Looking beyond the veneer

It's amazing how things come to you when you're busy doing something else. Like hanging out the washing, or mowing the lawn. I was hanging out the washing earlier when I realized over the years I have missed so many opportunities mainly due to insecurities taking over, or thinking things that you believe to be true, only when you stop and take a closer look you realize that it's just another story you've been telling yourself.

Sometimes we get so caught up in the drama of what we think that we stick to the stories we've created rather than looking at the cold hard facts. 

You might feel unloved, but is it actually true? Are you? For years I felt not only unloved but unlovable. Not because I had any hard evidence of the fact, just what I felt deep down inside. The problem with feeling like something is true, is that we tend to then act as if it is true too. So for years I acted like I was unloved and unlovable! It became a habit, a way of life. I looked out actively for any tiny indication I could find that this was true. All the time I was looking for proof that I was unloved and unlovable. A double whammy. Anything that would indicate that actually the opposite was true would send me running in the opposite direction, if I brought myself to acknowledge this at all in the first place. 

I felt unworthy if someone so much as bought me a coffee. Why would they bother? I am unlovable, so buying a coffee for me doesn't fit! Is the person mad? What do they want in return? Something far more valuable?

Why? You might ask. I have no idea why. It seemed a good idea at the time. It seemed to make sense, to me at least. What purpose did it serve? In some bizarre way, it kept me safe. I didn't have to do anything that other people did, because I wasn't loved, I wasn't lovable enough. I guess this is a natural extension of the idea of not being good enough. It also seemed that whilst I wasn't loved, or lovable, I wasn't good enough either. It felt like I was constantly being compared to a couple of younger girls in my area, they were good enough because they were able to do things that I couldn't do. I realise now that it wasn't so much that I wasn't good enough, more that I was being encouraged to be the best I could be. But I took it to mean that nothing I did was ever good enough. That because I wasn't good enough, I therefore couldn't be loved either. In order to be loved, you have to be lovable, and I wasn't that either, or so I told myself. I never once saw myself as being in any way adequate. I shrugged off compliments, and lapped up anyone who told me I was stupid, because it fitted in with my beliefs. So relationships naturally didn't really work for me. It must be incredibly hard being with someone who cannot see their own goodness. Who feels that they are not worthy of good things. Who feels that they cannot be loved or lovable because they don't feel it in their hearts. Who actively look out for and pounce on any behaviour that could possibly back up the theory that I am not good enough, worthy enough, or lovable. In the end it seemed safer to be on my own. Finally I didn't have to spend days looking for clues to prove what I had been telling myself all along. I had my proof. Or so I thought.

Can I change the habit of a lifetime? Can I truly believe that I am loved and lovable?