Do you feel empty? Alone? Are you, for some reason
beyond your grasp, unable to truly connect with people? Most of us can relate to these issues. We understand how easy it is to become
negative, depressed, and hateful. We may also relate to what it feels like to finally give up on everything,
including yourself. It’s a typical reaction to say you have been hurt before, and, it seems much easier to stop trying. It's easier to think everyone else should be putting in all the effort. After all,
everyone else should change to try
and work out a relationship with you, you’re
the one that is absolutely perfect.
At least with this mindset
you are not taking any risks.
You
do however continue to complain about all your previous friends that
were horrible, or all the ex-boyfriends that were just jerks. In fact, you may
extend this thinking to the whole human-race, blame them, or make excuses. The
real issue here is that you are unaware of just how hard it is for any
human-being to actually get close to, and know the real you.
Already
angry with the words I have written? Are you already coming up with a million
reasons why this isn’t what is actually happening in your situation? Telling
yourself you’ve just had a stream of bad luck in the past with everyone that you
got involved with? Or have you actually progressed to the next stage where you do acknowledge this is the truth but
simply choose to brush it off?
“Yeah, I am defensive; I am hard to get
to know. But I have just been hurt before, and therefore everyone is going to
have to make effort for me, if they can’t understand that I have been hurt in
the past and will need continuous validation,
and, the go-ahead to act horrible, snarky, and defensive when I perceive a threat to
my ego, then I don't think their worth being friends with”
Are you worth being friends with if you treat other people like that? Stop
and think about it for a second.
The
truth is if you are unable to acknowledge what I am writing then it’s okay to
keep your walls up till a later date when you are
ready to bring them down. But if you are happy with that sort of standard in
your life then realize your relationships are never really going to fulfill you,
nor will others be willing to open up to you either. If you can’t do anything
else, at least stop complaining to the people in your life about the fact
people are 'shit', or you are just going to push them away as well, and we don’t
need you to take any more ill-perceived blows to your fragile ego.
As
hard as it may be to take responsibility for yourself and your actions, I have to
tell you a bit of shocking news. Everyone
has been through some kind of trauma, because the mind naturally creates
drama no matter who you are. Ever heard of first world problems? When you
complain that your phone is playing up a little bit, or that you don’t have
enough clothes, when in reality, other people may not even posses these items at all?
The
difference between the person who makes excuses, and someone who takes
responsibility for their life, is that they aren’t choosing to act like an entitled
child about their problems by insisting that other people are responsible for, or should fix them, instead those people chose to develop a healthier mindset
somewhere along the way, or had some help with it. It became clear to their
mind, and their ego, that they weren’t a defenseless little child anymore.
Therefore it became okay for them to open up to people. If you have a healthy
set of boundaries for yourself about who you let into your life you will have an easier time creating mutual-trust. With mutual-trust created between
people who are; worthy of your time, or a special place in your heart, no longer
will you feel the need to lash out at tiny little things they do that upset
you, as you will naturally begin to discern between who has good intentions for
you, and who doesn’t with much more ease. And even if a rogue does sometimes
slip through the cracks, that’s okay, because your mind will be smart enough to realize
that; yes - you may be hurting - but - you are still an amazing person. It accepts the
fact you have no control over how someone decides to treat you, or act,
and if you consistently feel that hurt in your chest from someone then you actually
have the power to walk away. Wow! It seems so simple, but for some reason so
many of us are conditioned from a young age to feel powerless.
So,
let’s talk about your ego, the place where all these defense-mechanisms began.
Your
ego is created by your mind. It is made up of all the little things that your
brain associates with being you. Your ego - or your mind’s - first priority is
to protect your sense of self – this can be why we are so blind to how we
appear to others. Your mind simply just will not let you, it seeks to protect
you and when you feel threatened or upset, it decides to put certain boundaries
into place, or walls, that protect you from what is making your heart
feel anger, sadness, or grief (a threat). For a healthy person, these boundaries could be
walking away. But for someone with low self-esteem (someone who is naturally not
in touch with themselves) they may choose to lash out instead and demand to
be validated. These people become increasingly adverse to trusting people. They also seem to start all relationships off with the concept “guilty till you prove your innocence”. The fact that they
come to expect this behavior from others, means that they also start to believe they will never
get any better anyway, so they repress their need for love and choose to
interact on superficial instead.
Most
people grow up with relatively healthy ego’s. However, the problems can start
very early on in childhood. I'm going to give you one example, but, there are many times your mind perceived your emotions as a threat and tried to close off, for every different age and situation. Let’s say as a young child you felt unloved by your
parents, lonely, or unworthy. At that young age with no defenses in place those
emotions would have been simply overwhelming. When we were children we did not
always deal with these emotions in a calm and rational way, nor did we perceive hurts in a rational way either. How could we? We were only
children, it was not our fault that our heart told us that we felt lonely or
unloved, that was simply the heart doing its job in trying to bring to our attention that one of
our most basic needs weren’t being met. This may have made us
cry, shout, scream, and act entitled or infuriated when we didn’t get our way, and by acting this way our parents may have not perceived that it was actually more love and care we were screaming for. As children, we had no way of using a logical adult
mind to express why we had all this bitterness and anger, and in an attempt to quiet us down in times our parents were stressed or simply could
not muster up the energy to deal with us, they gave-in and gave us what we
wanted, such as toys to fuel our insatiable boredom which was actually born from inner turmoil
and emptiness. This taught our ego at a young age – before we were cognitively
able to understand our emotions – that by closing up, yelling, acting
viciously, we were able to attain something that helped us forget about how
empty we felt on the inside. The ego was happy therefore you were happy. And please don't go blaming your parents either, they had their own reasons for why they weren't a completely perfect human-being that understood all facets of the human mind.
As
we get older we do start to learn that maybe crying and yelling aren’t the best
tools to use with some of our friends, but really, we still have ill-equipped methods
to deal with conflicts to begin with, so we create new ones that aren't going to be useful for very long. This is because from such a young age we learn not to
listen to our heart – we learn to listen to our mind instead. This type of
entitled behavior is not coming from a bad place, it’s coming from a defensive
place, and although we may develop new strategies to cope as a teenager and
young adult, if we don’t get to the root of the dilemma it’s all going to end
up coming across as that person we have all known, have all met, or have
even been, the defensive witch. This
person is angry and empty because they are so out of touch with their emotions
and themselves. They continue to justify their negative attitude and anger
towards people due to the fact they have been hurt in the past. What they don’t
realise is, they have now become the exact person their ego is trying to
protect them against, someone who is irrational, lashes out, blames all their
friends and the world for their problems, consistently argues, and looks to
only the physical to make themselves feel better. They have not learned to forgive.
Ever
met someone that was so beautiful – but never satisfied? They may work out
hours at the gym, or starve themselves to look better when things just don’t
work out because they believe this is the only possible way anyone will ever
love them. When everything still goes wrong, and people are still repelled they can
only think “what is wrong with me?”.
Girls may dull the pain of rejection by trying to get thinner, boys may try to
feel big and strong or go out and consistently seek sex from different females,
but eventually this person has to realize that there is something missing in
their lives. What is missing is their connection to their heart. It’s hard to
open up your heart to someone who can’t even open it up to themselves isn’t it?
You try to connect with them but find that they are just consistently unhappy
with you or their situation, or are never satisfied with the current moment
you're in together. They can’t just be. They have to become, always, whether
it’s thinner, more intoxicated or more loved.
If
this is you, I am sure your ego is doing a million and one things to protect
yourself right now, and protect your sense of self. But please realize that all
those thoughts, all these actions, and all the defenses you have put into place
are not actually you. You are actually
just scared of opening up and being hurt, you
have been since you were a child, or that first time your ego decided it would be easier to deal
with your emotions by building defenses, making excuses for yourself, and
blaming others. You should also take comfort in this, because even though it may
be hard or a long road to take, you can become that amazingly beautiful and
radiant person that only creates joy and harmony in relationships with other
people. Don’t you want to be that person, finally? Don’t you want to be
released from your mind and filled with the beauty of your emotions and the
light of your own soul?
Once
you take the first steps to removing that barrier, you take the first steps in
becoming a person of absolutely high value – you are no longer taking value
from other people by being a walking reaction to everything others say and do,
you are becoming a genuine and authentic human being in who is in touch with
themselves.
What
you may believe: I just love to argue
What
others believe: That you would rather have a conversation validating yourself
instead of truly connecting.
So
what if they think that? It’s their perception. You don’t need them as a friend
if they choose to look at you that way instead of getting to know you right?
True.
But only true from your perspective.
If you are currently satisfied with the kind of friends in your life that you
can continue to have negative conversations with then I guess you don’t really
need to be reading this article. Oh but wait, you are reading this.
There
will be good people entering your life all the time, and they will continue to.
Don’t be threatened by them or try to bring them down, be with them, you are
worthy enough to be with them. If they are the type of person that only wants
to take from you, example; using your conversations to validate themselves,
then set boundaries for yourself and choose to hang around those who would
rather contribute to their own life and yours.
I
am not saying that walking around with an air of arrogance and negativity won’t
bring some people you consider friends into your life, however, they will
either be people with extremely low self-esteem that may only drag you down
when you begin to progress in your life, or they are people with just as many
walls up as you, people who make excuses, people who hate their life, and blame
others.
This
type of self-progression is not meant to be used instead of medication if you
really need it. You may be someone who has suppressed themselves and their
emotions in an attempt to appear perfect, strong willed, or in control for so
long that your mind is so confused about who you are that you simply cannot get
out of it without some help. Or your brain chemistry (unluckily) has thrown you into this state. But if you really do need medication, there is NO EXCUSE, to walk around a mess and refuse to take it. Medication may also start to change your view
point and your state of mind into a place where you can be more in touch with
your emotions. It may also make your mind clearer and progress you to a place where you find it easier to process cognitive-intellect and self-awareness. But please keep in mind, so much of that can be achieved through trying to eliminate your anxiety in other way such as meditating, sleeping well, eating healthily, and exercising. Also by cutting the crap in your life, people, lovers, food and wasteful pastimes.
Learning
to open up and take responsibility doesn’t happen overnight. Nor have I become
the new Buddha of this planet. But by taking these steps, and first having
awareness of what you are doing in your life that is becoming toxic to others,
you are ready to take the journey into inner-happiness. Also if you have friends who that might be interested in becoming better people, whom you trust and know have good intentions, perhaps you can both point out to each other when you aren't being your genuine self.
In
my following posts I will begin to start off with ways you can become more
self-aware and conscious in your every day and relationships with people. The
biggest thing I can mention to you now is that confidence is the biggest factor
to hauling yourself out of this protective state. With true and radiant
confidence, that only comes from inside
sources, not outside, you can start to blossom into wonderful person who
has high standards for themselves and for the people you choose to get involved
with. You hold the key, it's really that simple.
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