Okay. We wrapped up a Monday with me telling you that you deserve what you have, or what you deserve. Did that feel enraging? Did that feel like a circular reference? If you said yes to one or both, I get it. I do. I feel that so hard. It’s why I sent you a hug through the computer. I meant that hug with everything within me. I get it because I needed so many hugs, real and virtual, when I was coming to terms with all of this. I needed support and love. I needed it from myself and I needed it from others. The thing I learned though is that it’s your own inner strength that really lifts you up at the end of the day.
I am not suggesting that you cannot rely on others, because I firmly believe in having a support network. I am only throwing out there that the most reliable counterparty you will run into is yourself. Even when you make fucking awful decisions or fuck things up, you are still stuck with yourself at the end of the day, and that is that.
I needed to bolster my own self-confidence because I felt absolutely shitty when contemplating the notion that I had played a significant role in my own abuse and despair. It was easier to take those feelings and that experience and displace onto another human. You get that, right? Sometimes this concept is not more complicated than the path of least resistance. We reach for what is arms’ length away. Whatever is in our path gets decimated and that’s that.
I was talking to a friend today and I told her that I can’t stand when I see people screaming at retail staff who are trying to enforce mask laws. Truth be told, I don’t really get what the fuck the big deal is, but even if I unilaterally grant someone the right to be out of control over a scrap of cloth on their face, I still don’t understand the desire to take that rage out on the staff member in the store. I mean sure, there are some small businesses where you might be interfacing with the owner, but generally speaking, you are talking to just that, a worker. Maybe middle-management employee. Maybe, just maybe, some sort of stakeholder. Even if the last bit is true, that person likely didn’t unilaterally invent a method for keeping ‘us’ safe. They are likely following the law or at least subscribing to some commonsense methodology that keeps as many people safe as possible.
Anyway, I was explaining this distasteful scenario to a friend and she was like ‘duh, L, that’s an easy one.” How so? Well, they are just taking it out on the person delivering the ‘news.’ They would have been abusive to whomever it was. It didn’t really matter if it was a worker bee or a manager or an owner or a fellow shopper. Whomever approached this person and however respectfully they requested a mask be put on, they would have been verbally attacked by this angry human. Why question things when you have a punching bag right near the tips of your fingers? You know?
Gross, but yeah, that makes sense.
Furthermore, that person would likely not look within to take any responsibility. They would not acknowledge the clearly printed and placed signs imploring shoppers to wear masks. They would not acknowledge how they got loud and out of control when the person asking them to kindly put a fucking mask on stayed super duper calm. The funny, not funny, bit is that they might not have even been an anti-masker. It’s entirely possible that they were having a shit day for another reason, forgot their mask in the car, and the challenge by the store employee set them straight over the deep end. This is a very real possibility.
We might be going too far down the rabbit hole with this example, so let’s roll things back, shall we?
It was easier for me to look just beyond the end of my nose and call my partner ever name in the book. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I was willing to beat myself up, but not in the form of ownership, just self-deprecation. What does that look like? Well, instead of asking myself why I stayed or why I thought I deserved the behavior I was subject to (or the relationship I was a part of), I labeled myself broken and unlovable.
Just so you know, that’s also a cop out. Sorry, it is. You may really feel that way (I sure did) and it might feel good to say all those things about yourself, but it doesn’t really change anything. It doesn’t meaningfully move the mountain, at all. You just stay stuck in a perpetual cycle of accepting all the things that you think you deserve because you feel badly about yourself.
I know I talk about this a lot, but I feel like we are collectively getting worse at this whole thing. I don’t think the stress or the strain of the pandemic has helped matters much. There are so many examples of this paradigm all around me. Employers are stressed and treating employees like garbage, and employees tell themselves that they are unemployable outside of their current situation so why bother?! Relationships have also been fractured but we just blame that on the close quarters, external stress factors, etc.
Want another good example? I know you do. A lot of people gained weight during the pandemic. They are now condemning themselves and maybe even trying crazy diets and/or starving themselves to make up for the mistakes of lockdown past. Very few individuals that I have come into contact with have asked themselves why they decided to neglect themselves during the past year. I know, that may sound silly. Like who the fuck needs to ask that question? Things have been depressing and awful and that’s that. Nope, not even close. That’s a cop out. What EXACTLY was it that triggered you? Who triggered you? Were you lonely? Were you feeling smothered? Were you depressed, scared, and anxious?
There are definitely stressful situations that come and go, but more often than note, our underlying emotional reaction to the thing is indicative of something much deeper and more pervasive within us. We don’t want to admit this because then we likely have to make some changes. For example, here’s something very few people want to admit. The pandemic would not ruin a perfectly good and healthy relationship or friendship. It might tax it. It might put stress on it. It might test it. But ruin it? Nah. Not possible. Sit on that. More tomorrow.
x
L.
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