Reflections On 100 Heinzesight Columns
IT’S HARD TO BELIEVE THAT this is the 100th HeinzeSight column! I’m in a very reflective place where emotions of pride, excitement, disbelief, and humility bubble inside me. Late in 2010, I was contacted by Matt Kailey at Out Front about using my counseling experience paired with my love of leather and unique sense of humor to create a relationship column that focused on addressing questions and issues that affect the gay male community.
This request freaked me out. I consider myself a solid speaker, but had never written professionally or taken my mental pile of random thoughts and impressions, organized them, and presented them in a meaningful way. They usually just spew from my mouth, sometimes making friends and people around me laugh or raise a brow. I endeavored to create something that would amuse, empower, provoke, challenge, and provide
opportunities for individuals to laugh and ponder future possibilities. These columns were intended to make people think, realize they’re not alone in their struggles, and enable them to take better control of their emotions, choices, and happiness. Simply put, I wanted to help give others the kick in the
butt to create a fantastic life.
I just want people to take moments to stop and think about their lives. So many times, we just run from one situation to the next, trying to get through each day with little thought into how to make deeper, long-lasting
improvements in our lives. We tackle challenges only to get through them and move on to the next one. We run toward a future that is unclear and undefined because we haven’t taken the time to figure out what really makes us feel excited to wake up each day ready to attack the world or identify those barriers that are keeping us from finding fulfillment.
This process has been quite a wild ride that has impacted me in ways I could have never foreseen. There’s a fair amount of notoriety that makes the ego-driven part of my personality jump up and down with excitement, but there’s a more philanthropic benefit. I want to help create opportunities for people to make life changes. These improvements can motivate us to be happier in our own lives and be a positive force for other people. When enough cheerful, healthy, empowered people exist within a population, the larger society can benefit and thrive. We have the ability to strengthen our culture from the inside out.
I pull from a wide range of influences. Although my full-time job is working as a therapist and program director at Mile High Behavioral Healthcare and The Denver ELEMENT, most of my inspiration comes from interactions in my personal life. Through my intellectual, emotional, and intimate exchanges, my brain goes into overdrive and causes a metaphorical light bulb to pop above my head frequently. It can happen at the gym, during social events, in the middle of a counseling session, or at 4:30am when the light from my phone wakes my partner as I’m taking notes on a new idea.
Truth be told, so many of my columns also reflect my own past or current insecurities, frustrations, realizations, and hopes for the future. Most people find it hard to believe that my own journey to develop confidence to engage with people socially only started about ten years ago. I was the quintessential shy, awkward, gay, intelligent, introverted, timid, and self-loathing goth kid growing up feeling that I wasn’t a viable part of the gay community. I didn’t look like anyone else or relate to what I perceived was going on in the larger queer culture. It took me many years and a huge dedication of energy and effort to work on those parts of myself that kept me trapped and miserable.
Through personal and professional experiences, I’ve had some amazing opportunities to see individuals take control of their lives and develop skills to deal more effectively with the world and form stronger relationships inside of it. I’m honored to lend my experience as a counselor paired with a sarcastic, sometimes twisted sense of humor and conglomeration of life experiences to create columns that speak to issues faced by many of us.
I honestly love getting calls or emails from people asking for my insight or perspective on a variety of topics and situations. Even if these aren’t directly addressed specifically in a column, I do my best to respond to them or have their idea rear its head somewhere later. Almost every week, I get to talk to people who pull me aside to discuss how a topic of one of the columns has affected them or ask if I have time to offer a perspective on something going on with them currently. Sometimes they don’t feel so alone in their experiences and are put at ease knowing many others experience similar challenges. It encourages and makes me feel extremely happy to know that this column has been both entertaining and helpful to many people.
My ability to provide outreach has been supported by some wonderful individuals within the Out Front family throughout the years. They have supported me through challenging times, done their best to aid me in becoming a better writer, and pushed me to develop more confidence in expressing my perceptions. I have to thank Jay Klein, Jerry Cunningham, JC McDonald, Matt Kailey, Nic Garcia, Holly Hatch, Matt Pizzuti, and now Berlin Sylvestre for continuing to inspire, challenge, and support me in my efforts to have a positive impact in our community and culture. I’m truly grateful for this opportunity and looking forward to the next 100 columns!
What's Your Reaction?
