009 in Oxford, England. Not only that, I was selected to speak at TED about the year I was homeless. The theme of TED Global 2009 was, “The Essence of Things Not Seen.” My being one of *invisible,* the “working” homeless, my story fit. Does it sound fairy tale? Or “Law of Attraction”? It’s not magic. It’s the result of a combination of what Dan Pink describes in his manga book The Adventures of Johnny Bunko: The Last Career Guide You’ll Ever Need
and my lesson - Staying Hungry, along with the wisdom of others like me who have risen above their beginnings, risen above their tragedy and gone beyond settling for what life has put on their plates. You can change your life too, as millions have done.

I’m going to be sharing a lot of tips and stories of mine, as well as others. I hope you find one, or more, that speaks to you.