Do you ever just look back and see how much you gave to someone and then realise how little they gave you in return? I'm not saying you should give to receive, but ultimately, sometimes, you give and give and give, in this open, loving, unconditional way, only to start to wake up to the fact that you're the only one giving anything at all. It's like fighting tooth and nail for something, or someone, only to find that you're the only one in the battle, which surely means that in reality, you're ultimately fighting against yourself.
The annoying thing is, the real issue was never them, nor their behaviour, their lack of appreciation, or care, it was you, for accepting it. For making excuses. For going back. Time and time again.
Lately, I started to feel a little unsteady in my relationship and I projected a lot of that concern onto the other person, but it was only recently that I came to realise what the real crux of the issue was and it turned out, it wasn't them at all, it was in fact me.
I have always stood by the belief, that you attract to you, people who teach you something about yourself and especially when it comes to romantic relationships, it seems that we pull towards us the same types again and again, because there are often hard lessons to be learnt, that simply won't dissipate until they eventually have been learnt. Now personally, I thought I'd pinned down what my lessons were in this particular relationship - self-expression, loving without restrictions, yada yada, - but it turns out that the real issue was one that harked back longer than I could remember and one that was so engrained, I didn't even realise it was there: self worth.
This lack of self worth, that I wasn't even aware of, was not just affecting my relationships with the opposite sex, but also my relationships with friends and ultimately and perhaps more critically, even my work. I'm a creative, so naturally, to some degree, I tend to be critical of myself, but how often do I hold myself back, because I'm afraid that I won't be good enough, that what I create isn't good enough? How many times have I accepted being put last on someone's priority list, because I didn't believe I was important enough to be considered for a position on the top of it? How many times had I failed to speak up about what I wanted, or what I needed, because I felt that the person I had to say it to would simply walk away, not considering me worth the hassle?
Waking up to the realisation that I was persistently holding myself back in many areas of my life, simply because I wasn't willing to be my own champion, was eye-opening, if not a little tear jerking. How long had I been unwittingly doing this and most importantly why on earth had I been doing this!?
I think in life, you can be full of good intentions - being kind, caring, considerate, supportive and giving your love freely to others - but if you can't do that for yourself, because you don't believe you deserve to be treated that way, then there simply aren't enough people in the world, with enough love and belief in you, that will be able to prove you wrong.
Perhaps though, it's finally time to recognise that the past is the past, it's created our present sure, but in order to have the future we really want, we need to acknowledge what's been holding us back, what didn't work and learn to let it all go, so that we may finally find the confidence to stand up and be counted. To say 'this is what we want, this is what we need, this is what we're going to achieve' and be confident in saying it, because we truly believe it's what we deserve and are capable of.
It's soon to be a new year, another chance to make a change and exert some personal authority. *Deletes messages, erases phone numbers, puts the past behind.* Now, I'm not really one for making new year's resolutions, but I do think that this seems like an opportune time to maybe recognise what's not working in my life, where I'm clearly going spectacularly wrong and what lessons are obviously still left to be learnt and choose to make an executive decision to attempt to make right some wrongs. If I'm ever going to achieve great things, I need to first believe that I can!
“Everyone creates realities based on their own personal beliefs. These beliefs are so powerful that they can create [expansive or entrapping] realities over and over.”
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