...do NOT define you unless you let them.
So there you have it. If you want to spend whatever time you have left between now and dead, think about what I am saying here. You will never ever successfully move past your past and carry real hope in your heart for your real life "now" and in the future IF you keep insisting that your "saga" of pain and heartbreak is a never-ending focus of your present life.
Think about it. Are you one of those people who call friends or family members at random times of the day or night talking about "I don't want to be here anymore.." or "I can't take any more of his/her/their crap it's literally killing me!", etc. etc.? Listen, do you even clearly understand what you are doing to these "targeted" people who you go on and on with about your own past and present pain? You are not only robbing them of their own peace---but also imposing your desire for "care" on demand from him/her/them when you feel like it. Just on the face of it, it's rude behavior. Deep dive into it, and it's highly manipulative. Pick one.
You may not realize this, but your friends and loved ones have heard your tales of woe 1,000 times already. Why do you act like it's the first time you are sharing about your tragedies of life (such as your divorce, your cheating spouse, your nasty sister, your abusive parent, etc. etc.) whenever you call or see whomever it is face-to-face? Don't misunderstand, trauma survivors are notorious for forgetting what they said and to whom because past traumatic experiences know no timeline in the brain. When we get triggered in the "now", we can very easily default to experiencing the same emotional reactions we did when the original event took place. Even if that event was 25 or 45 years ago! So of course we aren't going to recall how many times we talked to our best friend from work about "him" or "her" or "them" who hurt and betrayed us so badly. We can't think straight when we are upset, let alone still caught up in our own traumatic experiences. Ultimately, we need to learn to move past those traumatic experiences or we are at high risk of allowing them to define us mind, body, and soul. And that would NOT be a good thing!
Also, ask yourself if you are a "Yes, BUT.." ter. That means that you will agree with someone who is attempting to give you sound advice, BUT---you always come up with an excuse of why you can't do "that" which is being/has been suggested. "I can't see a therapist! Are you kidding me? I went to one two years ago and she was horrible!" Huh?! Okay then! I guess that means when you get a bad meal in a restaurant, you'll never eat out at restaurants again. Or if you had a bad dental experience, you'll never see a dentist again (which people have done, as sad as that is to report!). If you haven't seen the lady on youtube these days with no front tooth in her mouth talking about being estranged from her son...that was her story. She had a bad dental experience, and then that was that. Never went back. Sad! Tragic! Trauma-driven decision making on blast! Yes-butters are under-responsible because they use their own bad/traumatic/tragic experiences as an excuse to avoid doing the right thing(s) now...
I have sidewalk chalk in my office. When someone is most invested in their own status as a "Poor Me!" survivor of this, that, and the other that happened to them...I will typically show them the box and then toss it over to them. "What's this?" I am often asked. "It's your chalk to give to those surrounding you to outline your body when it ends up prostrate on the sidewalk, that's what." Being and functioning as a card-carrying capital "V" victim is not a good place to live or overly identify with. We can all do it, not just you and not just me. When we identify too closely with victim status, we lose more and more of our ability to live in the "now" and can easily end up still very angry, resentful, and bitter by the time it IS our time to leave this world and enter into the next one.
Your disappointments, heartbreaks, setbacks, and tragedies of life are legitimate. Of course they are. But we often forget that we SHARE this common series of experience while we are here (on earth) regardless of who we are or where we came from. Rich people get dragged through the crap of life just as homeless people do. Smart people....and illiterate people. People from Iceland....and people from Australia. It doesn't matter who we are or where we came from or "what" we are defining ourselves as; everybody knows and understands what the experience of PAIN feels like.
So if you need help, get it from the "right" sources and not just those who you feel comfortable with calling up at midnight----or having drinks with after work. Make a decision to stop transmitting your pain around to other people and learn how to be transformed by your pain into a BETTER person. How about that? Yeah....how about that!?
Until next post...