“When presence is expected but not protected {we think} maybe they’ll see me if I love them hard enough but here’s the truth about that: no amount of over functioning will make the emotionally unavailable show up. No amount of loyalty will make the unstable feel safe to love.  No connection is worth keeping if it constantly costs you your clarity, confidence, or your sanity,” Jay Douglas.  This is the truth for every relationship we have but it speaks highly to the relationship we have with ourselves.  The way society functions (perhaps human nature) is that we have to adhere to these unwritten, often unspoken rules of how we interact, what we expect, what we are supposed to look like, how we are supposed to behave in certain environments.  That includes everything down to the way we look up to the things we are willing to say.  We train ourselves to run ragged on the whims of others with the hopes they will reciprocate something and we end up over functioning to compensate for what they are unwilling to give and what we were unwilling to give to ourselves. 

When we have people in our lives who treat us this way, we need to understand it has nothing to do with us.  Their inability to see our worth is a matter of their blinders, not our ability to live up to their expectations.  We only need to live up to our own.  It isn’t fair for anyone to have to be what someone else wants over their own desires and we create the freedom we want in our lives by doing what is in our hearts.  We have to understand that our presence and connection to source and ourselves is more important than the connections we hope to have with people.  Real connection is forged from an understanding of the spirit/soul within individuals, not our ability to contort ourselves into what someone thinks makes them happy for that moment.  Those types of relationships are fleeting and they are easy to fall into because some of us are so engrained with people pleasing and seeking validation that we are able to be what anyone wants.  But that isn’t real love. That isn’t reciprocity.  That isn’t a relationship—that is making ourselves a source of entertainment for someone else.

Learn to be ok with disappointing people.  Let them be disappointed.  We aren’t their children and if someone isn’t happy with our actions that’s no indication of our value as people.  We are here to sort out that relationship with our purpose, not to be responsible for someone else’s.  It can get confusing because I do believe with my heart that we are also here to help each other as our skills, wants, and abilities are complementary.  We were born with the inherent ability to help each other move forward in life.  We’ve gotten so consumed with competition and being number one that we feel like we have to put our needs first.  No ones desires outweigh someone’s needs, nor is it our responsibility to fulfill what someone refuses to do for themselves.  It isn’t our responsibility to tolerate what someone deems we are worthy for.  We are here to build a life, an existence that is meaningful to us, to fulfill our purpose.  It is only in doing that where we find fulfillment.  Don’t waste our time with people who don’t appreciate or respect that and certainly don’t waste time that don’t appreciate or respect us.  Walk away because the sacrifice if all that keeps us who we are isn’t worth it.