The beautiful thing about being oneself is the notion that you're living your own personal truth. It doesn't matter if anyone agrees with you or your choices because living truthfully means making no apologies. Not that bad behavior isn't part of anyone's truth, because as humans we fall far short of being or living perfectly. Living truthfully really only means that, right wrong or indifferent, all successes and failures, even mistakes... are at the very least completely honest in nature.
I'm not going to talk here about human error that results in hurting someone's feelings, etc. What I want to focus on is the natural result of living someone else's life. Some of the deepest wounds ever come from betraying yourself. I know, because I've done it.
Never allow yourself to be manipulated. The trick here is to know when you are. Some people are quite gifted in the art of manipulation and it's only after the damage is done and the sting sets in that you realize what's happened. Even then, you may only have a guess, because recognition is often difficult and require insight and assistance to fully recognize the culprit. This also happened in my case.
What is it like to live a lie?
Your subconscious will know and often react much in the same way that you react when your hand accidentally touches a hot pan handle. You recoil instantly, only inwardly from the immediate danger, and the pain burns on long after you've countered and reacted instinctively. I believe this is why we often keep reaching for that same hot handle again---because we haven't actually recognized what it is we've done and that it's caused not only pain.. but also damage. So, we reach again.
From my perspective and experience this same, harmful experience repeats itself endlessly until we finally see what's causing the hurt, the pain, the discomfort. We're outside of ourselves at this point, feeling the pain, seeing the damage, but unable to comprehend that our own actions are to blame. That realization, by the way, comes when it comes. We either see it or we don't and we don't until we do. This is different for everyone, of course.
I find myself once again in that same perpetual, ongoing and damaging loop of living through someone else's ideals, wants, needs, views, demands, rules, and so on. And it's not working now just as it didn't work in the past. This feeling, at the moment, is like not being able to breathe or move, like being bound and gagged and placed in a dark room where my experiences are only ones injected into the dark by another. This is what living a lie is like. At least for me.
As I find myself pushing aside my needs as a human being, natural thoughts, opinions, instincts, interests, etc. while adapting that of another, for their comfort, the damage is evident. Only this time I'm unable to simply allow what isn't me to fall away so I can heal and return to my own life, my own genuine self, my truth. Reconciling this is damn hard, I'll be honest.
All those things I enjoy, want, dream of, hope for and need are cemented beneath the very solid ground on which another stands. It's not pre-meditated, but it is a form of oppression. I've been here before and the result wasn't pretty at all. I healed, mostly, but the scars are deep, distinct, and still tender. But at least I know they're there, why they're there.
This is my struggle yet again, fighting to always remember who and what I am while being basically forced to live through someone else's life. It's a very slippery slope.
Regaining my health and my strength is CRITICAL right now. There's no respite from this, really. No decompression chamber where I'm free to just be who I am and take care of myself the way that is positively vital to my well-being.
.... More later. At the moment the pain demands I give it attention.
No comments:
Post a Comment