change your heart – Whiskey Momma

When It’s Never Enough, It’s Your Fault

What happens when you keep following the same patterns over and over to fill the voids in your life? What happens when your coping and defense mechanisms no longer tie you over until the next time? What happens when you wake up one day and realize you are surrounded by people in the same boat as you, both in physical and virtual presence?

Most people practice this pattern their entire lives. Some even after years of therapeutic interventions are offered and discussed. Why? Why does one simply just ignore lessons they’re going through and learn more than just to simply say, “yeah, that was kinda sucky, but it’s not as bad as…” then repeat the behavior?

We ALL know people who exist this way. Everyone knows someone who exhibits this toxic pattern. Maybe we know one or two, there are some that know more than a handful (me) and it’s exhausting. Which in itself could essentially be a pattern that could trap me or anyone in a rabbit hole. Luckily, I’m smart enough to set boundaries and keep them fast and hard enough (at least in the past year) to just let that person slip into whatever pattern they choose or feel, they can’t break away from, them walk away with an explosion in my backdrop.

It’s doesn’t mean I’ve given up on them; this is never really an option if you care about them. It’s just a way to maintain ones sanity and mental health and to live a healthy and balanced life. Here’s to self-care!

So what happens to our friends with patterns? Obviously, the best case scenario would be that they learn from their mistakes and grow and make changes in their lives and relationships that are geared towards being more healthy. However, they generally tend give up (cause shit gets real and it’s uncomfortable) and eventually become a victim of their own circumstance, then they cope “the way they always have.” In some cases they have made a pattern of justifying that others are at fault for their situations.

This justifying and rationalization eventually becomes “their pattern.” It’s a no win situation and it’s damaging to all their relationships. Worse yet, their children will see this behavior and learn it works to remove their responsibility for their circumstances. As a result we have an entire generation of “it’s not my fault, I wasn’t loved enough the right way” running around.

This has devastated marriage and relationship statistics, as well as an increase in incarceration and juvenile intervention rates. If no one is responsible for their actions it results in a complete break down of functioning relationships and we have a crisis of blaming others on a global level. Hmmm…sound familiar????

My challenge to you- ask yourself and others if you keep going in circles with your life? Are you having the same unhealthy relationships over and over?? Is that what you want to do with your life? To be miserable, tired, alone (don’t fool yourself just because you are surrounded by the same type of people, you feel alone) and faking your “life”?

Just do something different. It takes one leap and then keep doing something different to make those changes. Don’t stop doing something different until you can walk through your life without blaming others, life (even though this may be the case), or anything else for “why” you are miserable, making bad choices, not stopping the behavior patterns.

~WM~

We Give and We Give and We Give…

How much is too much to give of yourself? How many times have you asked yourself, “What is wrong with me, why am I not good enough?” I admit to doing this in the past, and sometimes it’ll rear its ugly head in ways related to the distancing and independence my little people try to exhibit (which is a great thing), but more so when I was being treated like shit by those one people.

I’ve been rolling the “I’m not good enough” (which is what makes us a victim) and the “why am I not good enough” around in my mind lately as many of my circle are feeling this burden. Even the ones that are keeping this pain in their lives. The rolling is persistent and it’s driving me crazy.

So here are my two cents…

“What is wrong with me” is a response to being rejected, and no one likes to be rejected, feel rejected, or even feel like they are not being placed first in the other person’s list of priorities. Which honestly, being the first priority in someone else’s life is not healthy…just as you should not have anyone else as a first priority in your life (we will get to that).

“Why am I not good enough” is a self defeating thought that we ask ourselves which reinforces the belief that someone else has the power to determine our worth. Ugh. We have literally given our self worth to someone else to tell us if we are good enough-IF they choose us then we are good enough, if they don’t, there is something wrong with us.

Both have implications of not having a sense of “Locus of Control” -Locus of control “is the degree to which people believe that they, as opposed to external forces, have control over the outcome of events in their lives.” BUT-we actually do have the ability to control if and when we give our control and power to others. AGAIN-WE HAVE THE POWER.

We tell ourselves it’s us that is the problem and that we aren’t good enough and then we finally get past that relationship and right on to the next one JUST LIKE IT!! We need to break the pattern. It’s not easy, but the practice can be as simple as this-telling yourself:

I have value… make a list of what you believe your value is-think, what do I bring to the table…I help people.
I have worth…which is different from value. I have integrity and I believe I can achieve my goals if I work hard enough!
No one has the power to determine if I am good enough unless I give it to them. I’ve recently begun to allow myself to explore and process how the insight and observations pointed out by the man I love change me internally and thus leading to positive outward changes.

Being able to do this has been a long and arduous journey- and I’m no where close to being done. This path is hard and uncomfortable. We often choose comfortable over uncomfortable but for your own sake- choose being uncomfortable.

Even though it’s hard to have the conversations with those we are either required to engage with, or those we want to interact with to move forward in our relationships the payoff is worth it. For the ones we are required to engage with, it will help keep good boundaries and clarity with facts.

For the relationship journey I’ll use my own experience. It’s often very exciting and I catch myself eager to learn new ways to get out of my shell and forgive myself for the lock and key I’ve used to protect my mind and heart. Sometimes I can feel very overwhelmed and I have to talk about it with my guy which again, this helps reinforce my self worth and sense of control over my life. Also whiskey. Whiskey helps.

I know it seems like it’s easy for me to point this shit out and walk away. But know, I’m not walking away. I’m repeating this everyday to whoever needs to hear it and I am in constant check of myself. Luckily, I have found my soulmate to help keep this process growing. As noted above-I do not put him as my first priority. I don’t put my littles as my first priority (their safety, yes)-I have to make myself a priority for my mental well beings sake.

No one can be in any healthy interpersonal relationship unless they are mentally healthy. One has to be able to love theirselves and take care of their mental health to truly work able to help others to grow in a meaningful way. Sure you can fake it for a bit-years even. But by then the damage is done. Years of work to undo that damage will be required. Thankfully, I am practicing this now. hopefully, always since I’m with my human.

This amazing man I love laughs sometimes because it’s hard for him to believe someone really wants the truth and to be challenged (spaced out over time of course too much and I’ll explode) especially when what needs to be said doesn’t feel good to hear. But finally, I’ve reached the point and met my human and I can always count on his honesty, loyalty, and support to grow as a human. For that, I’m grateful and fortified everyday.

Handsome D-thank you for being my binary… ~WM~