What Will You Do Differently?

When all is said and done, are you able to say what matters most to you?  And if so, would you stand for it no matter what?  Would you stand alone for it even if those you love do not support you?

Life is so fragile.  So unpredictable.  Do you know what you stand for and can you 

claim it fully?  Can you claim it without wavering?  Or are there things you have not addressed that you could lose the chance at addressing tomorrow and therefore, regret?

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A friend of mine lost both of his parents two months ago within a day of each other.  Yesterday, I learned that an old friend lost both of his parents in a car accident just two days ago.  It was his mother’s 78th birthday.  

Mother’s day is coming up in six days.  Both of these men will face their very first Mother’s days without their mothers.  Both will have to attempt to explain to their children where Grandma is for the first time without having a history behind them to fall back on of knowing what it is like to live into such a day.

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I worked with a life coach recently and she told me that I was addicted to narcissists.  I laughed and cried and laughed some more.  This was far from a surprise to me.  As abhorrent as I find narcissistic behavior to be, as difficult, as challenging, as much as I want to keep that textbook personality an ocean away from me and my psyche, clearly I still am trying to heal the wounding inside of me from all of the abandonment I felt having been raised by a textbook, classic Narcissist.  

You cannot heal a pattern by continually drawing the same personality towards you.  Not only have I continually recapitulated loss and abandonment by doing so, but this is also what is called INSANE behavior.  We all know this.  If we don’t, a quick tutorial: doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result is one of the classic definitions of INSANITY.

I consider myself to be a sane woman.  However, I do recognize that this particular vicissitude of mine could be characterized undoubtedly, as “insane.” 

I want to heal.  I want to heal.  I want to heal.  I want to heal.

One of the ways I have attempted to try to heal has been through tireless compassion and understanding of others with this same narcissistic quality.  But it does not work this way.  I always end up in the same place: exhausted, abandoned and hurt.

If from the inception, I was never supported, then the inner dialogue became “I cannot have the support I need in my life.”  

But nearing my 44th birthday, I no longer wish to believe this.  This is a core belief that I know is untrue, taught to me by a textbook narcissist who could not see past her own needs.

I look over the many failed friendships I have endured.  And as painful as it has been for me to watch my friends decide to walk away, I am fully culpable for the caretaking and the codependence I participated in.  I took care of big and loud personalities.  Famous people, not so famous people.  People whose needs were immense and exhaustive at the expense of my own.  And I have only myself to blame because I was still trying to heal a wounding in me.  “If I get this, I know will be okay.”

No.

I am okay.

I am okay alone.

I am more than okay.  

I can be loved in spite of what or how much I give.

And if I just sit here.  With or without giving.  I may even be loved anyway.  I know I can be, will be loved.  And yes, I may even be abandoned.  For some entirely separate reason.  It’s all part of the risk of loving.  But not without some great learning along the way.

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When I think about my friends and what they have recently lost, I know they are not debating whether or not their parents were narcissists.  But this is a critical time for us to show our humanity.  Not get wrapped up in minutiae.  It isn’t time to tell your spouse that they cannot go to the Wake because you don’t like someone who will be there: the sister-in-law or the cousin.  It is time to put yourself aside and think of the person in need.  

Decide what you stand for.  Offer that up in the most beautiful way imaginable.  Tell someone what they mean to you.  Give without expectation of anything in return.

Life changes in an instant.

What will you do differently today?

As for me, 

I am giving up my addiction to Narcissists.

Expressing my love LOUD and CLEAR. 

And having conversations with god.

With love.

5.7.12

Jill Bacharach