Elaborating

So, continuing with the subject from last time. . .how did I learn to deal with these instances? Let's see. . .

I'll tell you what didn't work, and that was blaming everyone else's actions on myself. I always felt that if I had been important/worthy enough, the other person would have followed through with whatever was in question. That fueled the self-destructive tendencies big time a few years ago, cuz I felt like everything was my fault. Obviously I was horrible, or else people would treat me better, and so I thought I deserved the pain and unhappiness.

I was going to a therapist at the time and this subject came up fairly often. She asked me why I thought other people would want to treat me badly. I had no idea. I *didn't* think I was a bad person, but there had to be SOMETHING wrong because otherwise people would like me. *She* was even a little perplexed because she rattled off a bunch of good traits that she noticed in me just from our once-a-week sessions.

But something had to change. If there wasn't anything wrong with *me* then everyone else needed to change. . .but how does that work?! It doesn't. It's impossible to change other people and what they do, so the only things that I could change were my reactions to these situations.

It sounds so common sensical now, but at the time it was a thoroughly unsatisfying answer. Nevertheless, I knew she was right and it was one of the few things that people have told me that really stuck in my brain.

It's been a long process. I'm a lot better at letting things roll off my back now. Why?

Well, the most important thing is that I DON'T blame myself anymore when other people don't live up to their promises. I honestly still don't understand how most people "forget" things so easily, but as I said, I'm not afraid to remind people if it's that type of situation.

When it comes to bigger situations, mostly things that have happened in the past, I realize that everything has indeed happened for a reason. I was engaged once and clearly that did not work out. It crushed me at the time (when we broke up) but if we had stayed together, despite our growing in vastly different directions, it would have just gotten a lot worse in the future. Then there are the several guys who hurt me in some way, but again, I only became stronger from each of those instances.

Of course, it also helps to have people in my life who *have* been trustworthy most of the time. My relationship with Rich helped a LOT, for example. Not to say he ever, oh I don't know, *wouldn't* be at his apartment when he said he would be, leaving me sitting outside on the porch steps or anything (haha) but I learned to deal with those little instances instead of being like "wow, I must suck or else he'd care enough to be here right now." Something to that effect. :p

I don't know. This entry was not easy to write because it's another one of those things that happened almost subconsciously. That, and I don't like talking about that really dark time in my life but at least I can see how far I have come since then. It's a little scary, but there's no use in denying how things were.

Off to write a short ICA entry and then Katamari time!