One of the many really hard pills I’ve had to swallow is that some people are committed to misunderstanding you. Maybe not about all things, maybe only about certain things that encompass their limiting beliefs. At least thats what I’m finding to be true. In my journey to finding myself for the first time, loving myself, becoming my own best friend, I’ve really noticed that I love being alone most of the time. It’s funny how that happens. Once you focus on yourself you become everything you’ve looked for in everyone else.
So once you do the work, you understand yourself, the why’s, the who’s, the what’s, from your perspective, you give yourself some credit. Only your opinion matters in your world. It’s really interesting to come out of solitude and find that people are committed to misunderstanding you. This actually triggered me last night, which told me I had to contemplate it deeper and ask myself why. It’s an ego thing, looking for someone else to tell me I am right. It really doesn’t matter, or shouldn’t matter what anyone else thinks but me. I know my reality. What came up was my mother’s abuse, I was invalidated, this person said something along the lines of, “Oh, well I love your mom. She really isn’t that bad”. Really diminishing my experience, everything I’ve said about what I’ve went through. Which really isn’t everything because I keep alot to myself, and this is a good example of why. Other peoples opinions tend to make you feel a certain way.
Lately I’ve also been quiet about certain things. Observing more. Not talking about my struggles or my successes. Working through them myself. In my head it makes me stronger, but there’s actually a deeper reason on why I do this. Anytime I start talking about something I feel deeply about I can tell when someone stops listening. When someone stops listening I stop talking, sometimes they bring up the topic 10 minutes later and ask me again to finish my story. I’ll oblige although I don’t want to this time.
The same goes for how I feel about certain things. My life. What I like. What society tells me I should do. My experiences. What happened last night is not the first time I’ve felt invalidated, but because of how I felt inside its clear it’s something I still need to work through. The thing I realized is that the person who was invalidating my experience also still tolerates behavior that I wouldn’t in my life. Of course I would never tell them this so I just observe this silently. Encourage them when they need it. Listen when they need to vent of course. But it got me thinking about limiting beliefs and how maybe their viewpoint is a projection of how caged they feel inside. How they would handle the scenario. They would allow it. Let bygones be bygones, she is your mom after all. Can it really be that bad?
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, this is why I love writing. No one’s going to be able to invalidate my experience once it’s on paper. It’s already there. You can only argue with my typed words in your head. I am not there for you to argue with. For you to tell me how wrong I am. This is my own projection I’m working on resolving. The one where I feel that I need to be defensive. Where I feel I need to justify what I’m doing, how I’m feeling. Where I can feel the anger bubble up inside of me. It’s caused by being silenced for so long. I will never allow that to be me again. I will never be swayed by another person. For so long I was even though I hate to admit it. Now I stand strong in my convictions. More or less what I want to say is, “I wasn’t asking for your opinion”.
But you can’t say that to people, to friends. So you can just smile and nod. Work through your feelings. Write them out perhaps. Get to the bottom of what the trigger inside is trying to tell you. Keep growing from the experience. Then the next time you are placed in the same conversation you can notice how the work you’ve done to contemplate the feelings it drummed up has changed your reaction. I’ve noticed this already with so many things. I’m growing and changing constantly.
But as I’m becoming more of an observer in society, enjoying the time with myself more than anything, I do have to say one major thing I’ve noticed is no one’s even listening. Maybe thats the problem we all need to fix.
The Girl Without A Face 