Nikki Sixx was born on December 11, 1958 in San Jose, California. Nikki only had his mother and his grandparents there to raise him because his father had left him at a young age. Nikki never really lived a good life. In his early life Nikki broke into neighbors’ homes, shoplifted and he got expelled from school because he was selling drugs. When Nikki was 16 he had already started playing the bass guitar. By the time he was 17 he had already left his home, moved to Los Angeles, starting working in liquor stores and started auditioning for different bands. Even though Nikki lived on his own at the age of 17 he wanted to pursue his dream of becoming a rockstar. He was able to play the bass guitar at a professional level and really put his emotions and feelings into writing his music. In 1981, Sixx founded Mötley Crüe, and ever since he was in the band his life completely went to hell and the life he was living helped him write the book called, The Heroin Diaries.

Having a good time, hanging out with friends and family, and fulfilling personal dreams sounds like a good life. Everyone has a different perspective on what is a good life. Someone might say that living a very dark and hellish life might be the best way to live. Nikki Sixx really lived a life full of demons and was always trapped in hell. Nikki was addicted to acid, cocaine, alcohol, and the hardest drug heroin. These addictions really changed how he lived, his emotions, his song writing and his personality. The good life for Nikki was sitting in his dark room shooting up heroin, talking to his demons, playing in his band, and writing in his diary. Everyday when Nikki did cocaine he always became an crazy animal and he had to resolve to heroin because it would calm him down. Even though Nikki was a rockstar and living the life of any musician, his “good life” wasn’t so good after all. Actions speak louder then words, and his actions  showed the best life for him was through his addictions.

Besides being a great bass guitarist Nikki was one of the best at writing his music. He was always making catchy songs that caught everyone’s attention and made them want to hear more. Its weird because Nikki wrote the best music when he was all drugged up. When Nikki wasn’t high he couldn’t write songs because he was so used to writing his music when he was high. I’m not saying that drugs are good but imagine what his music would have been if he was never addicted to drugs. On drugs Nikki always wrote about his feelings and what was going on when he was hiding in his room. He used these feelings and writings to help him create his magnificent music. Music was his life and Nikki put everything towards is music even when he was fighting his addictions.

This book is a real life story on how someones life as a rockstar isn’t  always  a good life to live. Most of us don’t even realize what really happens when huge bands like Motley Crue are created. Lots of the time we just listen to their music and become huge fans of them when there is actually even more to revel backstage. If anyone has read this book they will realize its more sex and drugs then rock and roll. The band members are always partying really hard, shooting up drugs, and when their at home its complete hell. When Nikki went to rehab and starting becoming sober he said his life was more alive. He was never feeling sick, he was able to go out riding his Harley, and he got to enjoy his life a lot more. Once Nikki was sober his career went higher and higher in fame.

I would recommend reading The Heroin Diaries because its a real life lesson. It shows that when someone is famous they don’t always live a good life. The book also shows how much drugs and alcohol can really destroy someones life. When I read this book it really should me how horrible Nikki Sixx’s life was. He was always sitting in his room shooting up his drugs and when he decided to write his diaries it showed that he wanted this book to changed peoples ideas about drugs. Nikki wrote this book to show others around the world how much pain and suffering he went through while pursuing his dream.

Family and Friends are an internal part of our lives and we need to treat the values, beliefs, and conditions that happen within these members with respect. Family members play a huge role in our lives because they help guide us through our lives. They teach us right from wrong when we are little kids, and when we get older they help us make the decisions we’ll need to use when we are older and out of the house. In the first line of the first poem Blake says his mother died when he was very young. It would be difficult to lose a family member especially when your that young and just starting to grow up. To lose a mother at that age must have really affected how the boy derived his decisions. The boy didn’t have much of a father either. The young boy was pretty much living on his own and to do this at a young age would be difficult. Always feeling alone, nobody to pick you up when you fall, what a harsh way to live. Treating family members with respect and being their to help them in times is a great way to have a good quality of life.

In the first poem, The Chimney Sweeper Song of Innocence, he says “my father sold me while yet my tongue”. I could not imagine being sold by my father right after my mother had died. Talk about a harsh life. Where was the fathers loyalty to his son and why did he not want to play an important role in the child’s life. The last thing that boy needed was for his father to sell him and not show that he cares for him. Even though the boy is stuck sweeping out chimney’s, and he hasn’t had much luck with his family being there to support him he is still very strong minded. The boys mother might have taught him to be strong and this shows when you have a family member  giving support, you are a stronger person. William Blake shows that no matter how hard someones life is they need to be positive and look for support if its from family or friends. With support of family and friends you become a stronger person and the decisions made are more wisely. Romantics need to admire Blake’s writing because it shows how having a positive mind set and believing that you will achieve in life can bring a good quality of life.

In the second poem a black boy is lying in the snow all alone while his parents are at church praying. The poem is describing how a young black boy is all alone weeping. Even though the boy is still happy his family isn’t there to help him while he is weeping. “And because I am happy and dance and sing, They think they have done me no injury”. The boy has been hurt inside but his parents don’t notice because they aren’t there to support him. This shows that if your family isn’t there to be your role model they don’t always know how you feel. They might be optimistic and guess how your feeling but really they have no idea.

The two poems together are both illustrating that each boy doesn’t have the support and values of a family. They are both missing a key concept in life which is having a family. Especially at a young age these boys need to have family and friends playing a key role in their lives. When they fall someone should be there to pick them up, if a wrong decision is made family support needs to be there for them to learn off the mistakes. Family helps guide individuals in society and without it, your alone and don’t have really close people to you. The two poems express the different values of white and black. The color white so fulfilling, hopeful and full of happiness while black is the color of shame, hopelessness, and disparity. Black or white, it shows that both chimney sweepers kept a positive mind.

Both the poems illustrate how important it is to have a family helping and supporting your. Nobody wants to be alone when they are a young boy, we want to be comforted and cared for and have a loving family we can come home to. William Blake is showing romantics how these boys families have mistreated them and disowned them. He’s telling us how having no family around to help make decisions can really affect someones life. Everyone needs to have family, and friends to be their role model and to have the support from these people.

Friends and family both have two different sides to them. They have their public image that they show to everyone and their private image that stays with them and their family. Not one person has the same image as another which makes them different from each other. Our private image is a very protected piece of ones image because it’s different then every one’s  and nobody can take it away from us.

When it comes to figuring out your own problems or to help a friend with theirs I think the best way is to figure it out individually. I find it easier to deal with problems individually because my thoughts are isolated from everyone else and I can reflect on what I need to do. In the book The Heroin Diaries, Nikki Sixx lives a very isolated life because of his addiction. When he is at home all he did was get high and write in his diary talking about his feelings and expressions he was feeling. The people he hung out with did drugs as well making it harder for him to quit. The best way for Nikki to deal with his problems was to reflect back on how his addiction was killing him and that he needed to change.

If my friends parents wanted me to figure out why they were acting so weird there is only a few circumstances I would take in consideration. The only way I would spy on my friend is if he was intending to harm someone or himself. If I heard he was doing hard drugs like heroin, or he was going to kill someone, that’s where I would do anything to stop them from harming them or others. I would expect my friend to come and talk to me, rather then me snooping in his life. I can’t judge how their private life is, or what their doing. The best outcome would be to let them come talk to to me.

If my friends parents requested me to figure out why they are acting strange I would feel like I’m intruding their life. I would feel that if I interfere I could end up doing more harm to them and I could lose my best friend. It should be the parents responsibility to figure out why their child is acting different, not their best friends. It’s the parents responsibility to pick up their child when they fall, cheer them up when their unhappy, and be their guardian.

Telling the truth is the best possible action to take in this situation. If my friends parents told me to do this and I chose to, I would tell my friend straight up what I’m doing. Lying to a friend would be horrible because then your friend wouldn’t be able to trust you and they would feel that you betrayed them as a friend. With honesty towards a friend comes the honor of being a good friend. It would be difficult to keep friends when we can’t tell them the truth.

Everyone feels that they need to be alone at times when they are feeling down or something has happened in their lives. They isolate themselves so they can reflect on how they can move on in their lives. We all need to learn to pick ourselves up when we fall down and believe in our self. The more confident we are in ourselves and each other, the more positive results turn out. Like Nikki Sixx, he thought the best way to get over his addiction was on his own. Nikki became successful because as of today he is clean, and his book is motivating people to stay clean.

Having rights and responsibilities is a key theme of social justice and I feel its one of the most important. To feel that you have your own rights is a great gift humans were giving. To live without rights would be terrible because you wouldn’t have the right to make your own decisions, what belief you chose, and what kind a life you want to live. If you didn’t have rights you wouldn’t have any responsibilities because you wouldn’t have the right to do anything. Now living a life without rights and responsibilities wouldn’t be that great, that’s why God chose to give us this key part of social justice. God wanted everyone to be socially equal, have the same rights with responsibilities, and he wanted us to live the best life we could.

When God created us he created us in the image of him and since he had rights and responsibilities. He wanted us to have them to so we could have the same qualities. Getting the gift of having rights has helped us become the type of people we are. Having rights lets us make the decisions we want and the right to do so. With rights we have every right to chose what type of religion we want, what kind of vehicle, and what type of education we want to take. If I didn’t have any rights I probably wouldn’t of had the right to become catholic, or to buy a truck, or to chose what kind of education I want and I wouldn’t of been able to take the responsibilities for these actions. When you have rights you get responsibilities. When I bought my truck I had my own right to buy it and with it came the responsibilities to look after it, and pay for the insurance and gas. If we wouldn’t of received rights I wouldn’t be the person I am today, a Catholic, owner of a truck, and taking the education I want.

Without responsibilities you don’t get rights and without rights you don’t get responsibilities. God must of been thinking that without these two key elements who would be responsible for looking after each other, taking care of the planet, and who would get the rights to do these. Being responsible for the things you do is something people should owe up to and show that their willing to take risks with responsibilities. Having responsibilities can be good or bad because someone could be responsible for discriminating a faith or someone could be responsible for the founding of a religion. If someone is responsible for discriminating a faith they should be able to owe up to it and apologize because what they chose to do would be against the beliefs of God.

Overall I feel that Rights and Responsibilities is an important theme of social justice because it justifies what type of people we are and what our beliefs are. We all have equal rights in a society and we get to chose what type or religion we believe in, what type or vehicle we want and most importantly the right to take the responsibilities of our actions. Without rights we wouldn’t have the amount of responsibilities we have today and the way we lived our lives would be entirely different.

What the Pharisees had thought was clean and unclean was very strict. They wanted to change society by making judaism strong again. They categorized certain things as clean or unclean, such as food and the way they were prepared. If people didn’t follow what the Pharisees wanted them to they were considered to be unclean. How can you justify if someone is clean or unclean, if they don’t want to follow certain rules. What the Pharisees seen as unclean was morally wrong because they were discriminating the people. Jesus didn’t agree with this idea and I’d have to agree with him. Nobody should be treated differentially then others. Jesus was willing to talk to anyone , even those that were considered unworthy. This shows how much Jesus loves and cares for us.

This might have caused conflict between Jesus and the Pharisees because they both had different perspectives on how it should be handled. The Pharisees were only worried about making Judaism strong again and they were not worried about the people who didn’t want to follow their beliefs. When two groups want to make change and each group feels what they believe is better then the other groups they start arguing and fighting. Each group wants to prove that their beliefs are better for their people. Jesus and the Pharisees are wanting to make the lives of their people better and this would create the conflict. When two groups like Jesus and his followers, and the Pharisees they see different sides to things. The Pharisees think making people unworthy if they don’t follow their distinctions is better while Jesus believes everyone should be equal and have the same rights. What Jesus wants to do is way better then what the Pharisees are wanting. Jesus believes that our world will be a better place if everyone is treated equally and have the same rights as everyone else.

Conflict is always being created between two different groups. Around the world many groups are believing that their believes and rules are going to make their people much happier and some people believe that their wrong. When two groups argue about who’s better and who has the best ideas creates conflict, arguments and sometimes war. When a group goes in a tries to change how people are living they don’t want to follow their rules and change because they are used to the lifestyle they were born into. The Pharisees had no right to decide which people were unworthy and worthy and who should be respected. Now what Jesus thought was more for the people because he believed everyone should be treated equally.

“What does God think about us”. From the reading of Jeremiah it says that God knew who we were before we were born. He knew what our interests, abilities, and weaknesses were. He created everyone differently with different interests, abilities and weaknesses. My interests are vehicles, the looks they have and what type of engine they got. Anything that involves me building, inventing, or anything that is hands on is what interests me. When God created us he wanted us to be different from each other and he wanted us to have our own individual interests. Having different interests then everyone else helps define what type of personality that person has and this is why God made us have different interests. When we have different interests we have different personalities and when we have different personalities we are all different people.

I have the ability to compete in team sports and work mechanically. I few sports that I play best in are soccer, basketball, volleyball. These are probably my strongest sports that I compete in. In soccer and basketball I had the opportunity to go to provincials for both of these sports. It was a great experience and I hope I can experience those events again. If you practice and work at the sports you love  best you will become a better player. The harder you work at it the better you become.

Everyone has their strengths and weaknesses. I have many strengths in my life but I also have some weaknesses.  Even though we have weaknesses God still treats us like every other human. God doesn’t just pick and chose who he likes, he loves us all. The weaknesses I have are I’m not really good at baseball or golf. Everyone has different weaknesses and I need to work on some of mine. If I can work on my weaknesses I can become a better person because I will overcome these weaknesses. 

If we screw up God isn’t going to punish us he’s going to give us advice so we become better people. God loves us for who we are and respects us. I want to grow up being successful, anything other then failure,. God sees us as a gift, what he thinks about all of us is equal, our lives is his gift to us and our gift to him is how we live our life.

As I look back at the person I have become to be and how I have achieved it there have been many mistakes. I remember some of the reasons why I changed the person I was if it was to fit in with the new school or a new group of people. I was thinking it doesn’t matter what qualities I have, what type of clothes I wore or what I had, I always thought what is going to make me a happy person. Over the past years I have greatly changed my individualism and left behind all the negatives.

Everyone has ups and downs in their life time and sometimes change from person to person. The person I am now is making me life a good life. I’m having good times with friends, family and I’m making them rememberable moments. I am always learning to become a better me, like saving for my first vehicle. Saving and buying a first vehicle is a huge step for me cause I have to take the responsibility to pay for the vehicle and all the insurance. Just recently I bought a truck and if it wasn’t for me changing my what I thought about vehicles I would have got a car. I’ve always wanted to get a nice car for a vehicle but once I changed my mind about which vehicle I wanted I became a different person. People are always changing from one person to another and are becoming someone different.

I believe that playing Soccer, Basketball and other school sports I have gained many important life skills. These skills have helped me become the person I am today. These skills consist of teamwork, listening to my coaches, and being a leader. These skills help me with my everyday life. When I have a group assignment in school it helps me make decisions that are best for the group and the decisions that will give us a good grade. I learned that if everyone wasn’t followers and followed in what they believe the world would be a entire different place.

The person I want to become is the person that has achieved their goals in life. I want to be the one who follows through with my dreams and achieve the goals I want in life. I want to finish my schooling at St. Jerome’s school, proceed to post secondary and hopefully become a civil engineer. I want to live the life that is going to make me a happy person. Even if it means I have to work really hard to achieve my goals and dreams I will do it.

I have a long list of desirable traits that I would like to have in my life. I want to be the person that isn’t afraid to stand up for what they believe in. I want to be the one who follows through with their dreams and keeps on trying until they achieve their life goals. But in reality I’m not going to wake up becoming the person of my dreams. It’s going to take lots of work and lots of dedication to become the person of my dreams.

A hero to me is someone you look up to for most of your life. A hero could be someone like a family member, a friend, celebrity or it could be someone you made up. The hero you choose is someone you want to grow up to be like when you’re older. Another definition of a hero to me is a roll model. Anyone you look up to that you follow what they believe and how they act. To me a hero is someone that you choose to believe in. I think it’s more of a personal choice on the person you look up to and nobody can choose a hero for somebody else.

Heroes in my life would have to be my dad and my older brother. I always go for to my dad for advice when I need it or when I need help. He’s always willing to help others out in a positive way and rarely refuses to. The main reason I look up to my dad is because has a helpful father, he’s always there supporting me, with sports, school, my job and he’s always happy. I will always look up to him when I’m in need of help. My dad is a hero to me because he took the time in his life to look after me and raise me to be the person I am today.

My brother is my other role model because he cares about his other brothers and sisters. Being the oldest in the family he is there setting examples for me and I learn from the examples. I learn to do the right things and avoid what’s wrong. He’s also because he has a sweet truck that I would like to have one that sweet one day. It shows that he puts time into his work and dedicates himself to do it. It takes a lot of work and planning to do that kind of work. Not only does that help me getting a sweet vehicle it shows that dedicating myself to do something, and I will get positive results.

“It must be the time for me to leave it behind, 
Cause there’s a new day out there where the sun will always shine”

Life is a long journey and everyone goes through the days they don’t want to look back on. “It must be the time for me to leave it behind” it feels like this song fits with most people. The days that I would like to leave behind are the days where I did something wrong or I was hurt mentally. Forgetting the days that hurt me most would help me move on in life. It would give me relief from looking back and remembering those hurtful days. I always said to myself  there’s always a new day out there and it helped me think that tomorrow would be a better day for me.

Music has been a huge instigator in many peoples lives. It has introduced drugs and violence to some young teens. The music media is always growing and is influencing many peoples lives more and more. Nothing can stop teenagers from listening to the music they want unless there is no access to it.”It must be the time for me to leave it behind, Cause there’s a new day out there where the sun will always shine” has helped me realize that nothing can influence me to think differently and become a person I’m not. These lyrics have helped me look into the past and to start thinking about the positive things in life and not the negatives.

I relate myself to the lyrics from the song “Please Come In” because it says that you can forget those hurtful days, and just focus on the days to come where the sun will always shine. It shows that if you follow your morals and beliefs there will be better days to come. You don’t always have to look back on the bad days because they will just make you fear that it will happen again. Just remember to leave it behind and focus on the days to come because it will help your mind focus on the happy days not the hurtful days.