@greenshade

The list of principles sounds like a great idea. I guess this whole issue does effect me because it’s almost as if the last conversation we had is on a repeat loop in my head.

It’s interesting how you bring up the idea of an intention being compassionate self-defense, I don’t regard this as being compassionate. Maybe it’s just me being proud. I have my pride and it got wounded (like it has many times before), but this all coming from him deeply wounded me, especially the fact I couldn’t get a word in to explain myself. Maybe I just want to have the last word to get even, like some form of revenge. I’ve spent the past year teaching myself self-respect and bringing myself up after a few setbacks and failures. Maybe I do have a problem dealing with criticism and maybe there were some valid points to Bill’s criticisms but there is also relentlessly criticizing somebody just for the sake of it. I don’t need to be around people who constantly bring up my flaws or constantly telling me “I should do this, I should do that, why don’ I do this, why don’t I do that…”

As for the affecting my work thing, perhaps this has only made me even more determined than ever to go after my goals, and I would feel more inclined to slay them if I didn’t feel like Bill was scrutinizing me all the time. Like I said, my success is not what his version of success is. I dance to the beat of my own drum.

Thankyou for your last response, it has helped me a lot 🙂

@VJ

Thankyou for sharing this with me, and thankyou for reminding me that I still need to read this book. I purchased A New Earth last month and I haven’t gotten round to reading it yet.

@anita

How’s it going?

I feel like this is something I should do but I don’t know how to go about doing it. Every time I’ve emailed or WhatsApped him messages, he just replies very briefly so I just get the impression he really isn’t interested in what I have to say and he’s just going to dismiss it. I remember sending him a message on WhatsApp but it took me a while to type something like “I’m good, how are you?” because the keypad on my old phone was broken, and he just sent me another smart aleck remark saying “Are you writing me an essay or something?”

I did suggest meeting up with him a few times but he always seems to be busy when he comes back to his hometown every weekend, but every other time it seems like he feels that the whole group should meet up together instead and that just used to make me feel uncomfortable because I don’t want to go for any more of these get-togethers, but I didn’t want to say that out of politeness. Now I realize that I am not responsible for the way other people react.

I kind of feel ridiculous about this whole thing – the last time I met up with this person face to face was two years ago. We have only spoken on the phone or sent messages since – we haven’t seen each other and I haven’t seen any of the other people from the group since but I felt like they had this hold over me. I don’t know how to go about doing this.