Dear anita

Thank you so much for your kind words. You are one of the people I really look up to.

“A person has a limited amount of emotional resources, so we can’t give it all away, exhaust ourselves and become useless to ourselves and to others.” – Absolutely. It makes a lot of sense now. I will keep that in mind.

I have been raised in an extremely judgmental society. I have been personally judged for a lot of things, and it hurts. But I guess my mind has been so confused about how to differentiate between using your judgement in the right things that I go to an extreme of non-judgement.

“Many people want someone to listen to them, but they don’t want any input more than: I-hear-you, and you-are-right. They don’t want to look inward and correct what is wrong.” That is so true. Sometimes I feel like my time and energy goes is wasted- because even though I spend so much time with the person, they end up doing things that hurt themselves.

Ah. I understand now. Thank you. Maybe it is time to break that tension release service- but it feels so scary. I know that I will have to establish firm boundaries but I have become so used to this, I feel guilty, spend hours thinking about what I could have done or justify my actions to the other person.

Yes, anita. I would be happy to communicate further- and learn from you. Thank you.

S

Dear Anita

As always, your words are full of wisdom.

“Once we learn or adopt a certain behavior, we are chemically and biologically not meant to change that behavior.” So true- especially, as you said, when they are creating powerful emotions. Now I know why I feel emotionally exhausted- everything makes more sense.

“but it will require an alternative plan: what to do instead of spending hours thinking what you could have done, etc”- I will think about this. I’m very used to my old habits but I will try and create a new habit for sure. And give myself time and compassion while doing it.

“Who are you slowly losing? I am asking because it is most important to attend to this clearly stated conflict” – I used to be a people pleaser. In some ways, I still am. This PTRS habit strengthened because of my people pleasing tendencies and the gratification and rush of excitement I felt when people came to me. Sometimes I feel like I am almost always, available for everyone all the time. A listening ear, maybe a help- anything. I just find it hard to say no- but most importantly, I know how it feels to have no help, and go through things all alone, and a reminder of that situation and all the emotions associated with it makes me feel like I don’t want anyone else to go through it.

But as I said, this was making me emotionally exhausted. So for a long time I stopped talking to people. Rather, avoiding people, insteading of being assertive. And with this, people have stopped coming to me- or acknowledging me.

My entire life I have always felt ignored and misunderstood- but, I promised myself I will never make anyone else feel this way. All this empathy and kindness, slowly wore me out. So I tried escaping the situation. But now after understanding all of this- I started reaching out to people, but with boundaries.

Now you can definitely imaging the shift my personality has gone through- from someone who is available all the time, the agreeable, sweet, people pleaser- to someone who has started creating boundaries, assertive, and bold enough to express what I feel. (I still need to learn tactful handling on situations) And this has made me lose a lot of people who had a certain image of me in their minds, and now cannot accept the fact that I’ve changed, it’s a bittersweet feeling.

I have always tried so hard to fit in, and mold myself according to people, but when I realised that I never really understood myself or knew the things I wanted because of how hard I tried to please other people- I stopped. And started working on things I liked.

I can be really frank and rude sometimes. I’m better at communicating via text, and make my words appear sweeter. But in person- I am really honest, and what I say and how I say it doesn’t necessarily intend to come out the way I want it to. In contrast to the people pleaser I was- always saying the right things and agreeing with people- this is a change. And because of this, people have stopped talking to me unless they really know me.

Also, I struggle with the fact that I am the one who is constantly reaching out to people. Always. Still irks me, but I guess that’s me. Most of the friends I have don’t really check up on me, and when they do, I feel angry and don’t feel like responding. I can’t believe even after the self love and healing phase, I’m unable to manage and handle my relationships with other people.

I hope this makes sense. I guess this was a really long post but once I started typing, I couldn’t stop.

S

Dear anita

“I think that you recently promised yourself that you will never ignore and misunderstand yourself- the very person who was ignored and misunderstood for so long.” Thank you.

“The feeling that you are being rude when you are honest and assertive is probably attached to when your behavior is not rude at all. It’s probably one of the misleading feelings that maintain the old behavior, and which will continue for a while.” Yes. It will take some time. But I will get there.

I guess, if you’ve heard about splitting- I tend to do it a lot. My mind filters things as good or bad, positive or negative- but life exists in all shades of grey. It certainly applies to people a lot.

I went through a really rough time this time last year-  one of my lowest points in life. And people didn’t reach out to me- probably because I’m high functioning as a person so they didn’t realise what was happening. If you’ve read this quote by Robin Williams – “I think the saddest people always try their hardest to make people happy because they know what it’s like to feel absolutely worthless and they don’t want anyone else to feel like that.” That’s my motto.

I was the kind of person who would check up on people, text them, and listen to them- and that was the only way they ever acknowledged me. People do come to me for my empathy and advice, but as an individual, I’ve been sidelined and ignored unless and until they need my help.

I have a rather intimidating personality- most of the things I talk about are either intellectual, or philosophical, mostly serious, and my friend circle likes to talk about pop culture and celebrity gossip.. and that’s not really my thing. I have to stick around because it’s really difficult being alone away from home, and finding a new group or new people would be difficult halfway through my journey in University.

During my lowest time, I stopped messaging people. I didn’t reach out. I shut people out- and to be honest, 90 percent of them never bothered checking up on me till they realised that they had stopped getting attention. The rest 10 percent I am really grateful for.

So anyway, I think the one thing that is holding me back is that, I haven’t really forgiven a lot of people (my old friends) for this. I think that explains my anger and not wanting to respond to them. Because I know that they didn’t bother, and they can do it again. I’m trying to find my people, but it’s a struggle because I don’t want to end up being hurt again.

On a good note, with my assertiveness and boundaries- and also the fact that I’m discovering my likes and dislikes, I have found some new groups and activities which feel amazing.

S

Dear anita

Thank you, absolutely.

I wish I had more things to talk about currently, but after this correspondence I feel a bit lighter.

I hope things are okay on your side. I wish I could hug you right now.

If you ever need me, I’m here.

Warm regards

S