Always speak your mind. If you don’t, well, then, don’t complain!
A gentleman I met recently said he was finally divorcing his wife of 35 years. He told me that he had never been happy in the relationship. He said he was feeling liberated that he was moving on. But then he asked me this question: “When we have been wronged, let down, trampled upon and dumped in a relationship, why do we often not seek closure and move on, why do we cling on to the hurt and insist on prolonging the trauma?”
Without necessarily focusing on the gentleman’s relationship with his wife, this still is a very important question. There are a few reasons why this happens. For one, most people cling on to dead relationships hoping to revive them. Or they want to fight to reclaim their lost dignity while staying in the relationship. Next, we generally don’t like to directly confront a person who makes us uncomfortable or sometimes even miserable. In a very strange way we enjoy feeling sad, pitying ourselves and presenting ourselves to the world as someone who’s been wronged. The other reason pertains to the discomfort we feel in making the other person feel uncomfortable. When you take up an issue head-on with someone, that person is going to most likely squirm. And you, being the good soul that you are, don’t want that person to feel like a worm. But unless you tell someone, who seems to take you for granted and so piles atrocity upon atrocity on you, that you don’t like being treated in a certain way, how do you expect that person to respect you and treat you any differently?
What you must understand is very simple. Don’t let anyone take you for granted. The moment you allow anyone to do that, you have lost your right to complain about your Life! And you don’t have to do much to push someone back. Just speak your mind, draw your boundaries and set a clear protocol that you don’t appreciate any trespassing or over-stepping.
Ultimately, if someone pisses on you, or tramples all over you, you, more than that person, are responsible for the way you are feeling. So, if you don’t want to feel miserable, stop clinging on to relationships that make you feel miserable. You don’t have to be rude. You just need to be firm – no matter who that person is. Have a brutally honest conversation. If you can’t do that, write that person an e-mail. Basically, communicate – efficiently, effectively and without mincing words. Seek a closure, with such communication, to whatever bothers you about the issue or the person. When you do this, you will feel truly liberated and totally at peace with yourself!
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