Why Should I Change (When It's All Their Fault)?
By Deb Hawken
THE PROBLEM WITH OTHER PEOPLE
The problem with other people is that they are other people. They're not you. As such you can rarely solve issues with someone else by asking them to change. Occasionally you will find a person who cares enough to mind what they're doing to you, and has the strength and self-belief to be undiminished by the idea they're not perfect, but those are rare people indeed. The rest are not your tribe.
Why Don't People Care?
We're raised with the myth that we're going to have many people in our lives that will care deeply for us, our welfare, and our mental health. The reality I've discovered is that if you can count those people on the fingers of one hand you're very lucky.
Yes, there are some wonderful families out there, but stop and think about how many families you know where there are tensions, arguments, and sometimes outright war and not speaking to each other until hell freezes over, or later.
There are also amazing friends who get who you are and understand that you're going to make mistakes as a bona-fide human. They are the friends who will tell you what you've done openly and respectfully, explain why it bothers them, and together you come to an agreement to make the relationship work.
This type of friend will not discuss their issues with you, with anyone but you, or cut you out when you make mistakes without giving you a clue why.
Humans are afraid of speaking their own truth, and few have that strong inner sense of self that allows them to do so without being unkind and offensive. Meet one of these people and you'll have a wonderful, lasting, friendship. Just never let them go because you're entirely blessed.
Sadly though love is an emotion that humans can struggle with, particularly if we're asked to 'love' too many people. We can easily like and appreciate any number of people, but I'm sure you'll agree that the deep love that says you'd walk over hot coals with recently manicured toenails, is a rare beast indeed.
It isn't that people are unkind or bad, it's simply that we're raised with faulty expectations of what the world has to deliver to us. Learn to understand how special real love is, and when you have that in your life, and a world of hurt will go away, replaced by realistic expectations that not everyone you meet will love you, has to love you, nor do they need to love you. Nor do you need them to love you.
WHERE DOES THAT LEAVE US?
Often hurting far too badly over far too many people who in truth are just passing strangers with whom you have a brief connection. It's up to you to choose those strangers wisely, and not to try to fit them into your forever category when they don't fit. Most importantly:
To understand when YOU genuinely want to make them forever, instead of assuming that they should be.
It IS All About You
You must decide who you want in your life and why, how you wish to be treated, and be ready to draw the line if the treatment you're receiving doesn't match up to what you believe you deserve.
If this is to be successful you will need to be scrupulously honest with yourself as to how you feel about the people you mix with. Feeling that you should like them when in fact they make you uncomfortable is never going to work. This is all based on the 'if they changed/if only they were different' fallacy.
If you don't like them as they are then you shouldn't ask them to change. Who has that right?
Of course as friends and couples we can grow together in understanding, and we should moderate our behaviour to support each other, that's a given. But if from the outset you're finding more minuses than pluses, or find you're nitpicking their every word, move, habit, decision, then you don't like them enough to have them in your life.
That's not wrong, it's just the way it is. Attach no blame to either of you and go and find people who don't make you scream out for change, even if you don't understand them 100% of the time. I don't understand me 100% of the time, do you?
This is the 'only human' clause in operation, and that boils down to one big thing that we need to exercise in life (apart from our abs and glutes)...
Personal Responsibility
You are literally the only person in your life. Everyone else is peripheral to you. The only person who can make the changes you need to make so that you are happy is you. This is why it's all down to you and always will be.
Not because you're bad. Not because you're unlovable. Not because you're too picky. Possibly because you're not sufficiently picky. It's down to you because only you can set the tone of your life, the nature of your life, how you want to feel about yourself and your life, and only you have the power to be effective in the protection, nurturing, and development of you.
Of course we're all frightened of being lonely if we can't find people to like and love us, but anyone who has been hurt will tell you that a relationship that hurts you is far more dangerous. This is partly because it fills the space the 'right' people should be taking up, and in trying to make the 'wrong' right, we're wasting our energy to go out and find the right people.
THE WHY IS
Because you'll be miserable if you keep giving the power for your happiness away to others, and you will be happy if you learn to be discerning without judgement.
Three tips:
- Respect how you feel even if you don't understand it.
- Don't get into wrong and right. You wouldn't feel guilty and buy a car you aren't comfortable in, so be equally guilt-free in only embracing relationships that work for you.
- It's fairer to everyone concerned if you're ruthlessly honest with yourself about your feelings, and fairer to you if you consider yourself worth protecting, and respecting.
Don't fall for the myths that you must have a huge circle of people who love and like you in order to be a great human being. A few genuine, trusted, people who love you will do just as well.
Apart from that just enjoy meeting others without having an agenda. This is life, not social media, only collect real likes!
To your happiness, if you're smiling more than you frown you're getting something right.
Deb Hawken Writer - Spiritual Mentor - Public Speaker
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