We all do it. We take the harsh things that happen to us personally, most especially if we are highly sensitive. It hurts to be subject to those who are shut down and dont get how hurtful their actions and words can be. It hurts not to be seen. But is it about us or about them? Are they doing it just to piss us off or is it that they don’t see any further than their own defences or armour will allow, and just how long exactlly do we stay angry about that?
We most definately need to reclaim our life blood and lively energy. Many of us raised during and before the 60s were not allowed this kind of life. My own parents had to buckle down and suck up a lot of diffiuculty. They raised us with the idea that being responsible and doing a good job was ideal, they didn’t practice self care but over rode their own boundaries, all symptoms now I understand of their own emotional neglect that was passed on to us. They were not able to be there emotionally as other concerns dominated. I am sure it was not just that generation. I am sure people from other families may have received more love and attention to their inner worlds. I know I didnt and I know how much in recovery it has bitten me to find out I never got a lot of care. I was out on my own in my early 20s following three major traumas that would have shook anyone’s world trying my damnest to look okay and keep performing. I didnt really begin to break out of that until I hit 40 years of age and it required the ending of my marriage.
I remember when my first therapist recommended I take time off work for grief and depression back in 2001 that I found that hard to swallow. In my mind you fronted up no matter what and put on a good face. Luckily by that time I was working ina place where I could talk about what was really going on and they gave me time off. But I remember my husband coming into the room while I was in bed and raging at me to get up and get to work.
Things hit the skids a few months later and I ended up back home in Oz alone. I wish I could have maintained a little day job as well as my inner work but it wasnt to be and a little while later I had the head injury and that put paid to early rising.
I now see so much of what happened to me wasn’t personal but I also wasn’t on the receiving end of a lot of empathy to a bit further down the line. Sometimes I wonder how my parents could at times have been so emotionally shut down and I despair at my family who maintain a very discrete distance. The one exception is my oldest nephew who has opened up his pain with me as I have with him.
Lately thought I am learning to take it less personally. If I start to rail about it, it just gets me all steamed up. I would rather put that energy into self care and positivity. When I put my assertive energy into passivity or passive aggression it backfires on me. I dont want that kind of passive powerless life anymore. There are times to surrender and let go and be passive for sure but there is no fun in playing the victim card over and over and over again. Yes for years I was a victim, but now I am not unless I choose to be. Yes I DO HAVE pain and grief over past things and probably always will, but those feelings are not the whole of me. There is more to me now that I don’t have to take it all so personally. The truth is that I am an aware and sensitive person who has endured a lot. Not everyone is going to get that if it lays outside of their expereince. That doesnt make them bad people and me good. That to my mind is a spit view. It just means they operate on an entirely different level to me. I can choose to maintain a distance if I find other’s actions consistently hurtful or diminishing and I can remember that how they react to me says far more about them than it does about me.
Emerging From The Dark Night 