We're Never too much but Always Enough

Know your worth. Everywhere we hear it. We read about it. In books, online, it's even making its way through to social media. Self worth. The epicenter of our psyche. Our mind. Who we are. How we feel about ourselves. How we look at ourselves and finally others. How we believe we shall be treated, what we deserve or don't deserve. And even more important who we deserve to have next us, to be with and vice versa.

But what does all this even mean and how would I even discover where I'm standing in all this? It seems everyone knows and talks about value but only few can understand what it means in the big picture. What it means in reality, in our daily life. Self-value, self-worth. How it feels. How we're feeling when we feel deeply ok with who we are. How we it is manifesting in daily life to have a healthy self-esteem. 

First of all it grows out of reflection, a mirror of our fellow human beings what we believe of ourselves and how worthy we are of receiving what we want and need without having to make an extra effort or adapt to every situation and person around us. Or the opposite phenomenon to behave overly autonomous as a rebellious sign of needing no one and nothing. Both are strategies to not get hurt in the attempt to receive love. 

We might think valuing ourselves has to do with how we are behaving, what we are feeling or thinking and it most certainly does but as mentioned before many of our behaviours and actions are actually operated by our unconsious protective mechanisms and patterns that we've aquired a long time ago, mostly in our early childhood when our brain wasn't able to reflect yet. When it was wired to develop strategies to protect our heart, our well-being and in the end our mere existence when we weren't taken care of properly, as we needed at each point. Unless we have uncovered all these blind, unconsious strategies and defense mechanisms, it's very likely that we've been unknowingly following them, behaving according to them, living them, getting into the same patterns and circles over and over again throughout our life. Self-sabotage without knowing, becoming our own self-fulfilling prophecy, wondering how we can ever escape it. How we can ever break through, change the outcome of our actions. A big mistake it would be to believe can achieve a different result using the same strategies. It is THE definition of being insane. Yet we all know the feeling of repeating our patterns wondering why we end up in the same situations.

For a long time I thought it was simple. Knowing your self-value, doing what you like, not caring what others think, knowing who you are and so on and on. For many years I've lived in a way that I thought I understood all about it, wondering why I would still end up in toxic relationships, being used, taken advantage of, and then left behind, ghosted without a word. Always I thought I was giving my best, seeing the good in all people, giving chances, taking care of them, trying to stay open minded, understand them, talk honestly and openly, communicating my every thought to create transparency and trust. I thought I was doing all the best I could to make the relationship work and I sure did as most of us do. Only...the other side of the coin of seeing the best in everyone, staying with them longer than I should is... Ignoring the red flaggs in favor of being loved, getting attention, ending up betraying myself.

The favor. The advantage behind all our actions, even if it seems there cannot be a benefit in them, harming ourselves over and over again, there must be a reason for all of it. There must be a certain component that will be beneficial to our mind and well-being. And there is. Always. Finding that advantage is a big part of the understanding process of how to unlearn our patterns, to look behind what would happen if we could choose a different behaviour. What if we let go of our control mechanisms and became vulnerable? Started to trust? Would we get hurt? Could we survive?  

Would we get hurt? Maybe. There is no guarantee of not getting hurt ever, which is the intrinsic characteristic of trust. But also there cannot grow love when we do not trust. Control is the opposite of trust and therefore love. Shall we not at least rather try to find authentic love for the price of perhaps getting hurt at a point instead of never knowing what true connection feels like? Could we survive if we got hurt? Yes. We always do. And this is what we need to learn. To truly understand and feel it in our hearts. We can survive anything. We are grown ups now, not children who need a caretaker to be alive. We can take care of ourselves. We do not need a romantic partner next to us to survive. It may hurt but almost all of us have experienced heart break one or the other way and learned that we get through it. Trust. Trust that experience.

But how to discover our strategies if they've become such an invisible part of us, pulling the strings without us even knowing. The answer will include different layers but mostly we will figure it out if relationships keep going into a similar direction over and over again. Here it's likely that it has something to do with our strategies. Uncovering the mechanisms can be the most important step to finally find a way out and develop new understandings of ourselves, learn new behaviours and train to make them become us. Catch ourselves in the moment we're applying our long established automatisms and switch, become aware of what we are doing and find a new concept or strategy of how else we could go about a situation (instead of running away or holding on to toxic behavior). The biggest part of our learning is to bring our theoretical knowledge into practice to convert it into feeling, becoming it. Uncovering our dysfunctional patterns and reprogram our unconsious behaviours into new functional ones.

All this underlying pain that caused me to betray myself over and over again, hanging in in unhealthy relationships, wasn't exactly visible to me over the last years, especially because of all my self developement, personal growth work that I've been doing for almost 20 years. It made me blind for the deepst core problem as my friendships and relationships to people in general grew deeper and more beautiful than ever before. With one exception: Romantic partners. Men. I felt like I've already understood so much about myself, it had turned me blind for the obvious as within these 20 years my process had started as I began to heal certain wounds and become a new version of myself... more outgoing, more self-aware, more selfless, more confident, more happy, more pure, responsible, open minded, caring, empathic, courageous and sometimes even vulnerable. What was the best version of myself I thought. A functioning version. A version that everyone loved. A version that everyone wanted to have in their life. A version that was admirable, likeable, lovable, inspiring for so many people. A version that got attention. The best version. The best version for everyone - except...

... Was that version also the best version for MY-self? Indeed it wasn't for where I am standing now. It got me holding on to people I would have rather stepped away from. Stay in situations with people that caused me pain, didn' respect me, didn't see me, had no interest in who I really was but needed me to solve their pain. What this version was lacking was one very important thing. Maybe the most important feature for our identity to truly be connected to ourselves. Boundaries. Where they belong. Values I had, to know who I am, what is important in my life and what is not. Values I had. To live them even for others. Responsibility. I overlooked one really important factor. That I was not the one needing to be better for everyone who wasn't. Living my values for all of them who couldn't. That I wasn't responsible for all the unhealed souls. That I wasn't responsible for people not wanting me in their lives. That I wasn't responsible for people treating me badly, for people using my trust, my honesty, my heart and my forgiveness. I wasn't responsible for their own toxic behavior. I became a proxy for the unhealed souls.

What I was actually responsible for was my own actions. And they did not include setting boundaries to the red flaggs I've been shown. I'd rather take more hurt, more humiliation and betrayal, trying to fix situations and relationships as I believed this was the way to make a relationship work properly. Now I know it is not as it was the mirror of all my missing self-worth. In opposite. By taking on other people's misbehavior I created the space for them to live their unhealed selves without understanding that in their world it is a confirmation that their behavior is ok. I myself held space for toxic dynamics instead of ending them by... Right. Setting boundries. I ended up betraying myself by letting people overstep them. Hurting me and begging them to still be with me. Pathetic. Sad. This deep longing of wanting to be loved for who I am. For wanting to be heard and seen. 

Boundaries. I thought I did have them, I thought I had set them. I was wrong. I couldn't see it clearly. My vision was blurred from all that I had learned throughout my life of what made people love me. I wasn't aware at any point that I was taking on all the dysfunctional behaviours of others, trying to fix them. I let them cross the line because I didn't know my line

, ending up betraying myself, alone, deeply hurt, manipulated and abused without having the awareness of how much too far it had gone.

Why? Because I could take it. I still can. I can take a lot. I'm a fighter. A warrior. A strong warrior. People admire me for that. My resilience is brilliant. Excellent. It's aspiring for more. I'm not broken. I'm not hurt. I can fight through it. I can manage. I always did. So brave, so strong, so full of energy and eagerness to make things better than they were before. 

The question I have today is a different one. It is not can I take more? More of the suffering, more pain, more betrayal, more shame, more blame, more hurt and humiliation. My question is the opposite. Why take more? Why not take less or more of the other side? More care, more kindness, more support, more love, more attention, more empathy, more compassion, more joy, more ease, more affection, more understanding, more peace. Less fighting. Less fighting for what should have been given to me in the first place. Only I didn't learn that. I did not learn that I don't have to work to be loved. That I do not have to fight to receive the love I deserve. I did know. I knew it in my head. But my heart couldn't feel it.

Manipulation and trauma-strategies are various but in the end causing all the same outcome. Separation instead of connectedness. Home. Belonging. As mentioned before they are formed by our early childhood brain as tools for protection of real life hurt. Tools to save us from being left alone in this dangerous world. They are designed to protect our existence. Because when we were children being deprived of love, care or warmth by our parents meant Death. Physical Death. We’re fighting for our lives here. This is significant to understand.

All this relationship turmoil is caused by our survival instincts. Training us to keep us as safe and sound as possible. Keep us in control of the situation. Control to safe our hearts. 

 

Only recently I had my latest out of the books encounter in my favorite field of practice with a grown man of 40 years. It was my first experience in that "new" state of mind (e) where I felt in utter awareness of my old mechanisms, my past mistakes and dysfunctional behaviours in relationships when getting to know a new potential partner. 

As my heart has been longing for love, true love, romantic love, one like a fairy tale romance, deep and true, I would rush into the next best person who gave me only the tiniest bit of attention, hoping that time it would work out. Preferably verbally (my love language: words of affirmation) being promised my perfect illusion, I would believe every word when clearly in reality none of the promised land had substance. Unconscious manipulation. I would only see what I wanted to believe in the other person, projecting my own best will, intention and potential of the relationship onto my partner. Head over heals, wanting to be loved and admired, giving my all away. Sometimes this would work for a short time when I got all the admiration and attention I needed, until I was pushed away again, rejected, outcasted, thrown away without any further warning when I wasn't fulfilling all their fairy tale wishes like a fairy from the heavens without any flaws but turned out to be a real human being, a woman from flesh and blood. A human with an individual personality, not here to serve the other person's needs and fulfill their expectations. 

And so I learned over and over again to become even better, more lovable, more... of more of more and remained in my self-fulfilling prophecy of harvesting superficial attention that had nothing to do with my personality, instead of the true deep love for who I really am.

 

This time, when I met that guy, I wanted to approach the situation differently with all the awareness that I was carrying with me. He really didn't impress me at first. I did not even feel very comfortable around him or excited. He barely said anything, rarely smiled and didn't seem to make much of an effort for holding the conversation up. It gave me discomfort. I understood the pattern. It seemed he didn't need to prove anything to me or himself. A stable person. A grounded person with no major troubles in his life as it appeared. Nothing that I could do to impress him or convince him of my worth. He did not need it. Owning his self-founded company, more cars than I could count, a nice flat, a big circle of friends and a family that all seemed to be in agreeable terms, his life appeared to be totally in balance with or without me. No need for me to be there and hold space for anything or heal anyone's trauma.

This seemed to be my shadow. Finally a man who was not a lost leaf in the wind like a ghost, floating around in the universe, not knowing who they were, trying to find release, their home and safe space in my company and care. This was a good sign. I got over my discomfort and decided instead of projecting any expectations, wishes or dreams on him to just give him a chance and slowly get to know him. As a person, a potential friend. A potential whatever. I wanted to give it my first real try without putting on my love glasses and truly get to know the complex person behind what I was seeing initially.

So far so good I felt curious and ready for a different experience in my real life practice space. The first night we wanted to go out, I had a bit too much to drink so I decided to instead sleep directly at his place. He seemed a bit indifferent, in a positive way. Not approaching me physically or even emotionally in any way, only making sure I had what I needed without any fuss around the situation. Like being at a friend's place.

When I woke up the next day I felt fairly out of order, ready to go home, shower, have a coffee and spend a day on the couch. He seemed to have different plans. Getting out of bed, looking for something to drink, he asked me to have breakfast or to hang out. We took a car to my place to eat and have coffee as he suggested a little trip to the outside of Berlin. The sun was shining, the flowers started blossoming and so we hit the road. Getting his old Mercedes Cabrio, opening the roof to let the sun in, I felt as happy as a child in the candy shop. One thing lead to another, he knew his way around, suggested more little stops, eating aspargus, exploring a little village in the country side and pick up some ice cream in the best Italian place on the way back. When he dropped me off it was already dark and I felt at ease and positively surprised what had come out of no expectations.

Over the week we would not have a lot of contact as his life consists mostly of work and he's not a fan of texting. Nevertheless he was interested in seeing me again and spontaneously had time again the next Sunday to take another trip. Things went unexcitedly stable but enjoyable as before. We talked a bit about things that came to our mind, I laughed a lot and felt happy even when it was different from all the other very emotional encounters that I was used to from my previous experiences. With him things seemed more rational. More stable. No butterflies, giggly, sweep me off my feet feelings but more slow consistency. No rush, no deep conversations where I already bare myself open, reveal every layer of my personality, trauma, pain and heart, laying a manual on how to handle me or if used in the wrong hands - destroy me to his feet. That's what I used to do in blind trust for people to then treat my heart with care. If only I told everyone how to handle me things would turn out to be well. No need to get to know me even. No need to even have an interest in me, make a healthy effort to find out who's that person behind that pretty smile.

Not this time. This time I wanted to do it differently and not give my all away in the first hours of meeting. Our communication consisted of less words. He wasn't a person of big words or an affectionate communicator in general. No compliments, no emotional reactions, a lot less of everything that I was used to which made it hard for me to read him. Reading him. Right because this is what I was used to do all the time. Reading people to make sure I will behave accordingly to what people may feel comfortable with. Read their needs, read their mind, read who they are. Not this time no. I was me. Only there. And he made sure I had everything I needed to feel ok. We would end up watching a late movie at his place after some pasta and a glass of wine that night. I fell dead into his bed as it was past my sleeping time. No communication about sleeping over or even coming to his house in the first place. Not needed as before. It seemed to just be ok the way it was. Until...The next morning, he dresses, goes to work, says bye, charges my phone, tells me to close the door behind me when I'm leaving and...Nothing.

Days pass by as I don't hear anything from him. As I know he doesn't like to write I remain patient. Waiting the whole week for a sign from him, I try to find the thin line between his needs and mine, figuring that I wasn't ok anymore not hearing anything from him for all these days. In my mind looking forward to seeing him again, finally pulling out some topics of my choice, something personal, getting to know each other on another level, putting on some nice clothes and make up, I felt some sort of excitement thinking about how that side of me would turn out on him. Well. Turns out it doesn't at all. With each day I don't hear from him my fire slowly starts turning weaker and unstable. As the week passes by, Friday night I send him a message: Was that it? Simple and clear. The next morning I will find the answer to my question on the phone. "I really enjoyed the time we spent together but since there are no romantic feelings I don't wanna waste your time anymore. Btw did you ring my door last night?"

Wow. That was. Something. Something unexpected. Something out of the books. It seemed what I had taken for stability was more of a being stuck in -surprise- protection mechanisms. Of being totally disconnected from his emotions. Reading this message I find myself laughing. Laughing to the skies as I cannot believe these words. So obvious, so transparent to what they actually mean even when you have no idea physically reading the plain letters of the words as what he may have meant, what belief construct was projected on me.

According to a social standard supposed to sound polite, I would see this as the opposite of social. Where have we ended up if this is the norm of handling separations?? I could not understand a single word, reading only the letters. „I don’t get it.“ my mom righteously states. No romantic feelings? From whom? Him? You?“. Exactly what I’ve asked myself. What does romantic mean anyway in this context? After two meetings. Not knowing anything of one another? Do you mean physical touch? Deep talk? Did I not expose myself fast enough like all the other times? Do you take two meetings as a rational elaboration for if a person could turn out to be the woman of your life when you have seen nothing of her personality at all or were you just not ready to commit to even get to know a person from your heart? 

Also you do not want to waste my time? Mirror? How can you waste anyone's time but your own anyways? Did you see that your message was the one of a coward, an unempathic asshole aka an unhealed, hurt child who covered up what was really going on by using words that sounded like they were "appropriate", polite or whatever they would make you believe about yourself and your identity? A polite rejection without hurt feelings?

Instead of writing in honesty: Dear Lina, I realized that I do not bring enough interest, motivation or patience to truly get to know you as a person as you would deserve it but rather ghost you without a personal interaction where you can also express your feelings and thoughts about the situation and what you expected of it because of my personal fear of being abandoned? As you did not make yet a move on me, I decided to just drop you because what I'm really afraid of, is that if I truly got to know you, understand what an amazing person you are with all your beautiful facets, gifts and heart, your aura, your energy, your perspective on life and the way you smile, when you look into the sun and your eyes turn from green-grey-blue into the deepest alive turquoise, I may fall for you and would potentially want you by my side, love you, be with you. But since I know you will go anyways and I cannot be sure you will develop the same feelings for me in the meantime and return my affection for you, I'll rather cut you off before there is any chance of even developing any emotional bond getting to know you. Too risky. Too much of a threat for my heart to be hurt. So I decided I will rather run away from you where I do not even have to face you in a personal conversation to make sure I'm safe. Flight mode.

Yes I was laughing in disbelief. Shock maybe because I was hoping for a grown, stable man but then got disappointed again. Heartboken. Not for myself. This had nothing to do with me. Heartbroken for that little boy, longing for love, sabotaging himself from finding it by protecting his heart so effectively that there was no way to get through. No willingness to be vulnerable. To be brave enough to look at the wounds. The hurt inside of himself. Am I not worthy of love? There it was again. One of my friends unknowingly wrote: This somehow devalues him. Nail on the head. He blindly devalued himself. For the sake of not being deserving of love. Self-fulfilling prophecy.

Friendly Reminder: We all are worthy of love, protection, care, empathy, kindness, joy, passion, pleasure, attention, peace, affection, to be heard and seen for who we are and much more. We at no point shall have to work for love. If someone makes us feel like we're not enough or too much... Always remember:

*~ We're Never too much but Always enough. ~*