Dear famaz:

Thank you and I too am interested in continuing our discussion.  These are my thoughts in regard to what you shared in your recent post: all young children look up to their parents for .. everything, physical and emotional needs. We put our parents on a pedestal, at a young age, because we need them up there: we need to believe that they are able- and willing- to give us all that we need to survive and thrive because we aren’t able to make it on our own, we are completely dependent on them. As adults, we put other adults on a pedestal because we don’t yet believe that we can make it on our own.

Long after I worked and earned enough money to make it on my own, I still didn’t feel that I can make it on my own: objectively I was able, subjectively- I was not. Coming to think about it, I didn’t want to make it on my own because the idea of making it on my own meant (subjectively) that I will be forever alone. There is something about a childhood so filled with alone-ness, isolation and disconnection, that it instills a fear of alone-ness, and the child turned adult becomes desperate to not be alone.

What do the people placed on a pedestal do? “they noticed it and somehow used it against me (from) time to time, not following through with their promises or trying to deceive me“- Lots of parents, lots of criminals (on the street and in leadership positions/ positions of power), and lots of people in our day-to-day lives, in one way or another, use their power against people who are weaker than them, including the people who handed them power. It takes a person of character, of strong ethical principles to be aware of their power and yet, to not misuse, or abuse it.

“After a while, I got sick of them, sometimes I avoided them completely and sometimes, if the situation was so frustrating, I exploded and told them how I really feel about them“- this is what I did. In my case, it was my behavioral pattern for many years, and it earned me the diagnosis (no longer in effect) of Borderline Personality Disorder.

“At the same time, my inner thoughts were confirmed: PEOPLE ARE OUT TO GET ME, NOBODY IS TRUSTWORTHY and that made me even more isolated“- this has been my mindset: I used to focus on people’s normal, human imperfections and mistakes and see those as evidence that they are indeed untrustworthy. I used to get angry (still have this tendency, which I need to better pay attention to) at imperfect people who make mistakes…  people like me. It takes the understanding that it is okay to be human: okay for me, okay for others, and forgive the forgivable about me, and about others.

anita