A life long dream! Now my life is over!

Hi there, thanks for visiting my blog!!

Let's talk about dreams and how not everybody's dream becomes reality

Please be advised, strong language is used in this article!

If you are not interested in the background of my dream and all the hurdles, simply skip to "damn you 2020"

My dream

Since I was a little boy, I enjoy watching my friends and cousins play videogames like Tomb Raider, Metal Gear Solid and other action and adventure games.

I enjoy watching and after I become a little bit older I enjoy playing them myself, only all those games become boring after some time. Then I find new enjoyment in watching movies like Rambo (Yes I am that old), Terminator, the Expendables,.... only to find myself bored again.

Like life itself sometimes, the adventures become less adventurous and the action becomes blunt and repetetive. But all those games and movies have one thing in common: THE BADASS HERO

It is always a jacked Stallone, or a beautiful sexy Jolie who is the Badass in those movies and I find myself wanting to become one of them..... Only how could a scrawny, little 10yo show off become a Badass?

Badass

To become a Badass I figure early on, that you have to be able to withstand enormous amounts of pressure and also function under imense pain. Almost like you have to torture yourself only to be able to withstand all those things later on, when you really have to push through. War movies and games always present soldiers as some real life super heros.

Since my origins are from a war torn country, I have the chance to talk to some veterans who fought in the war in Croatia and in Bosnia and had to watch their friends and families being torn apart by shells and bullets. They told me from the beginning on that a soldiers' life is a very difficult one, almost like they wanted me NOT to become a Badass soldier. Good thing I am as stubborn as a brick and my dream is born.

Now I only need to prepare myself and my body for what is to come

"Are you insane, son??"

As I said in the beginning, my origins are from a war torn country, which means I don't live there. Now that has been a problem back then, since I have wanted to become a soldier so bad and somehow it seems impossible due to me being a croatian citizen and I live in austria, so basically no army for me.

I have no other ambition, I just want to be able to run as long as my feet can carry me and my equipment. Of course I love weapons and whenever we go shopping I find myself going to a hunting and military shop just to feel like a little princess in winterwonderland.

School is going good for me, which is why my parents don't want to let me go working before I at least finish the "Oberstufe". So naturally I do the smart thing and go to the "HTL" (Higher Technical Institute) where I enjoy the fact that I am a teenager now and have some freedom of movement. After only a few months I start getting the feeling that this is not something I want to do with my life at all. But now I have chosen it and I have to deal with it. At least my grades are quite good... Until they aren't anymore.

4 years in I get the message that my grades are catastrophic and there is no chance to advance to the next school year. I AM FAILING! By then I feel like I am the biggest failure on the planet and every day is just so grey and black...... I want it to stop, simply to end!!!

I HATE MY LIFE, MY CHOICES, MY CIRCUMSTANCES, but mostly MYSELF!

I go up to my dad and tell him I want to quit school. For some reason I have not expected this conversation to go this way, but read for yourself...

- "Are you insane, son?"

- "It is something I want to do!"

- "Don't you understand that this is your future you are playing with??"

- "Because it is my future, I should have the choice where it leads me!!"

- "IF YOU WANT TO DECIDE YOUR FUTURE YOU NEED TO HAVE AT LEAST YOUR OWN ROOF!!"

- "...(thinking) I already hate the fact you put me on this damn planet, dad..."

- "I'll give you 2 months to find yourself a place to stay before I throw you out, if you do decide to quit school"

Show must go on

In my head I am already planning where I should go and how to get there. Realistically I look at my situation:

I have no job, no education and not even a license. How the fuck can I survive if my dad throws me out of our apartment? I must finish school first and become an engineer!

Even though I hate every second of my life, I bite through and finish school a year and a half later. By that time, I am already 20 and by 21 I find a job and now I can plan on becoming an engineer. For the first time in like forever I feel really happy!!! I feel like I am free and I start loving and living life to the fullest.

2 years go by and I absolutely love my life.... I am still not an engineer but I am on my way to become one. The only thing nagging at me is.... I know I don't want to work in that field.......

Every single engineer I work with is pessimistic, depressed and only counts his days until he/she can retire. The problem is not the company I work for because I usually work directly for clients so I was working for over 8 different companies in 8 different branches. I've had 40+ coworkers that have been doing exactly the same as me and everywhere the engineers show the same symptoms (I call it "Engineeris necrosis"). It's not a life I want or wish even on my biggest enemies, so why should I want that for me?

But I know I am different and once I get my engineers title I know I will be different

(Oh, how arrogant and naive).

Engineer at last

Finally after 3 years of going to classes in engineering, programming, rhetoric, project management,..... working full time, while still trying to maintain a private life, by 2019, at the age of only 24 years, I become an electrical engineer and hold the diploma with pride in both my hands. AWESOME!!!

Now what do I do?

I move away from my parents home half a year later, I keep training like a beast and torturing my body to the fullest with restricting food and water, I switch to cold showers and start waking up at 05:00 every single morning to run 1,5 miles up and down a hill. Just to toughen myself further.

Usually I even have some blood in my spit due to the cold weather attacking my lung, but that shit doesn't bother me at all.

And even though I know I don't want to work in this field anymore I keep working as an engineer because it is a good job, with awesome pay, for mostly physically easy work and comfortable things to do, that is.......

until 2020 hit me like a brick in the face....

damn you 2020

In that year the world stands still. Up until that point I have been earning good money as an engineer, travel a lot, been going to SCUBA school to become a SCUBA-Diver, skydiving, work part time as a model and play for a Rockband.

When the market crash hit us in 2020, I am exited at first, because I know that now the investing opportunities are insane and I start investing in all sorts of things like my first project the Quarantine Warriors and in stocks. But I mainly lose money because I don't have any experience with investing and business.

Also already before Corona I have put most of my available funds into Crowdfunding and Crowdlending sites, where I lost more than 3000€ just because I've been naively believing promises of websites. Furthermore I have to sell my beloved bike (Kawasaki ER-6f) to not get into debt, because I overextend myself.

Ok, that all is not a problem my stocks are at least rising. But I didn't buy any Cryptos and I missed the window of profit. So now not only have I lost good money, but also I am missing out on the biggest opportunity in my fucking life. On top of that my client is getting angry with me, because I overpromised and underdelivered.

So basically what I end up with is: A missed opportunity, consumer debt, I hate my job because I know I don't want to work in this field and a burnout, because I don't know how to get along with all of this.

My life ends now

"I simply want to die" is my mantra most of the days.....

I have no friends that come over for the weekends, because I have spent too much time working and busting my ass off instead of persuing human connections and interactions. My parents can't stand seeing me, because I am crying and sobbing due to feeling like I wasted my life and all my opportunities already. So in order to ease their pain I stop going to their place and isolate myself even more. A black spiral consumes my soul.

This is the most miserable I have ever felt. On top of that I couldn't let my boss know that I am thinking about taking my own life, because then, I am sure, he will find somebody to replace me (no he is not an asshole, my brain has just told me that this is what he is going to do) and then I have to find a job in the worst pandemic the world has seen in order to pay off my debt.

Thank god I know where this all is going to end so I decide to go into therapy.

But first I shoot a video of my depressed state in order to remind myself of what difficulties I have had to endure up until that point and what I and my mind has survived whenever I feel like a little sissy.

In one of the therapy sessions I share my life long dream to join the Croatian armed forces. The moment I shared this information tears come down like a stream and even the therapist tells me "I see you already decided to persue this, know it will not be easy but this is not a far fetched or unattainable dream". My life in austria ends here and now in January of 2021!!!

Within 3 months I put in my resignation, move out of my flat, brake my foot and now I have to learn running again after that injury....(godda**)

Plus a 10k obstacle course race and the military boot camp is only 4 months away from the moment I brake my foot

Fight

It was fucking painful....

breaking my foot only a week after I put in my resignation and moving back to my parents' home when just a year prior I have moved away was a huge financial hit and a kick to my ego's pussy. This is fucking humiliating. Have you ever felt like you are not welcome in your parents' home? Now that is what humiliation really feels like. But I still have some fight in me and only 2 months after I moved out I am standing with pride in croatia...

I cannot give you too many details about my time in there but I can tell you this:

I end up becoming one of the top soldiers during basic training and even break a national record in the croatian military.

I AM FINALLY A MOTHERFUCKING BADASS

I have earned the trust and respect of my Drill Sergeants and have the privilege to sit, stand, salute, give comands to and shoot next to some of the best young men and women croatia has to offer and that is something I am extremely proud of.

But sooner or later everybody wakes up from a dream

Shattered dreams

No matter how much I loved the bootcamp and how much I enjoy the soldier life, there is absolutely nothing you can do against paperwork.....

Bootcamp is like a basis for many people to join the police and security sector in croatia. It is very easy to get into bootcamp when it comes to the paperwork.

But once you want to join the special forces (like in my case), your paperwork has to be pico bello. That's difficult if your papers are in german.

Imagine an U.S. citizen going with papers in portuguese into the Navy Seals.....Not going to happen!!!

Yes I did translate the papers (which was quite costly), but that is not enough in croatia.... You must nostrificate and verify them too.

There were days where I have literally been calling 9 times in a row, have sent 3 E-Mails (the first being deleted without even being read) to the institute that should provide this kind of service, only to get one cold answer after MONTHS of trying

-----> "Oh, we don't do that"

I am already nearing 30, which means I have no time to start a real military career after 2022 anymore. Most people are waiting up to a decade to get promoted to "Skupnik" and maybe get a place in the SF....

I don't have years, but only mere months (remember if I don't become a soldier by 30 I have absolutely no chance to join the forces).

My dream shatters in front of my eyes. I am devastated. This is the world's end for me. Everything I strived for, everything I ever wanted to be now is officially dead...

Light at the end of the tunnel

But even so, I still am not unhappy with the choices I have made. I put up a good fight, I would even say the best one in my life I have ever had. If I've had the chance to turn back the hands of time, I would not hesitate even 1 f-ing second to do everything over again. Yes, I do mean even breaking my foot again and all the steps in between, just so I can shout "DOMOVINI VJERAN!!!" at the end of my oath.

Thank you for reading to the end