When I Stop Fighting by Daryl Dittmer
It’s commonplace for people to gravitate to the well-known influencers — celebrities, athletes, political and religious leaders, and other icons in their fields — when looking for voices to follow and messages to embrace.
But there is often a stronger sort of influencer — the everyman just like you and me whose words sound more real to us, more authentic and easier to relate to, given our place in this world.
Daryl Dittmer is such a man, an ordinary guy from the middle-class Midwest, and he offers encouragement and ideas of great relevance to a wide audience in When I Stop Fighting: The Unexpected Joy of Getting My Head Out of My Ass. Dittmer acknowledges that he is not a celebrity, doctor, retired general billionaire, politician or Navy SEAL. “I’m a very regular guy who desires to give back what I’ve been given.”
Lessons Learned the Hard Way
What he has been given is a second chance, at a young age, to straighten out a life whose childhood was littered with alcohol, drugs, lying, cheating and stealing.
Dittmer’s goal is simple: to help people navigate the journey of life and make it much easier, rewarding and less complicated, and to help people understand they have a responsibility to be useful members of society. These are lessons Dittmer learned — but not at first, and they didn’t come easy.
Dittmer honed his values and a Protestant work ethic of diligence, discipline, and frugality from his tough-minded father and strict mother, working on a farm, and integrating into a new small-town school with its cliques and its ways. But his desire to fit in, and not buckle to peer pressure, led him down a road of alcohol and drugs.
Beginnings of a New Life
Wanting to be accepted was creating problems and leading to bad decision-making. The moments that were making Dittmer the proudest were the moments that immature adolescents relish in — and lead to trouble. He was distancing himself from any meaningful relationships and clinging only to the worst influencers.
When he finally enters a treatment center, he wants to abandon his old life but is not sure how to do what’s needed to obtain a “new life.”
“How do I go from very low self-confidence and self-esteem and general unhappiness to something better?”
When I Stop Fighting: The Unexpected Joy of Getting My Head Out of My Ass is Daryl Dittmer’s story about how he got to that better place and the lessons he learned and imparts to readers. It starts with a willingness to change and moves into the idea of “turning off his ass-kicking machine” so that he can take advantage of opportunities. “I was too busy being an idiot.”
Honest and Authentic Storyteller
The author is a great storyteller. Yes, his life underwent a massive transformation — he learned from it and is committed to helping others at similar life inflection points. Yet his ability as a masterful storyteller through his honest and authentic narrative takes this book up a few more notches, making the tale of an ordinary person extraordinary in its own way. Dittmer had much to overcome, and he had to be willing to take the risks — and accept the possible outcomes — in order to clear the hurdles.
Dittmer explains that all too often he was put in a position where he had no other choice but to find out how to “stop fighting, to find out how to quiet the storms inside me.”
“Experience has taught me that life is difficult and will include anxiety, fears and grueling times. This is all part of the process of maturing, growing and improving. How we face those times is how our future is ultimately shaped.”
After a humble and often tumultuous beginning to his life, Daryl Dittmer has worked relentlessly on himself for almost 40 years. Having had ownership in several business ventures and having been a carpenter, sales professional, builder, landlord, real estate investor, and consultant, Daryl has been as retired as he’s wanted to be since the age of 48. Now he is focused on writing and telling his story, in order to give back. With their sons grown and moved on, Daryl lives with his wife, Kristina, in the mountains of beautiful and peaceful North Georgia. They spend their time hiking, hanging out with their labs, and appreciating the mountain views and each other’s company.
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