I am close to some family and friends, I do not speak to others anymore. For various reasons...none of which are important.
The only thing that is important is I am now defending my peace since identifying I am not receiving love in the way in which I need to receive it.
It takes objectivity to exist as a serene human, one not bent on vengeance.
How do you do that, when people continue to hurt you?
First off, who caught the error in that sentence?
It should be: when you allow people to hurt you.
People are going to expose you to negative and painful actions of their own doing.
YOU must decide how it affects you.
Start by taking your emotions out of the equation. Look at the actions and words of another without tangling up your need to feel love or approval.
This is the toughest self-love, and it can feel like you are ignoring your needs. But you want to get better, so GO to the place where you are most afraid.
Absorb this truth and let it help you: the action of another exists ALONE. When you remove your element of hurt, next, assess if it is a caring gesture. If it is loving. Do the words and actions have potential to cause pain? Do they come from good, yet misguided intentions?
IF you don’t understand why the action was taken, or the words seem unnecessarily cruel, then you have your answer.
Now, you get to decide how you are going to feel about it.
The most beautiful, liberating reality about this next step is that by allowing yourself to make a choice as to the emotions you will feel, and how you will be affected, you take back the power.
Are you going to complain you are persecuted? Are you going to drown in your helplessness, or are you going to put the action, the words and the responsibility squarely back on the deliverer?
Where they belong.
One of the best choices is to make no choice. Others find it quite challenging to engage in altercations when you go silent.
Why would you agonize over someone else’s words, allow them to root you into helplessness as you slaver for approval?
YOU don’t need anyone’s approval but your own and you are far more likely to give that to yourself when you conduct yourself in a manner which makes you proud.
At the same time you are rejecting the onus of another’s actions and words, you must also embrace your responsibility for what you have said and done.
The sooner you do that, the sooner you change your future.
The sooner you become empowered.
There is no validation in receiving attention for negativity or for perpetuating destruction.
The next step is to think about who said what to you and what value you assign their title.
One of the gravest mistakes we can make is saying, “...but they are my (insert relationship title.)” Did you know titles don’t matter? When you are not being loved in the way you need to be, you get to choose what you want to do with that information.
Ask yourself if you can tolerate the types of interactions you have with people whom you allow to hurt you. If it is good for you? Are people hypersensitive, incapable of recovering from breaches of trust? Are you being heard?
In healthy relationship cultivation, you must remain objective; you must remain distanced from the hurt you anticipate, and you must see the intention and truth of your treatment from others.
Similarly, if you are experiencing consistent pain despite well-placed aims, you still get to choose.
Because you always get to choose.
It’s okay to walk away and say, I love this person, but they are not good for me. Or this relationship interferes with my happiness.
It’s alright to stay, too AS LONG as you are able to maintain proper emotional distance. Can you remove your choice to feel hurt? If you are able to function, thrive and love without a lick of self-doubt, proceed.
It helps me to remember I am loved, but maybe I am not receiving love in the way I need. That’s okay. You may still be loved, but getting it sideways. You may still be loved, and the intention is well-meaning, but the communication is FUBAR’d.
You can have the best of intentions, speak to the best of your ability and still get it wrong in someone else’s eyes...even someone who says they love you.
Do not waste one more minute of your time taking responsibility for another’s words or actions. Move on and you will never regret the inner reassurance it brings.
Finally, love the people who love you wrong anyway, even through distance. Send them virtual blessings because you are a good person, who deserves a blissful life.
I am not a therapist, but I know the pain both of abandonment and choosing to leave. This is what has worked for me after enduring a lifetime of pain and over twenty years of therapy. #lovealways.