Opposition. Defiant. Resistant.
That’s how I have felt lately, towards everyone. Not because they have done anything to deserve it, they haven’t. And I love them.
Still, I keep observing how even just the mere thought of reaching out to them floods me with anger. I have struggled to accept that, because I didn’t have a reason that explained why I felt so resistant.
I produced the anger. The anger is a result of a truth I haven’t owned and a part of me who is refusing the truth.
I believe I’m expected to always be available. Someone texts me: immediate answer! If someone says they want to see me: rearrange my day to make time! My default setting is that there is no room for what I want, so much so that it isn’t even part of the equation. I have always sacrificed what I want for the sake of what they want.
I didn’t get the experience of being met by a person who didn’t just want themselves to get what they wanted, they wanted ME to get what I wanted too. As a result, cooperating to find something we both want hasn’t been part of my toolbox.
No one helped me build a mindset that said “we don’t want the same thing right now and that’s ok. We will find a solution that feels good to both of us, I love you and of course we are still friends”.
I learned that:
If I don’t sacrifice myself, I lose the connection.
They saw sacrificing myself as a valid option.
I was difficult if I didn’t sacrifice myself.
If I didn’t sacrifice myself, I had myself to blame for losing the connection.
I thought going to therapy meant figuring out my (wrong and outdated) underlying assumptions, and that fixing them would cause me to stop not being ok. I mean, easy, right? I’m not ok because I’m wrong and I can correct where I’m wrong, I don’t have to face that I’m actually not ok.
I wish that was the case.
Instead, my truth is telling me what I want. And… The truth is I want something I have yet to find.
The part that is opposed to my truth believes I will lose relationship if I listen to what I want, which in this instance might be true. Which is hard to sit with.
Those two aspects are the root of my current internal fight. My truth has become so loud it’s impossible to ignore it. I know how painful it is to be alone and that’s the emotional experience that gets activated when I think about my newfound truth. On top of that, I blame myself for my truth… “If I don’t sacrifice myself, I have myself to blame for losing the connection.”
It’s not that I don’t love my friends (or that they don’t love me). It’s not that they have outgrown me or me them. It’s about having different values.
