This morning, I was refering to some of my conversations with my psycologist with my mother, who has been staying with me since February, 2020. When I referered to my ex-partner, the man I have loved the most as a lover, she decided to turn around and say that she doesn’t like him.
Of course, this made me angry, and I blew up, saying:
I don’t like your daughter!
refering to my only sister who has fallen out with me for a while now.
But this childish behaviour was basically saying:
Oh! So you don’t like MY lover!!!
Then let me find someone you love to not like.
Ok then, let’s pick your daughter, since your husband is dead, and the other one you love is me, and it defeats the purpose of this argument, if I bring myself up!
After a bit of arguing, I marched out of the room.
While in the shower, I felt bad for telling my mother off.
I understand her.
She loves both her children a lot. And if her children are hurt, she automatically tries to find the root cause, and starts disliking the root cause. So when she dislikes someone based on her children’s experiences, it has nothing (much) personal about the third parties involved. They are merely expressions of feeling sorry for her own children. More often than not, since she only ever hear half the story, it’s easier to dislike the third party.
There was a lesson in this drama that unfolded this morning, and later played in my head while showering.
When ever one feel sorry for themselves, if they are anything like what I have become recently, they also want to NOT put the blame on another.
Without being able to blame another, the “feeling sorry” may not have enough energy.
So this may have the tendencey to come back towards us saying “You were a bitch”!
Now this can start a hating ourself cycle.
Let’s assume, something we experienced in our childhood, coming from our parents has caused us to have some stupendously negative belief.
Now, there are two standard ways one goes about this:
- This is our parents fault. Let’s feel sorry for ourself by hating our parents.
- Let’s just acknowledge this happened, and let’s be a grown-up and deal with it, and work towards fixing it.
In both these standard ways, we probably end up not fully feeling sorry for our inner child who sufferered.
The first approach, we may temporarily take the inner child’s “side”, but very soon the adult will kick in and say, “Nah mate, that is not right, and your parent is now hurt!”. This is going to hurt us again, and now we will directly swing towards hating ourself!
The second “grown-up” method, which I am very guilty of taking, doesn’t have sufficient empathy for your inner child. So, we are smart enough to know it’s all what our parents knew, we are smart enough to know, it’s up to us to fix it, but not WISE enough to sit with that child for a while, and listen to it’s original needs. Give it a hug, and say:
“Mate, I love you no matter what. My love for you is eternal. I will never go anywhere”
So is there a third method? I think so…
It is to first and foremost feel the pain, feel the sorrow, feel sorry for yourself fully. During this time, limit your blame by journaling. Go through what you journalled. Then, understand the background of your situation. Once you’ve understood, you can imagine to be a temporary carer sent from heaven above who lands on the situation and go:
“Let me take this child over for a second, I want to talk to them”,
and ensure the child’s emotional needs are met.
But the better third approach is what I have finally started doing.
See a damn good psychologist. They have all the tools and techniques with them. They become up to date with their continous professional development programs that comes from their associated schools. They also meet multiple patients like us and learn from them continously. So, nothing we say is likely to shock them. This means, we can truly and utterly be ourselves.
Personally speaking, try to find a psycologist of the “gender” you are attracted to. Or ensure you really like the psycologist. The first method is currently working for myself, as I have pretty bad low-self worth. Seeing my psychologist as HOT, and flirting with him while talking, fills my love tank automatically. I have a natural tendency to hear him, and work with him. Of course, one needs to be careful in this, because, in the end, it is only your psycologist. You don’t necessarily need to be attracted, but you need to build sufficient respect for your psycologist. This has to be a match made in heaven! Remember, you must listen to this person and take advise. So they must know how to get to you, even in your most fragile and stubborn moments.
Finally, if you can master the art, try to be unappoligatically yourself! This doesn’t have to mean you hurt another. Dancing while walking on the street is not going to hurt another, but someone will probably not like it and someone will probably critique it. But if you can master the art of being unappolgatic about it, especially if it means something to you, then you probably have a good balance of feeling sorry for yourself.
As for me, I’m definitely still a student. I have my moments of “Princess Nim” where he dances on the streets, and then have moments of “Insect stuck in Mariana trench Nim”, who hides in his room with all curtains closed tellling how no one loves him.
Now I have to work on being just “Nim”. (Although I don’t want to give up the title “Princess!! sigh!!)
– Nim –
A Moment with Nim! 