I'm doing 11 things
I don’t even know where to start with this goal – I just know I need to do it. I have diagnosed myself with emotional diarrhea – haha. But seriously, my emotions get the best of me way more than they should. For instance, there is one particular man at work that does things I find very discourteous and disrespectful, but rather than speak up and stand up for myself when he does them, I get very angry and run to the bathroom or my car to cry, then call my boyfriend and vent to him about this guy. But I will never stand up to him and just thinking about doing it makes my heart race. I can’t stand up for myself when I need to, but I blow up at the people that I truly care about – my boyfriend, my mom, etc – and then feel terrible about it later. It makes me very upset just thinking about it because I know I have so much anger at many people but I am too afraid of them not liking me to do anything about it. I know what I should be doing as a “mature” adult, like talking it out, but I find that letting someone know that I am hurt or angry about something they’ve said or done makes me so afraid. I am angry at others but I can’t stand it when I know that someone else is mad at me. It makes me very uncomfortable and I get to the point that I have to do whatever it takes, even sacraficing what I know to be right for me or standing up for what I truly believe in, in order to make that person happy so they won’t be mad at me anymore. This behavior has ruined many romantic relationships for me also – no one wants to be with someone that always gives in and is constantly after approval for everything, but then gets so resentful they blow up at you over “nothing”. There are no truer words than the saying that if you can’t love yourself, you can’t love someone else. You can certainly attach yourself onto someone else like a leech, but you can’t love them, at least not like you want to.
I could write a book about all this. I know much of it stems from my past and my family history, but I don’t know where to start in order to fix it. There just seems to be too much mess to be sorted through in order to get my head on straight and allow me to express all my emotions in a healthy way. I am really afraid that I am “screwed up” as a person.
