I have reached a new level of gratitude for Karmic lessons unfolding right before my eyes. Self love allows me to show up fully and give chances, it won’t keep me there for long though if it’s a bad or unhealthy relationship. What I’ve been through has helped me become more enlightened.
My ex and I tried to make it work for the third time, I’m glad we did. The first time, he left. The second time I left. The third time he left and that was enough for me to confidently close that door. There’s a peace in knowing you gave it your all. There were patterns of behavior that were displayed as a result of addiction and lack of self awareness or care, to how it affected us that I could no longer tolerate on his end, but was I willing to work with him…yes. I’m not saying I was a walk in the park either. There were lessons to learn on my end too about tolerating emotionally unavailable men and believing actions instead of words.
Heres the thing, for anything to work, both parties have to actively be engaged in owning their part of the reasons it didn’t before and use that as wisdom to do better. Any party that refuses to do that, you’ll end up right where you left off. I could go on and on about all the reasons it didn’t, but at the end of the day it didn’t because one of us was committed to growing and the other one just wasn’t. Not my words, his. The “This is just who I am“ statement is often a cop out and an easy way to avoid any accountability. There are times an enlightened individual liberated from the ideals of society might say this and it might ultimately give them a sense of freedom. However, as the linked blog so succinctly states:
“It’s misleading to say “this is just who I am” after I recognize that my life is multidimensional and in a constant state of flux.”
We all have situations and narratives in our lives that, if we allow them to consume our journey without any thought, they will.
stub·born/ˈstəbərn/📷Learn to pronounceadjective
having or showing dogged determination not to change one’s attitude or position on something, especially in spite of good arguments or reasons to do so.
I equate a stubborn person to a brick wall. It’ll take a bulldozer to breakthrough and I was willing to be that bulldozer…suffice to say once he left, it’s as though it crumbled on its own…
Being with this type of person is a challenge. Being with a woman of emotional strength and fortitude is a challenge too. As a mutable sign I am able to put up with a lot. “I could never” generally isn’t part of my vocab. Even for those things I’m passionate about, I am persuadable and those close to me know this. A stubborn attitude can have its place, but in the realm of trying to evolve dysfunctional patterns in a relationship, it does not.
Hearing it be professed “This is just who I am”, is something I get frustrated with but also find peace with because it tells me two things.
You have no desire to grow or you truly don’t believe you can.
Its really all I need to know to understand to you it’s not worth it, or you need to seek help to understand whats blocking you. There is a whole discussion on accepting people for who they are which has its place here, absolutely. People don’t change, but they do grow. Growth mindset requires work and I’ll be honest, not everyone is interested in that and that’s okay. There is a point where self help can almost feel like self hate. Constantly trying to improve yourself thinking of everything about you is flawed. Here’s the thing, no human being is perfect. We are trying to get back to our true, and good nature unlearning things that have taken us away from that, through self help.
From the moment we enter this world to the point you are now, ask yourself…have you evolved? The answer is always a yes. Why? Because it’s the nature of life to do so. The miraculous thing about us as beings and streams of consciousness and having a mind is, we get to use it. From childhood to adulthood we are constantly developing character and learning how to respond based on events that occur in our lives. The truth of the matter though is, some people might get stuck.
For some, becoming a man or woman indicates, they’ve made it. You can be a man or a woman but be far from grown. Parents even sometimes feel as though they’re infallible simply because they are mom or dad. There are people stuck in their narrative and so I realized I needed a strategy for the future to let go of control and better navigate this.
The Three As, Accept, Adapt, Avoid.
Those are the choices. Notice that “make them change” isn’t among those choices. You can only change how you react to people, you can’t get them to see the error of their ways or make changes for the better.
Realizing the end was nigh, I was no longer going to pacify behaviors that didn’t work that were showing up again negatively impacting our relationship, as it did the first and second time. Again, insanity. Honestly this could have all been avoided if I let the second time around be the second time. However I knew there was still something about being with this person I needed to discover, something like unfinished business. I didn’t know it would be a karmic relationship as defined below.
Not realizing my attraction to this relationship and him as an emotionally avoidant partner much like my mother was, I kept allowing that familiarity to play out with us. It was more evident when my mother visited, that I noticed that pattern. I was “dating” my mother. After that realization, I was still willing to continue on despite the problems, despite this realization and in spite of, because we shared a child and because I knew he was a separate person from my mother. It persisted and I finally gave up trying to hold my tongue for what would ultimately lead us to our fate. It wasn’t meant to work. I was not ok with who he was in my or our sons life, I was vocal about it and he left. There’s no ounce of me that will tolerate that again.
I saw clearly at the beginning, or so I thought. Then I realized my mother wound was playing out again. Through this relationship I was able to heal that wound and that’s something I’m grateful for. We can take a lesson from every relationship we have, if we look closely enough. I’m grateful for the beautiful son he gave me and for once I am at peace that he left me, again. This is why it is crucial to let people go through what they need to and provide advice sparingly. People will share their stories and their journey and from that you can learn. If I hadn’t given this relationship another chance, I wouldn’t have realized I had this karmic lesson to resolve.
So you must always take advice with a grain of salt. Your journey is yours alone.
We are all working out ourselves in a spiritual way through the people we meet. Some will in this lifetime reach enlightenment. As my sister said it best though, ”what do you think, you can just avoid the hard stuff”. You can’t, which is why I developed strength to carry on in spite of. I now know that passed this test.
