Love & Hurt As Partners:Part 2
What if there’s a perspective that is always more helpful, more fulfilling, more peaceful, more satisfying, are you willing to keep gently exploring until you land upon it? Willing to remain open to it arriving unexpectedly? Willing to be at peace in the knowing that this might occur out of the blue if you simply keep sowing the seed and remain open?
Last time I was in Vancouver I was trying to meet up with a friend of a friend. I was staying here for the summer and looking to meet new people. My friend had introduced us and we’d been back and forth with messages, booking in provisional times, but with nothing ever managing to happen. The cycle was…. Are you open, let’s do something, oh sorry, something has come up, let’s do another time. Rinse and repeat.
And…. It was boring to me. I was getting tired of waiting around, being cancelled on and I was also in some work with my coach on not tolerating things that didn’t serve, not accommodating around everybody else, and asking more powerfully for what I want.
So… I tried it out…. This asking for what I want malarkey. “Let’s get a time where you know you can absolutely commit to it, and it’s ok if there isn’t one but if that is the case, we can leave it until there is”.
And you know what… we NEVER met up again. I heard from him but what aligned for me didn’t align for him. So we never met, and we never spoke again.
I remember being in mixed states about it – does it really work asking for what you want? Sure, it does because now I am free to meet other people to spend time with, but it also doesn’t because now I’m back to the beginning of knowing very few people here and wanting to create a community to socialise with and experience the city with.
Anyway, fast forward 4 months. After a brief return journey to the UK, I arrived back in Vancouver on Friday and was out for a drink on Tuesday evening with my friend who had made the introduction. She told me…. Oh by the way “X” is engaged!
I was like… whaaaaaaaatttt? And my logical mind went to… well that makes sense. I actually really respect that he was a no to hanging out and getting to know someone else whilst he was starting to get to know his current date. I mean, who knows if that was actually what he was doing and anyway, it’s not important as that wasn’t the gift in all this. Little did I know, the gift was still to arrive 48 hours later…
Which brings me to today, this morning whilst out for my walk by the beach, I was thinking about the conversation. And my mind went to… I wonder why he didn’t just say that? Just be honest! Who knows whether you were trying to keep me as a plan B, or whether you are just trying to manage my expectations, but for goodness sake, you don’t need to manage any of that.
I don’t need protecting, I don’t need wrapping in bubble wrap, stop seeing me as a weak, small, little thing that can’t handle the truth.
And…. Wow, what a gift this last realisation was …. This was news I could use. For over a decade I had been so unforgiving of myself for hurting my ex in the past when I chose to call it a day. Constant thoughts of he doesn’t deserve this, he is a nice guy and I’m so sorry, he shouldn’t have had to go through this. Kindness is a huge value of mine, and hurting someone has seemed to me for a long time as being the opposite of kind.
And I realised, I had been unknowingly seeing him as small, as weak, as needing protecting. My feeling pissed off about someone else seeing me as weak and small and unable to tolerate the truth was exactly the thing I needed to release the responsibility I had placed on myself to protect people from their hurt. Just because somebody doesn’t deserve it, doesn’t mean they can’t handle it. Doesn’t mean we have to treat them with kids gloves!
I’ve already seen a lot from this exploration I have been on around relationships, around forgiveness, around hurt and love as partners.
1) People don’t deserve to be spared hurt – these experiences are what make us strong, resilient, they help us discover the depths of our bouncebackability!
2) The more hurt you feel, the more it shows you love, and that is a beautiful thing to be able to do. To have the capacity to love and care at such a deep level.
3) I am not my past, I get to make different choices today.
And today’s one…
4) People might not deserve hurt, but that’s totally different to not being able to handle it. People don’t enjoy being seen as small or weak and I am doing them a disservice by creating them this way. There is no need to take on the responsibility of protecting people from hurt.
It is Thursday 2nd Feb 2023 and from this day on I will see everyone as GIANTS.
In loving service,
Lisa x