Dear troy:

I believe I know this feeling oh, so very well, this distressing awkwardness at the compulsion to be …nice, to smile when I don’t feel like smiling or when I don’t know if I feel like smiling. The.. fear at times (you didn’t describe this, but let me know if it applies to you) that another can tell I am thinking negatively about him or her, and “having to” cover up what I think with a smile and a pretense of sorts. When someone looks at me a little too long, I am thinking What are they waiting for? What am I supposed to do that I am not doing? And I get angry: what does he or she want from me? Am I doing something wrong? Did they “catch” me thinking or feeling something wrong?

And THIS is happening on my healing path, still. I believe as I am thinking about this anew, that it stems from me having been rejected and negatively criticized as often as I have been, as a child, for what I thought and felt. And having been told to be …. nice and to smile to people that my mother hated behind their back. She told me how bad those people were but acted extremely nice to them, generous. And then complained to me that they were taking advantage of her. She.. made me smile and act nice to them although I was raging inside.

Do you have a history of your own that will explain the compulsion to be nice? Anything?

anita