third year evan lasseter

For the first time in my life, I purchased a Six Flags membership this summer. Platinum. Free entry into all Six Flags parks, including White Water. Free drinks all season long.

It was a Monday, and I had plans for my first trip of the year. I was going to meet my girlfriend (shoutout Hannah) at her house in Atlanta before hitting White Water Tuesday morning. However, before making the hour and a half trip to Atlanta, I had to tend to some summer internship business and get news tires on my car.

As it turned out, I never reached Six Flags that day. I found myself in my car tipped over against a phone poll, the result of an accident. While it wasn't as dramatic as it sounds, the crash did scare me. It scared me enough to feel like I could have died. Yet, being scared in that way didn’t give me a kind of revelation. As I sat staring at my totaled car from the sidewalk, I expected it to be a life changing moment, but that experience never came.

Honestly, before the accident I had been spending a lot of time not being happy I was alive.

Just a few months before that accident, I really had no clue how to deal with the unsettled feeling within my spirit. It felt as if I was trapped in my own feelings, unable to change the world around me and not ready to change myself. And, I’m sure we all know of the type of place I’m speaking from.

I had to ask myself, what could I do to find a way out of that place?

I gathered the courage to get some help and spent March all the way to the start of the school year talking to a counselor. Although there are days I still feel sorry for myself, get caught in the bullshit of my head, and deal with personal baggage, seeing my counselor helped me grow. I developed an arsenal of tools to tackle my problems. I learned that even if life's problems are never ending and reoccuring, I am here today, encouraged and better equipped for it all.

My prayer, hope, and wish for anyone out there is encouragement. Encouragement to know that maybe, just maybe, you should be alive right now. Encouragement to know that it is OKAY to get help.

Eventually, I visited White Water and Six Flags, and I’ve been to both multiple times. It’s encouraging, because looking on what may have been my last summer at home, I see I’ve experienced a lot. I spent a beautiful time with family, built my portfolio, and grew myself. Still, that doesn't mean the dispiriting feeling never crept or is not creeping back up on me. It just means that when it does I know I can get away from it. And, I know that you can too.

Roller Coaster Summer