Question:
Dear Rita, i read your reply to someone that was having boyfriend
problems, him asking her to change her attitude and style. I'm in the
same situation but there's more to it. When i was a child, i was very
insecure about myself because i started maturing physically a lot
faster than my other classmates and was plump up to when i was 15, i
felt very ugly. When i was 16, i changed to another school but i had
lost 10kg after i was attacked with dengue fever. I started gaining a
little confidence and i also had my first bf but i got into that
relationship because i didn't really have friends and felt lonely. I
guess i was with him just to keep me company. He would say that he was
lucky to have me because i was beautiful and smart and kind but things
didn't work out as there was nothing in common. Then i had a guy
friend *bbb* that liked me but i was still with my first bf *aaa*. I
would tell my stories to bbb about my life and he would tell his
stories too, about his gf and all the girls he liked/the girls that
liked him etc. After awhile, i was with bbb because i liked talking to
him and felt comfortable with him. I was independent, i went out with
friends, i just did whatever i had to do and he did what he had to do
without caring too much because i trusted him. But then he started
controlling me because i used to talk to guy friends, he told me to
delete my fb, Whatsapp, change my number and bring him along if i was
going out with my girl friends. I did everything he said because i
loved him and wanted him to be happy. Now, after 19 months of being
tgthr, he tells me that he doesn't have any peace in his life because
i'm too clingy, always needing to talk, text, and asking him details
of everything he does, who's he with, i feel like i have no life
besides him and if i feel something is fishy, i immediately start
getting aggitated and anxious, even when he suddenly tells me he's
going out with his family or something, i get angry because i know he
wont be texting me and he'll say things that hurt me and call me
names, due to me calling and calling him, i call him around 100 times,
sometimes more, sometimes less. I no longer can go out with friends or
family because i immediately wish that i was out with him and i could
be spending time with him instead. I have lied to him about going out
with friends because i was afraid he would leave me. He threatens me
when i'm crying on the phone, when i'm sad. I call him because i have
nothing else to do and i just want him to tell me that everything's
going to be ok. Instead, he just says 'stop crying or i'll put down
the phone and turn it off, u wont be able to talk to me anymore' OR
he'll just slam the phone. It breaks me down even more knowing that he
doesnt care that i'm crying/sad and can just leave me alone. He says
that me lying about going out with friends is the reason he is like
this today. I am pretty much quite reserved nowadays and there's no
one i can talk to because they don't know the actual story. Sometimes,
i feel that he doesn't appreciate me and my love because he knows he
can get someone better out there. I feel so bad that he ended up with
me and i tell him 'you can get someone better than me, u can leave me,
u don't have to pity me' and he replies 'i know i can get better'. I
was always a happy child, i was shy, always sticked to my mom like
glue but now, i've become someone that i hate, ugly, disgusting, not
good enough for him (he never tells me i'm pretty, he never looks at
my face for more than 30 seconds) and when we're out and i see a
pretty girl that i feel he's attracted to, i look at him immediately
to see if he's checking the girl out and i start getting sad,
eventhough he doesnt look at the girl. There have been several family
problems also because my family doesnt approve of him but eventhough i
know i should let him go, it's so difficult and i get depressed and
crazy because i know i can't get better than him and he'll be happier
without me and he'll find someone better than me :( on the other hand,
i also hope that if we do break up, after awhile i hope that he'll
regret the way he treated me. i guess what i'm trying to ask is, is
this relationship going to work out, how do i stop feeling so insecure
and will i ever be happy again like i used to? :(regards, nadia.
Rita:
Dear Nadia,
You are the only one capable of giving yourself the gift of happiness, the gift of feeling good. Right now, you are putting your boyfriend in charge of your well being. You are giving him a burdensome task and he will never be able to perform it the way you expect.
Nobody can ever give you what you need to feel happy like you used to. That is because this happiness is still inside of you, but it is covered with layers of ideas. And uncovering it, layer by layer, so you can be in touch with it again, is your own journey. You are the only one who can do it.
First of all, you don’t have to blame yourself for having let your happiness to be covered by so many layers. These layers are made out of ideas and the ideas are everywhere. Right now, you have concepts and beliefs in your mind which are not even yours. They just came to you and you absorbed them, so now you think they are yours and, even more, you think you are made of them.
You noticed how you started losing your self-esteem as you transitioned from childhood to teenagehood. And that is normal. Because children, mostly the ones that are more sensitive like you were, will believe fully in what they are told and this includes ideas about themselves.
In the early school years, they start being overloaded with ideas of people with some authority who tend to label them in many negative and false ways. So, when they are almost teenagers all these criticisms are already builded up in their minds.
That is when their bodies start to change, the ego starts forming and they feel all the discomfort of not being who they think society expects them to be and that’s when they lose so much self-esteem. Therefore, you must know you are not the only one who feels this pain.
Look, it is good that you are trying to have a relationship, because now it is the time in your life to experiment with that. This very same relationship you are in right now, can work out. But what you do have to know is that this doesn’t have anything to do with your own inner happiness. You have to treat the relationship as something to enjoy, as something that adds to the happiness you already have, in opposition of seeing it as a medicine for your sadness.
Yes, a romantic partner can help you to get through things, to cheer you up and it is always good to share your feelings with someone who loves you. But ultimately, you must know in your heart that all the power you need lays inside of you.
And that is because, in a relationship, if you want it to be serious and to work out for all the years to come, you must be ready to also give and give a lot and, in order to do that, you will need to be very strong. Your life companion is going to need you, much more than you can imagine. And, if you have a child, this child will need you completely for the first years. Then, after childhood, she will also need you through her teenage years and you will have to be ready to listen and listen.
Therefore, you have to know that you do have strength, and this strength has to be summoned right now to lift your chin up and uncover your happiness that you remember you felt in your past days. The fact that you remember the feeling makes it easier, so you will know when you are getting closer to it.
The awareness that you have so much power in you is what will make you feel secure. Your boyfriend can’t make you a more secure person, no matter how many times he reassures you over the phone that everything is going to be ok. One day, he might tell you that, but that will be when you won’t even need to hear that anymore, because this will be the day when you will have decided in the heart to just let go. Once you let go in the heart your boyfriend and the need for reassurances, you will be giving him space for him to say what he feels instead of just reacting which is what he has been doing until now.
Also, you must know that love doesn’t know the meaning of such phrases as “you deserve someone better than me”, or “I can get better”, because the only better person is the one you don’t know. If you see them from far, they might seem better or appear more normal, but once you get to know people from close, you see that they will also have their own wounds to heal and another or several other issues. It is like a rainbow, that from far seems perfect, but once you try to come close to it, it disappears and you realize that all that beauty that attracted you was just an illusion, it doesn’t even exist.
That is why, when you two start talking in those terms of finding someone better, you have to know that these are just ideas which you both use to torture each other but that won’t make you grow or take you anywhere because they don’t have any meaning for the heart. You are the best person there is for him right now because you are the one who is there with him and he is the best for you because he is still with you. This is the only reality there is.
You can put an effort to be strong and to listen to your heart and then find your inner peace and happiness. This is all you can do and this is what will make you better compared to what you used to be before. But you cannot compare yourself to other people because each one has their own issues and their own journeys to overcome them.
Your willingness to live and to be happy, and all the concentration you put into rescuing that inner child are what make you special. When you feel this truth in your heart you will realize that you are worth of all the good things you wish to yourself.
Love,
Rita Cascia
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