Why Life Keeps Asking You to Let Go
Many years ago, I clearly remember celebrating a strange victory. I had only spent one day overthinking a problem.
I was triggered by the end of another situationship. I could feel them pulling away. Something had changed, but I didn’t have the answers. I was stuck in that painful limbo space.
For that day, I had done what I always did. I replayed conversations in my head, searched for hidden meanings, imagined different scenarios, and mentally rehearsed what I would say if I could turn back time. I checked my phone more times than I could count and searched YouTube …
“The heart that’s been through the most can sometimes mistake chaos for connection.” ~Unknown
I remember the exact moment I knew something was wrong.
We had been talking for three weeks. Every conversation left me either floating or deflated, never just… okay. Either he said something that made me feel like the most understood person on earth or he went quiet for two days, and I spent those two days mentally replaying everything I’d said, looking for what I’d done wrong.
And yet, when he came back, I felt relief. That rush of “he’s back, everything is fine” was …
“Expectation is the root of all heartache.” ~Unknown
I turned forty this year. And I am only now figuring out something I wish someone had told me at twenty.
Most of my pain—the kind that sat in my chest for days, the kind that made me replay conversations at 2 a.m., the kind that made me wonder what was wrong with me—was not really coming from other people.
It was coming from what I expected them to do.
I know. That is not an easy thing to hear. It wasn’t easy for me either.
I used to think I was just bad at coping with stress.
Every Sunday evening, I felt anxious about the week ahead. My chest would tighten when certain emails appeared in my inbox. Before meetings, I’d rehearse what I wanted to say over and over, trying to avoid saying the wrong thing.
At the time, I blamed myself.
I told myself I needed to be tougher, calmer, better, more resilient. Everyone else seemed to be managing, so I assumed the problem must be me.
What I didn’t understand then was how deeply a toxic workplace can affect your sense of
“A codependent person is one who has let another person’s behavior affect him or her and who is obsessed with controlling that person’s behavior.” ~Melody Beattie
From a young age, I felt insecure in my own skin. I was a highly sensitive child and, subsequently, struggled with low self-worth for most of my life.
Although I had many friends and a good family, I consistently looked for approval outside of myself. I grew up believing that the opinions of others were the only accurate representations of my core worth.
As a teenager, I witnessed the crumbling and eventual demise of …