One-self

I was raised to be a good person, that meant that I had to be polite, respectful, tolerant, and kind always.

I actually have no problem with those things, as most of us don’t, yet they can still be a problem because they can lead to us putting up with too much for far too long. Moving beyond our tolerance zone into the damage zone.

Me me me

The attitude of my family was that doing anything purely for yourself was a bad thing. As was trying to be the best you could, as a person (conceited), or at work or in hobbies. It horrified them that I went into amateur dramatics and thought I could get on a stage and act. They really didn’t know what to do with a daughter who would do that kind of thing, and were in equal parts proud and horrified.

Let’s not even think about thinking of yourself, questioning treatment, arguing back (as in having a different viewpoint), those things were ideas I just wasn’t raised with.

My parents weren’t bad people, they’d just been raised in difficult circumstances themselves, and trauma doesn’t set any human up to be a positive parent, as far too many of us know. Our angst, training, and past memories can cause all kinds of ruptures in life that most of us would do anything to go back and put right. However…

If you were raised this way

Or perhaps came across and adopted these kinds of ideas and attitudes towards self somehow, you know not how, then you’re probably wearing yourself out tolerating behaviour long after you’re exhausted.

A few weeks ago a friend told me that I needed to be more empowered, I was outraged, more so when I realised that she was right. That I’d slipped into a habit of not standing up for myself, not answering back, allowing myself to be controlled by decent, loving people, even though it was wrong for me.

What was worse was that I realised I’d been putting up with unacceptable treatment for a very long time, not standing up for myself, not giving my opinion as I knew that others couldn’t cope with that, yet being on the wrong end of their angst. Trying to be kind and understanding was costing me dearly.

Lower your weapons!

One of the big issues with standing up for yourself is that it can quickly deteriorate into arguments, and that’s the reason that many of us don’t stand up to be counted, we take the quiet route, the one of least resistance. In truth, fighting back rarely works.

Oddly, and this is the interesting point, I realised that I never once felt diminished by doing the best I could in difficult circumstances. I may have realised I’d given too much power away, but my sense of self and feelings of empowerment, self-respect, self-determination, are rock solid. Just how?

It seems to me, upon reflection, that my fight was a quiet one. I didn’t need to tell anyone that they were in a battle, I just let them flounder around and kept my own counsel. They may be battling but I wasn’t. If they thought they were in control they were wrong. If they thought they’d ever win…dream on. It simple wasn’t important enough for me to make a fuss about, but it was majorly misinterpreted.

Perspective

No one can take your sense of self if you don’t give it away. If you do something and someone else (your boss maybe) changes it without consultation, they have a problem with respect.

People will mistake tolerance for weakness, just quietly put them right and if they ignore you say ‘stop’ and walk away. Don’t lose yourself in order to try to beat them. That’s just being them.

If what others think of you matters too much, you will not only lose your sense of self, you will be the person who kills it. Instead think about how human we all are, see that the person making you feel wrong is human too. Fallible. However, they don’t get to define you, you do. If you can look at yourself in a mirror and like who and what you see, then the opinions of others should be considered, and you should make a choice as to whether you take them on board, or silently bin them. If they hurt, bin them then burn the bin.

Choices

You wouldn’t buy a coat that was miles too big or small and insist on wearing it would you? A coat should fit comfortably. We can all be wrong and sometimes we do need some straight talk and it does hurt, but it should always be done by people that you trust to have your best interests at heart. The ones who want to pull you back from the cliff edge not shove you over.

The people you’re with should be a comfortable fit too. If you know someone who can give you a telling off and you know you’ve just been saved, measure everyone else by that person. If you don’t know anyone like that, you still don’t have to take crap from anyone. You’re worth more.

One choice you have to make is to make yourself ‘enough’. Good enough, kind enough, thoughtful enough, and so on. Don’t try to make yourself perfect in the eyes of others, there are far too many eyes out there, all of whom see things differently. Don’t try to be perfect at all, try to be kind and include yourself in that initiative.

To happiness and self-belief

Deb xx

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