Who wants that perfect love story, anyway?
Cliche.
Cliche.
Cliche.
Some realizations are so powerful that they must become blog posts. This realization is of that magnitude.
Today's post is inspired, but not sponsored, by Part II (On The Run) by Jay Z.
And if loving you is a crime, tell me why I bring out the best in you?
...
I don't care if they give me life. I get all of my life from you.
The Carters' love story is one that demonstrates the power and importance of love. and choice. and forgiveness. and grace. and all of the beautiful things that can happen when we exercise all of those things together.
I've been going deeper and healing more re: my relationship with men. My expectations of men. My beliefs about men. My fears of men.
This healing is intragenerational so we'll start with a story.
My grandparents, my mother's parents, were married until death. I grew up assuming that they were always happily married, especially as they raised my mother and her siblings. But, that wasn't the case.
I'm going to make this part as quick as possible because... privacy.
Their relationship was emotionally tumultuous. My mother, and her siblings, experienced parentification in their childhoods because of it. My grandmother would talk about my grandfather's habits and choices. She'd make assumptions, and would paint him as "the bad guy" in her talks with the children.
My mother, a Libra Sun, would or had apparently tried to stick up for her father. She tried to offer a different perspective to help establish peace in the relationship. She was trying to be supportive and helpful. My grandmother did not enjoy this.
So, long story short: my mother would stick up for her father and, when she did, she would be abandoned and rejected by her mother.
What did this teach her?
That to choose a relationship with a man would mean abandoning herself. Sticking up for and desiring connection to a man was an act of self harm, because she would experience emotional pain as a result of it. It taught her that it was wrong to want a relationship with a man.
When we believe that something is morally "wrong", and we do it anyway, we feel guilt. Guilt is when we do something wrong. Shame is when we, ourselves, are seen as wrong. When we believe that something about us is wrong, we feel shame. We believe we are inherently bad for whatever that is.
In this case, my mother learned that it is inherently wrong to want to have a relationship with a man. She learned that it is bad to defend a man or to stick up for him and his perspective. Watching her mother's behavior, she also learned that men are inherently untrustworthy. She learned that it is good and right to assume the worst about a man and to push him away as a result.
These are very frustrating beliefs to have when you're choosing to have love relationships with men.
I've observed my mother to be a suspicious person.
Growing up, as it relates to my father, she was very quick to see the worst in him, or to tell stories about him being a bad person. Their relationship was tumultuous. On and off. For about 22 years. Until my father died.
When the relationship was good, things were great. I was emotionally neglected and they lived in their own bubble. But between them, things were great.
When things were bad, they were terrible. She would tell stories about how he was manipulative and he was just using her and that he didn't love her, he just loved what he could get from her. They would break up. He would move out.
And I always preferred when they weren't together. Because that's when I would get more love and care from my mother.
Long story short, I can see how her upbringing influenced this pattern. It's very aligned with a disorganized attachment style, but that I won't make claims of. These are just observations that are helping me connect the dots in my own story.
As a consequence of these patterns, I inherited and observed and experienced men to be untrustworthy and unstable. I believed men to be dangerous and reckless and evil and inherently wrong. I believed the desire to want men and to desire men was self harming and bad.
[I observed myself assume a new potential interest of mine to be a player, entertaining other women. I had no proof. Consciously, I'm confident in myself. I'm a real catch. Truly. I'm amazing. Subconsciously, I held the belief that men only want sex. and lots of women. and that they are not faithful. That means it doesn't matter how amazing I am. Because it's not about me. It's about who they *inherently* are. :))))) Interesting how these things are passed down.]
Growing up, I had two older step sisters. The youngest, about 16 years older than me, I think. My older sisters would sit me down and talk to me about my father. They were trying to support me and protect me. I believe they were trying to manage my expectations.
They would tell me that my father loved me and that he just couldn't show it. They would tell me that my father wouldn't show up for me. They would tell me that my father wouldn't be a stable figure in my life. They would tell me that he just couldn't be a good dad, and that he still loved me but he just was made to hurt and abandon me, basically.
They were well intentioned. Their actions didn't get the results they were seeking. These meetings began to reaffirm the stories in my DNA that men were not to be trusted or relied on or allowed into my heart.
I don't remember ever being open to my father. I imagine that I was at some point, when I was really really young. One of my favorite pictures with my father was probably taken in 1999 in like an airport or something. I haven't been able to find it since he's passed away, but I look like the most happy baby in the world and I look like I adored my dad.
Growing up, I was ashamed of my father. He wasn't present. I used to tell people that he'd died. [I'm not lying about his death now, I promise he's really dead. lol] It was easier to say that he was dead than to say that he'd abandoned me. Or that he didn't want to be a dad to me. Or that he was just incapable of being a dad to me. Or that he was addicted to drugs and he would rather be out, living life on drugs than picking me up from school or coming to parent-teacher conferences. I didn't know what to say.
As a child, I didn't really understand what was going on. All I knew was that my dad couldn't be trusted to stick around. So, I never enjoyed the time I had with him.
Yes, this is all very in alignment with the experience of having a break in the bond between a parent and child. I remember and feel the experience.
So, when my dad would come around, and my mom would ask (parentification) whether or not my dad should be allowed to come back around, I would always say no. I had observed the pattern. I knew what was going to happen. I knew how things were going to end. I knew they'd talk about wanting to be a happy family and wanting him to participate in raising me. And I knew they'd last a few months before getting into fights and arguments and him being kicked out and sent somewhere else on the greyhound bus.
I knew the pattern well, and I never understood how my mother didn't. I never understood why she kept trying. I resented her for it. I resented her for continuing to hurt me with her poor choices. I judged her for wanting love. And I judged her for wanting a happy family.
I grew up to feel this anger and resentment towards all of the women in my life who got boyfriends and love. I was angry at them for wanting love in the first place. I was trying to protect them from the inevitable harm to them and to me that would come as a consequence. I was trying to talk them out of being in love and abandoning me as a consequence.
I thought I was jealous. It wasn't jealousy. It was fear of men. Distrust of men. Protection of my loved ones, and my own emotional wellbeing, as I'd be the one left to pick up the pieces when it all went to shit.
A lot of that energetically has been cleaned up with other women. Mostly because I understand boundaries and don't take responsibility for the emotional wellbeing of my friends, although I choose to show support and provide emotional labor when available.
But what I've been cleaning up most recently is how this shows up for me.
As I'm sure you can imagine, these beliefs did not do very much for me in my own love life.
A part of me resented myself for wanting love. I've felt ashamed of wanting relationships with men. I felt like I was betraying myself for wanting to be loved by men. I felt like I was setting myself up for disappointment.
I developed a defeatist attitude in love. Growing up, I wished that my mother would stop trying to make the relationship with my dad work. I didn't understand why she'd keep going back to the good feeling if it just always ended in pain.
I thought it would be better to skip to the part where it's over.
This thought has been fucking me up.
Turns out, a subconscious part of me has not been open to men. at all. Because, "I know how it's going to end. So let's be efficient and skip to the part where it's over."
I get it. I've been protecting myself. But, as with most protective inner children, this is not the best feeling way to get the result I want. Especially not when the result I want is to be in a loving, healthy relationship.
To be fair, the plan is rock solid coming from like a 5 year old. I didn't understand that relationships and emotions were complex.
I forgive myself, and I love myself. and still I'm like DAYUM. It really be your own subconscious.
But alas, we heal. We forgive. We move on.
So, what's the result I want? A feeling of safety and security. What's the solution my inner child came up with? Separating myself from all men, forever. Why doesn't that work? Because I want to be loved by a man, and if I don't get a forehead kiss in the next 48 hours, I'm going to lose my shit. What was I missing? An understanding of the interpersonal skill needed to establish and maintain relationships.
In other words, a feeling of safety and security can be created between two people. A feeling of safety and security can be created in a relationship. I don't have to isolate myself from the world in order to get a feeling of safety and security. I don't have to deprive myself of the joys of connecting with men in order to feel safe and security.
Practically, this looks like a lot of different things that I don't want to write here.
But all we need to understand is that my parents relationship wasn't destined to fail. My parents were not wrong for trying to make it work. My parents mistake was that they weren't ready to have a better feeling relationship. They weren't seeking answers outside of other family/friends who don't have the interpersonal skills needed to have healthy relationships, themselves. So, they were choosing to have the tumultuous relationship dynamic by not seeking out and choosing to create a better feeling one.
My mother wasn't hurt by love. I wasn't hurt by love. We were hurt as a natural consequence of trying to do without an adequate understanding of how.
Men didn't hurt the women of my lineage because they are inherently flawed and unworthy. The men and women of my lineage hurt one another because none of them knew how to have healthy, interpersonal relationships. And it's not anyone's fault. A lot of these concepts and skills are "new". It's all just a natural consequence of living in a hyper-masculine world that doesn't prioritize emotional wellbeing or health. And there's no need to be in the vibration of blame. We can understand where things come from in order to problem solve. Nothing more and nothing less.
Years ago, we didn't understand electricity. As we, as humans, grow, there's no need to beat ourselves up over the mistakes we made when we didn't know of a better feeling way to exist. We just adapt to the better feeling way until we have a new normal, and then we're on to the next break through.
We've believed that men have hurt us because there is something inherently wrong with them that make them harmful to us. This is not true. Men are not inherently evil. Men are human, just like us. And we both play parts in the stories of our pain and suffering. I'm releasing blame and shame and guilt, and I'm moving into greater and greater states of compassion and love and understanding of myself and my lineage and men.
I'm understanding that forgiveness is a part of every relationship. Because, a relationship is two realities becoming one. This means, another living, creating being is coming into the reality that you are living and creating in. They are coming with their own traumas. Their own stories. Their own fears. And their own needs. When we communicate, we make a lot of assumptions. We assume that people will understand where we are coming from. We assume that people will know the words that we are using. We can assume that people are having the same thought processes and experiences that we are. And those assumptions are not always true. So, when two people, from two different places, with two different perspectives, are coming together, there are moments of misunderstanding. There are moments of mistakes.
Our job isn't to read each other's minds. Our job is to be able to express what's alive within us. Our job is to be able to listen and to seek to understand what is alive within another. Our job is to advocate for our own needs and to be flexible with how those needs are met. Their job is advocate for themselves and to be flexible with how their own needs are met. Our job is to determine compatibility. Our job is to forgive one another and hold each other in compassion and grace when we inevitably make mistakes as we act out of old stories and fears and traumas.
Because we don't live in a world where everyone is healed. We don't live in a world where everyone is being raised by emotionally mature people.
We don't live in a world where everyone is perfect. And that's okay. Perfection doesn't leave any room for growth. And mistakes are a natural consequence of living life on the leading edge of creation, where the goal is growth and discovering better and better ways to enjoy life on earth. Finding better ways means we are always coming into an awareness of the truth that our old ways weren't the best feeling ways. This is easier to accept and shift when we aren't beating ourselves up with fear, shame, and guilt.
I realize now that the only thing that makes a relationship worth putting energy and effort towards is the desire to be with one another. Choice.
I used to be afraid of breaking up and making up. I was afraid of repair in relationships. That put me in a position where I could never allow in long lasting relationships because break and repair are normal, natural occurrences in healthy, long lasting relationships. It's safe not to run away from conflict. Conflict is the gateway to intimacy and closeness and the deepening of bonds and the securing of relationships when we navigate it correctly. And I give myself forgiveness and grace for all of mistakes I made while learning to navigate conflict correctly. And I extend that forgiveness and grace to men for the mistakes they've made while learning to navigate conflict correctly.
Blaming people and harping on mistakes isn't good teamwork. Trying to do anything to be right and to look like the "good" person in a situation isn't good teamwork. Trying to do anything to avoid making mistakes isn't a good exercise for building better interpersonal skills. Mistakes are okay. Mistakes are a part of the process.
Men are good enough even when they make mistakes. Men are good enough even when they don't do it perfectly the first time. Men are worthy of love even when they make mistakes. Men are worthy of grace and understanding and compassion and love. And so am I.
It is safe and good to want relationships with men. It is safe to experience break and repair in relationships with men. It is safe to forgive men. It is safe to be loved by men. It is safe to be taken care of by men. It is safe to love men. It is safe to trust men. It is safe to have an interpersonal experience with men that no one in my family line has ever had before.
I am no longer cutting people out of my life based on their mistakes. Instead, I'm determining who I allow into my life based on whether or not I like them as a person. If I like them as a person, and they are willing to see things differently and show up differently and to work with me, then I am willing to experience repair in the relationship. This puts me in a position where I am no longer on the "defense" in love [or any other type of relationship]. I'm not afraid of discomfort or pain or betrayal. I can process hurt, and I can move forward from it. This doesn't mean I desire hurt. It means I can live my life without the fear of it holding me back. This is what it means to be free and empowered. This work has put me in a position where I interact with the world in a way that I've never considered before. For that, I am grateful.
I hope you liked this post. And I hope it was helpful to you. I hope it helped you view relationships and men and yourself and forgiveness in a better feeling way. I'd love to hear from you in comments and emails and DMs.
Also, if you'd like to learn how to identify and shift unhelpful stories in your own life, you can join my elevate course, which will help you do this amazingly empowering and freeing work for yourself. Check that out and join here.
Love you all so so much.
Talk soon,
Nathhughes
