Uncharted

The lighthouse at Sanibel Island, Florida

When I first started this blog in September of 2018, it was going to be a basic blog on game, approaches, and my progress with conquering one of the biggest challenges of my life, that of being able to be good with women.

It was just a blog.

I was coming off another unsuccessful relationship with a liberal woman, getting into another doomed-to-fail relationship with another liberal woman, and was getting myself red-pilled after enduring two years of post-divorce discovery of who the fuck I was.

I had, two years earlier, divorced my wife of 10 years after enduring a marriage rife with problems. I didn’t know my ass from a hole in the ground, so I grabbed on to whatever I could during that time, including many women who were toxic. I was working hard at my company, drinking with my friends, getting and staying fat, and had zero direction while I floated from relationship to relationship, date to date, day to day, just waiting for something to happen.

This was my life, and I didn’t see a way out except to play by the rules.

But, as we know, rules were meant to be broken. Part of the foundation of myself built on my divorce was the fact that my decision to divorce was made by ME, by only me, and my choice to not be miserable anymore. But it was a journey, as I was starting, that I didn’t have a solid destination. And that’s some scary shit for a man going on 40 who’s basically restarting his life. Add in running my own business, raising two children, and trying to become a patriarch of my family all while not knowing who the hell I was, and you’ve got a recipe for disaster. It’s no wonder many men who divorce have disastrous consequences follow them as they don’t know the hows, whats, or whys on what the hell they need to do to rebuild their lives, so they just grab on to whatever floats by, and it’s usually a water moccasin ready to bite them in the ass.

So as I was dating, I blogged as the Red Pill Dad, dishing my experiences with game, my approaches, my style, and my numbers. They weren’t great, but I figured anything I could do to keep my spirits high as I moved from girl to girl, trying to get better talking to them, would be quality content. So I blogged about it. I blogged about my red pill journey, my failures in relationships, my relationship with my ex-wife, and kept reading, studying, and writing as best I could to keep my mind off of this life I was trying to rebuild.

But then, in Early 2019, I was convinced that the rebuild WAS my life.

The Journey Began

It became more than game. It became a man who was on a journey to find himself, his purpose, his convictions. He spent his life being pulled in different directions by special interests and women who benefited from his work. As I placed myself back firmly in control of my life, I was seeing that the red pill was more than just a piece for getting laid. It was an integral part of taking my life back. Meeting women took a back seat to my voyage to find myself and take my life back, so it was getting more and more about the moral, financial, and personal dilemmas that men face after divorce that was taking up my writing time.

I was working out, on pace to lose 80+ pounds and regain my health. I was raising two children as a single dad. I was running my own business. I was struggling to take my life back from those who deemed it theirs. And it was pissing all of them off. For years I had thought I was wrong to alienate my friends and family from my inner circle because they would always shame me for daring to make my own decisions. So I cut those fuckers loose.

I was evolving.

Even friends online were telling me that my “Red Pill Dad” moniker was not really embracing my writing evolution. So, after a talk with a friend, I changed to “A Father’s Journey”. It was about telling men my story so they could see what I was doing. It was about showing men that life crises can be overcome with a strong back and the willingness to fight every day for who you are.

So I shifted my focus. And it was an amazing journey. I started writing about the aspects of my life that were affected when I started to take control of my life again. Parenthood as a single father, dating, and sex as a single father, life as a business owner, and other subjects began to dominate my feed. I was losing weight, taking back control of my life, all while tweeting and writing about it. My world was changing, and I had to chronicle it. My goal was to show men that regardless of obstacles in their way, their journey continued with them at the helm of it. It was a no-excuse time to take control of their lives. So I wrote and blogged about what they could do, what experiences I had, all while showing them that the fear they felt was certainly palpable, but also, faced and overcome.

As I would later find out in my re-brand, I was becoming a beacon to men out there struggling to take back their lives from the tide of an unfair family law system, a feminist society hell-bent on destroying masculinity, and the proof that there is an amazing life after divorce. Second chances are not given often, and men who fail to take these chances to improve their lot in life physically, mentally, and spiritually are doomed to be nothing more than a casket with onlookers lamenting the “could haves” he missed out on.

Not me. Not in this lifetime, and not on my watch.

So I opened my DM’s and I opened my life.

The off limits portions of the Red Pill Dad were now open for business.

My life was theirs to see. I knew it needed to happen. I knew they needed to see what I was going through, what I was learning, how I was growing and failing, for them to see what they could do to improve their lives.

They needed to not only learn to be alone, but THRIVE at it.

They needed to accept their circumstances, but also create better ones.

They needed to understand the fight for their lives doesn’t stop when the sun goes down and they go to sleep.

They needed to always be making moves to free themselves from a world that only wants them for their work.

For all of their lives up until that point, it wasn’t about them. It was time to make it about them.

My taking back control of my life is what my journey was up until that point. It was about writing to let men know that they actually have a choice on what they can do in their lives. They can learn and improve from their mistakes, but they have to make them first.

And maybe, just maybe, the young men reading my blog can avoid what I did. Maybe they can take the steps needed to take back control. My writings, videos, and shows would be a guide. That was my goal, and it still is to this day.

But the journey has changed. And I’m in very new territory. And I’m embracing the new challenges ahead.

Uncharted Father

As many of you know, I’m writing a book that will detail my life before my marriage ended into the divorce proceedings and eventually to the other side.

As I’ve been writing the book, I’ve been trying with increasing difficulty to come up with a name for my untitled book.

Then in January of 2020, I hit on something.

Every year, I go on a vacation by myself to Southwest Florida, specifically Fort Myers, and one of my favorite places on earth is Sanibel Island, home of a famous lighthouse. I go to that beach every year, and my family for over three decades has been living in the area as a second home. So on a particular day at the beach, I walked by the lighthouse and had an epiphany.

My purpose has been to help men who were in my situation, or any situation for that matter, to be better and overcome the slings and arrows of life’s folly. My purpose has been to be a guide to those men who would look out and see darkness, only to be greeted by a faint light of my help. They could choose to follow it or not, but the light is always there telling them of the impending rocks on the shore.

But it also represents the unknown.

What life there is still left to live is going to be unpredictable, and you as a man must plan accordingly. Being constantly prepared for all that life has to offer, both good, bad, and ugly, is a man’s first job. He has to be a beacon, a watch for anything that comes his way to do him harm or pleasure, and he must adjust to embrace this eventuality.

There will be things that happen that you can’t prepare for but must, there will be places you go that you’ll have no clue how to navigate, and there will be times you have to remember in order to move forward in the present and future. In any case, as a man, you must be prepared.

So, on that January day, I decided that my journey had indeed changed and I was navigating uncharted waters.

In every aspect of my life, I was an “Uncharted Father”.

Everything I had done I had done with very little knowledge, only the action to make things a reality in my life, the time to try to help as many men as I could, and the willingness to make as many mistakes as I could in that pursuit.

Men needed to see my struggles in this new life, and they had, but now, they needed to see my foray into new avenues, relationships, and opportunities. My actions and thoughts during this time as well as my past would be a beacon for men looking to make their lives better.

I’m not going to let these men down.

I’ve seen too many men take their own lives, get divorce raped, fall back into damning habits, and destroy their lives because they didn’t know where to turn, didn’t have a tribe that had their back, nor did they have a place they could look for support and accountability.

So I ran with it. And my symbol (I’m a big believer in symbolism) is the very lighthouse I’ve spent much of my life admiring. It’s a symbol of my goals as a man to continue to shine brightly to my kids, my girlfriend, my family, my friends, my business, and all the other things in life that need my light to survive and thrive. I want to be an inspiration to men everywhere of what they can do to navigate crises in their lives and how to come out on the other side better, stronger, and more determined.

My journey has changed. It’s a whole new ballgame. And it’s time for myself and other men like me to “Blaze Our Own Trail.”

I am The Uncharted Father.

Guilt and Shame

“You can twist perception. Reality won’t budge.”

  • Rush – “Show, Don’t Tell”

Show me a man doing what he’s told, and I’ll show you a woman who used either sex, or guilt and shame to accomplish it.

Men, especially men here in 2020, millions of them, are in relationships or marriages where the woman calls the shots.

And the way the women call the shots? It’s the way they always do, utilizing emotional manipulation and withholding sex to achieve their goals.

Men are still, after all is said and done, responsible for their actions, however, they need to be aware that women (a majority) are doing this not because they are some sick, twisted soul, but because they can navigate emotion with great skill and do all of this unknowingly.

Women, regardless of where they are in your life, do this almost daily. We call them “shit tests” here in the manosphere, but we also must realize that this isn’t something that women can control.

While we want to rail against women who purposefully do this (they are called psychopaths or borderline personality disorders), a majority of women do this simply to make sure their man is up to the task.

This also goes for mothers and their sons, sisters to their brothers, aunts, nieces, etc.

Women test men daily, hundreds of times daily at times, to make sure he is who he says he is, believes what he believes, and holds his boundaries and beliefs unflinchingly.

But what we are seeing is what I was under for 10 years of my marriage.

Women can use guilt and shame to attempt to influence a man’s actions.

He must not let that happen.

The Fog

As I stated, I was in this trance for most of my life.

It wasn’t that these women who were in my life were manipulative.

They weren’t. I’m sure they wanted what was best for me.

But what was best for me in THEIR mind was different from what was best for me in mine.

My mother and sister, as well as my wife, tended to push me in directions that I didn’t know I didn’t want to go because I didn’t know any better.

As a man, I had no direction, so these women were trying to

My mother has been through a lot in her life.

She is a champion and is a fantastic mother.

She’s endured child abuse as a kid and survived cancer.

She helped my father raise three kids that weren’t hers as well as 2 that were.

She was a successful financial accountant for a giant corporation for 30 years.

And she is my rock when I needed support.

And she continues to be there for me.

But it wasn’t always on my terms. For a time, it was on hers.

She over-compensated with my child rearing, because of how bad her childhood was, she swore that her kids would have a better life. And we sure did, my parents were and are still very loving and supportive. But with the over-compensation, I was over-protected and relied on my mother for a ton of decisions that I needed to make myself. And that over-reliance on the women in my life spilled over into my sisters and my wife (now ex-wife). I didn’t want to take responsibility for my life, so I decided to let the women of my life drive while I fucked around.

Important decisions about my life were given to the women of my life. And as soon as I let go of the wheel, I was going to places I thought I wanted to go, and looking back now after taking back control of my life 4 years ago, I should’ve taken control sooner.

But many men never wake up, letting their wives / mothers / daughters / sisters take the wheel and drive their lives. And it’s not as if they aren’t good drivers, but men nowadays are more concerned with the “clock in, clock out” world than they are with actually making their lives all that they can, with women as their willing accomplices. But here’s where the break happens…..

News flash: WOMEN DON’T WANT TO BE IN CHARGE OF YOUR LIFE.

I highly doubt my mother, or my sisters, or my now ex-wife wanted to tell me what to do with my life. I was so eager to avoid conflict, take the easy way, not fight for what I believe in, that their advice became a crutch for me to excuse making tough decisions in lew of the path of least resistance.

In short, I didn’t want to live the tougher parts of life. So I conceded that control to women who I felt had my best interests at heart. And in their own way, they did, except their goals and dreams for me never lined up with what I REALLY wanted, hence when the rubble of my marriage and my life was still smoldering, the conflict with the other women of my life came full circle. My life goals were now, after 10 years of marriage and 30 years of female control, diametrically opposed to that of the women in my life.

When you give someone overreaching control of your life, don’t expect to have an easy time getting it back.

It’s not that they want control, it’s the absence of control that you exert that forces women to take the wheel. Like an abandoned ship with no crew, she has to take control or she’ll be dragged down with the wreck.

I don’t blame my mother for any of this. She had a childhood where she was basically abandoned by her father and her mother neglected her. So she had to steer the ship. She had to control her world, and it took her childhood away from her. She didn’t get to be a kid, she’s been an adult her whole life and it didn’t give her a chance to rest and recharge. She didn’t deserve it, which is why when I took back control of my life, my goal was to tell her to put down the hard stuff and let me take it. And the process of that will take time. She needs to be able to relax, and me taking control of my life, though disappointing at first to her, gave her some relief that she didn’t have to take the wheel anymore.

And it gave me relief because I now have control.

The Only Way to Win is Not To Play

So you’re being guilt and shamed by a woman in your life? The best way to overcome and pass this “shit test” is the only way. Don’t play.

Any attempt to guilt and shame you is an attempt to change your mind using manipulation of a certain set of circumstances.

“If you don’t do this for me, I’ll XXXX.”

If someone is giving ultimatums to you, you walk. Ultimatums are a cry for help because these people have lost control of you. You have free will, which is usually a bad thing for a person who’s trying to control your actions with their guilt and shame.

As I say with many confrontations, you don’t avoid them, you turn them down.

Not getting guilt and shamed by someone so desperately trying to is the answer. Walking away from a losing game is not avoiding confrontation as much as it is not wasting your breath on such a confrontation.

You have better things to do, and trying to confront someone who has no interest in changing their behavior wastes your time.

You do you. Let them worry about themselves.

When you finally take control of your life, there will be MANY people who won’t like the direction. My response has always been “if you love me, you’ll support my decisions.”

And most importantly, you can’t be afraid to cut people out of your life, at least temporarily, but worst case, for a long time. Charting your own course, by your own rules, is the healthy option. Unless you are doing unhealthy things like drugs, crime, etc, you have every right to do what you want with your life. But many people see you doing that and it takes away their power over you, and the benefits of that power doing good things for them.

Don’t be afraid to walk and never look back.

Sometimes burning bridges is a good thing.

So back to me. My family life is improving. The women in my life may disagree with my path, opinions, or convictions, but they understand that as a man, I have every right to chart my path.

But with me wrestling back control, I have seen the women on my life, mother, sisters, and ex-wife, understand and accept my chosen path, and now, even support me no matter what.

That’s why I love this new me so much. I have put my flag in the sand and now people can either rally or leave. And the women in my life haven’t left, they’ve only become better allies in my conquest of my world and myself.

And for that, I can’t thank them enough.

I love you, Mom, Debbie, and Shanny. And yes, Jill, even if we’re divorced, I still love you. You ladies have helped me to understand what I really need and are there to support me.

I promise, you won’t be disappointed by the finished Tim.

He’s got this.

The Grey

“Life is not a game, it’s a song.”

-Five Finger Death Punch, “Brighter Side of Grey”

The cold desert morning cut through me as I pulled out of the parking lot. I signaled right, even though I knew not a damn soul was out at this hour.

Just my own nervous habits, I guess. Making sure everyone knew where I was going, even though I didn’t want to leave.

My rental car cut through the chill in the air as I merged onto a desolate I-10 on my way back to Phoenix, on the way back to my old life, on my way back to my own reality. As I drove in silence, I realized what I had been dreading for the entirety of this trip was finally happening.

There were three things that I knew I couldn’t avoid and I knew were the honest truth of my current situation.

  1. I had to leave.
  2. I wasn’t coming back.
  3. I was never going to see her again.

We had shared our goodbyes in the early hours and we both knew it wasn’t going to be easy. But we both knew it was coming. We knew this wasn’t going to work, it never works, and with each of our situations, there wasn’t a chance in hell we were going to be different.

It seems exceptions only work for exceptional people with exceptional resources.

So I drove. The traffic was slowing as the sun rose on this picturesque scene in the middle of the Arizona desert.

Regardless of how it worked out, I still had a flight to catch, a life to go back to, and a world that wasn’t going to have her in it, no matter how many stars I wished upon.

Silence, sweet silence, gave me pause to think about what I had just experienced, the fun times, the great sex, the amazing people, the venues, the food, the weather, the world that I had a chance to broach for 6 wonderful days.

But I also knew that I was kidding myself if I was going to bring any of it back with me.

This isn’t Hollywood. I wasn’t riding off into the sunset with the woman I love after saving the day, I was riding off into the sunrise alone, heading back to my life.

With a heavy heart, I boarded the plane. I was never coming back here again.

“She’s only yours for a limited time.”

This is the struggle many men and more recently, myself, has had to come to grips with. There are certain things that float around the ‘sphere that we tend to make fun of as cliche, but when they boil down to it, they are correct.

This rings very true for many men. My last few relationships haven’t been relationships as much as they’ve been a quick window into what could be if circumstances weren’t working against me.

But that nasty word, “reality”, intrudes all too often to men who think romantically and not pragmatically. This is a red pill truth that is all too often beaten up because it is used in a way that tells men that they shouldn’t even try to have her in their lives.

Because indeed, it’s better to have her for the time you have her than to never have her at all.

This is all too often an excuse for men to avoid women, go MGTOW, and admit that Hypergamy, that horrible boogeyman to men, is an unstoppable force that men cannot overcome. She’s always going to be looking for a better dude than you, right? She’s always looking for another option, right?

The black and white that red pill purists are trying to have doesn’t work when you throw in the grey. It works in theoretical work, but when in the field, it tends to be determined differently in different situations. There are men on this side of the world that have been in long term relationships and marriages for a while now. But what makes them different is the fact that they’ve entered into it on their terms, under their own frame, and with the guidelines of a “REAL” reality that she can be there with them for the entirety of their lives.

The problem is that men need to be able to ascertain that regardless if she’s only going to be in your life for a short time is that your life is better when she was in it than when she wasn’t. Women in general fulfill men’s lives if men understand exactly why women do what they do.

The reason I traveled to Arizona was to have a vacation by myself, she was the very good icing on the cake, but I let myself get sucked into the mantra that “anything is possible” even when it most certainly wasn’t. Her life was in Arizona, mine was in Indiana. There wasn’t anything that was going to change that. She knew it and so did I.

But the “grey” I can take from the black is that at least I got to spend that time with her. I’ll probably never see her again, and that’s okay. Because I made the most of the time I had with her. And that’s where the pragmatic needs to show itself to men.

Men will try to move hell and Earth to make something happen romantically that shouldn’t. They’ll travel hundreds, even thousands of miles, rearrange their lives, and forgo things they shouldn’t because of the “special” times they have with a girl they connect with, never questioning if they should just chalk it up to a great weekend, week, month or year of having fun with a woman whom he connects with.

And while having to leave is certainly depressing, it helps to be grounded in a reality (especially mine), where the chances of anything happening past a great experience are nil. I have two kids, I have a business, I have a life of my own in my own state. I’m not going anywhere, nor would I want to. Even if I didn’t have my reality and was single, I wouldn’t change my entire life to pursue a woman, because there are many more important things going on that I’m building.

But it still doesn’t mean you, as a man, should avoid meeting women and experiencing all that life has to offer.

You can’t let the prospect of you potentially falling for a girl dissuade you from wooing her. You have to be able to disconnect, but you also have to remember….

The roller coaster of life is worth experiencing.

Women love and leave you and you MUST feel those feelings. It makes you a better, more lived, well rounded person. A tree that’s been through hell and back has the rings to prove it. It’s lived a life worth living. Are you going to look back with regret that you didn’t take that trip, meet that woman, have awesome times? No one wants to be regretting on their death bed.

It’s why I had to feel the gut punch as I left Arizona that day. If I hadn’t done everything I did, even knowing I wouldn’t see her again, what kind of life was I living?

The pain was worth every part of the pleasure.

Who wants to live a life that avoids living?

“Long Distance Relationships Don’t Work.”

Depends.

This is another manosphere mantra that for the MOST part is correct.

I’ve met a few couples who have managed to make it work, but knowing that one or the other was going to move (in most cases, her to him, him to her very seldom works out for anyone), they made plans. They have to not be too attached to their locations, but they would have to be committed to a life with you, and many women won’t or in my case, can’t, do that. They have families, they have roots, and so do you.

Men make the mistake of trying to make a long distance relationship work, especially with a woman who has many options around her that she doesn’t have to work for. Regardless of how much fiction I wanted to believe, there wasn’t a snowflake’s chance in hell that anything was going to happen that would’ve changed this. She doesn’t have to move, she has a ton of other options closer, and I knew this.

It still sucks, though.

I’m not saying it doesn’t. I’m just saying that when you get attached to a girl, especially one that lives far away from you, you have to be realistic about what is going to happen. You can’t rearrange your life for her, she doesn’t want that and you shouldn’t either. Enjoy the moment for what it was and move on to another moment.

There will be other girls, I promise.

But don’t kid yourself about making an LDR work. It’s a correct assumption that a majority of them don’t work out, either by hook or by crook, you’ll have to make that decision sooner rather than later, so get it out of the way. The longer it festers, the worse your recovery will be.

There are too many options around you right now that are both more advantageous by location, as well as financially beneficial. You can’t be flying back and forth from distant locations hoping to make it work when another dude can be in your lady’s house in 5 minutes. You have to think logistically.

I knew, quite accurately, that as the feelings subsided on that cold morning as I was driving away, that nothing was going to come of this. There wasn’t a magical ending that was going to bring her to me, or me to her. And there wasn’t anything that the mileage between us was going to solve, it was just making the truth that much easier to see.

But you can’t tell a guy in love this. He sees only the Hollywood ending, when he moves to be with the woman he loves, only to see her resent him the minute his plane touches down. She doesn’t WANT you to be with her, because if she did, she would be on a plane to see you. Guys have to realize the moment is just that, a moment, and if she wants anything more, SHE has to make that move.

When the guy makes the flight, the move, the life change, the timer is ticking on the end of the relationship.

I’m not saying never, but I’m saying it enough that men should avoid it.

You can’t force anything if she won’t make the move. Stop trying to force something that isn’t there.

Gotta Feel It

It blows.

The gut feeling that I felt as I drove away. The certain truth that I wasn’t ever going to see her again, the fact that I had to leave to go back to my life, and that she wasn’t going to be a part of it in any way, shape or form.

But I wouldn’t trade it for the world.

Because the feelings I had when I saw her in person, all the great times I spent with her, the feelings we shared, the times we had, can’t be matched.

She’s an amazing person and I hope she can find a guy that will make her happy, but she and I aren’t it. I had a hope, but with all the available evidence and with everything that I already knew, there wasn’t a chance.

Hope can be an effective tool but it can also be a damaging self immolation and skewing of reality.

So we’ve moved on.

But you can’t be afraid to feel. You can’t be afraid to put yourself in situations where you’ll feel a plethora of different emotions. That’s life, that’s the reason you live it.

I’ve had a large amount of different feelings in my life, from joy during the births of my kids and my wedding, to defeat when I was struggling with depression during my divorce, to sorrow when I lost my friend who killed himself over his ex-wife, to hope when I log in and see a man’s DM to me saying I’ve helped him overcome something in his life he wouldn’t have without me.

But I do what I do, I go where I go to meet new people and experience life with others. There are always going to be peaks and valleys, but avoiding them altogether to avoid pain is a life not lived. Pain helps us grow. Pain helps us appreciate the times we didn’t feel pain. Pain helps us prepare for the good or bad times awaiting us in the future.

You can’t avoid it, so accept all the feelings in your life, because this is life.

Stop being afraid of everything hurting you and start preparing yourself for experiences you can tell your grand kids about, experiences you can use to fuel your life, experiences that fill the photo album of your mind and heart.

But most of all, stop avoiding your own reality. It’s good to escape to another world for a while and have some fun, but realize that you have your own life and there are many women out there who are clamoring to be a part of it. Women who are in your town, your church, your local area that are attractive and wanting a dude just like you.

Regardless of how I felt on that morning, driving back from a life that I couldn’t have, I got on the plane, and flew back home.

My life is here. I got off the plane, got home, hugged my kids, dried my eyes, and focused on the fact that there are many women who want to be a part of my life, and they don’t have to uproot their own existence to be there.

So my journey continues….

And to my beautiful Arizona woman, I want you to know that I cherished all the times we spent together, the talks we had, the moments we shared.

You are indeed a very special person, and I can’t thank you enough for making this time one of the most amazing times in my life.

I wish you the very best.

Stop being afraid to live you lives, men. You have a whole world out there to experience. Stop being afraid of pain, hurt, heartache, or disappointment.

It makes the times you succeed, truly fall in love, smile, and laugh much more enjoyable.

Never be afraid of the pain of getting burnt by the fire, because all the other things the fire brings you are more than worth it.

I still referred to this quote as a reason men need to face life with their chest out:

Never be afraid to feel.

There’s always a brighter side of grey.

I’m writing this in case I’m gone tomorrow
I’m writing this in case I’ve moved along
There’s something that I hope you’ll remember
That life is not a game, it’s a song

So take the best parts of me
Locked away without the keys
And know that I’m forever by your side

When the lights go down
Know that I am never far away
When the sun burns out
I’ll be waiting on the brighter side of grey

If you’re reading this, I know you’re feeling sorrow
If you’re hearing this, I know you’re probably scared
Just know that all the things you want are borrowed
And all you get to keep is all you’ve shared

So wipe away the tears for me
Know that we’ve made history
Remember no one ever really dies

When the lights go down
Know that I am never far away
When the sun burns out
I’ll be waiting on the brighter side of grey

When the lights go down
Know that I am never far away
When the sun burns out
I’ll be waiting on the brighter side of grey