Hmmmm The questions of the day....
It has been a trying year for all of us so far. I have so many friends and family that have lost family members, are having financial problems, health problems and so on. It is hard to keep ones head up and think positively.
I made a promise to myself at the beginning of the year that I was going to try my best to start each day with a positive thought, and for the most part I feel like I have done that. I do have days that I just feel like there is no point, but I snap out of that feeling as fast as I can and get on with my day. I have found myself feeling very sad lately. Have you ever felt sadness but you were not sure where the sadness is coming from? I wonder if this is just a part of suffering from Depression. I believe that all feelings have a root or cause. Just like all pain has an origin, so do all feelings. So where is the sadness coming from? My relationship with Deshawn is getting stronger every day. We are the united front, so that's not it....I am doing well in school, my weight is dropping, and for the most part all my needs are being met, so why so sad?
I was watching the final Oprah show today and she said that she found happiness in making others happy and helping them to improve their own lives. I asked once how one finds self worth and the answer I got most was by helping others find their worth. I feel like I do that to the best of my ability but when your help is refused, what do you do then? How do you get past that rejected feeling when you know what you are offering another is just what they need but they choose not to take it. Oprah said that when some one does not want what she has to offer she gives her blessing and walks away. I can't seem to walk away...Take my help and advise Damn it!!! So now my question is...if finding your self worth is in help others find theirs and they refuse your help...what then? I'm not sure I like the thought of my self worth being wrapped up in someone else...maybe I am missing something. I understand that I am responsible for my own self worth, but if I don't know what it looks like or feels like how can I find it?
I made a promise to myself at the beginning of the year that I was going to try my best to start each day with a positive thought, and for the most part I feel like I have done that. I do have days that I just feel like there is no point, but I snap out of that feeling as fast as I can and get on with my day. I have found myself feeling very sad lately. Have you ever felt sadness but you were not sure where the sadness is coming from? I wonder if this is just a part of suffering from Depression. I believe that all feelings have a root or cause. Just like all pain has an origin, so do all feelings. So where is the sadness coming from? My relationship with Deshawn is getting stronger every day. We are the united front, so that's not it....I am doing well in school, my weight is dropping, and for the most part all my needs are being met, so why so sad?
I was watching the final Oprah show today and she said that she found happiness in making others happy and helping them to improve their own lives. I asked once how one finds self worth and the answer I got most was by helping others find their worth. I feel like I do that to the best of my ability but when your help is refused, what do you do then? How do you get past that rejected feeling when you know what you are offering another is just what they need but they choose not to take it. Oprah said that when some one does not want what she has to offer she gives her blessing and walks away. I can't seem to walk away...Take my help and advise Damn it!!! So now my question is...if finding your self worth is in help others find theirs and they refuse your help...what then? I'm not sure I like the thought of my self worth being wrapped up in someone else...maybe I am missing something. I understand that I am responsible for my own self worth, but if I don't know what it looks like or feels like how can I find it?
Your self worth is never wrapped up in someone else. It shouldn't be, anyway. When your offer of help is refused, it's not about being rejected. Some people may be too proud to accept, some may just need to weather their own personal storm alone. Whatever the reason, your offer of love, help, comfort, whatever it is, that's coming from you and it's an accomplishment you should put a feather in your 'feel good' cap. Even if you're just sending them on with your blessing, that's worth something. The offer comes with honesty, love, and it doesn't get any better than that, honey. Love you!
ReplyDeleteMy punctuation makes that feel good cap sentence sound funny. Sorry. You know what I mean. LOL!
ReplyDeleteLyndi, It’s only human to take another's rejection personally. But we can never understand what their "stories" are -- what happened to them in the past, what losses they’d had, what dreams they watched die, etc. So their rejection is most likely related to something inside themselves: they feel they don't deserve help, they feel you are offering out of pity (even though you're not something in THEIR past leads them to believe people only offer help out of pity).
ReplyDeleteLet me share something very personal: several years ago I attended the Landmark program. I learned many valuable things but here (in short summary) are two of the most important to me:
* We create who we are over the years based on past experiences. Landmark calls this our "story" because it isn't the facts, it's our interpretation of, and response to, things in our lives. Think about someone who says, "I'm clumsy" or "I'm stupid". They weren't born clumsy or stupid. They were likely told over and over as a child that they were clumsy/stupid and that "became" who they are. But it isn't "the" truth. It's the story that person has decided is the truth. When we can truly discover the root causes for what shaped our personalities we can choose to create a new "truth" of who we are. Here's my "story" -- I was quite shocked when I realized how I saw myself: "I don't matter." It took remembering several childhood experiences to realize where that "truth" came from -- rejection by classmates, rejection by a teacher, dismissal of my tears by a parent who thought I was over-reacting. I internalized all of that as "I don't matter" and I became convinced that no one was a "real" friend -- they all hung around for various reasons. Or I would eventually drive them away without realized I was doing it. When I told all of this to my best friend she said, "But I told you all the time that you were my best friend and I loved you." But what she didn't understand, and what I was just learning, was that my personal "I don't matter" world-view filter would not let me SEE her actual love and care because, well, because I don't matter. So how could she possibly be sincere? She was probably just being nice, or showing me pity, or whatever. Our "story" becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy. So if you would have tried to help ME before I attended Landmark, I'd likely have rejected it because my deeply held belief that "I don't matter" simply would not have allowed me to accept your help.
I highly recommend Landmark for learning with amazing clarity who you are, what you want, and how you can get it. If you offered me $1million today and said I'd have to go back to the person I was 5 years ago I'd turn the money down. I'm quite serious.
But the bottom line is people have "stories" that you cannot know -- most of them don't even know what they are. A dear friend's story is "You're not important to me." I can guarantee that when "I don't matter" met "You're not important to me" during arguments it was NOT pretty! LOL But we both went to Landmark and it made a huge difference in our relationship. Back to the bottom line.... someone's story may simply prevent them from accepting help. They don't know why and certainly cannot tell you why, because our stories are so deeply inside us they simply "are who we are" so we have no way (without help) of stepping away from them and seeing the fallacy of our "reality" about who we are.
These concepts are very difficult to talk about because they are so different and personal for each person. But I hope this helps.