This is a real struggle I face on a regular basis. I hate disappointing people and so I try to please everyone. What that means for me, is that I often neglect what I want. I’m so concerned about pleasing everyone else around me, doing the right things and saying the right things…it’s frankly, exhausting.
I feel often times like I am living a double life. This came out recently while talking to someone close to me. I feel like I’m living a double life. There’s this image of me I’m trying to uphold and then there is the real version of me so stressed out and nervous and anxious that is just so tired.
I don’t know how to reconcile the two. I believe that parts of me are the things I’m trying so hard to be. Then these is the reality of who I am – which is this imperfect person just trying to do my best. I get really beaten down by these ideas that people might be disappointed in my choices.
I believe this comes from years of being made to feel like I needed to constantly work at getting approval. So I still work really hard at it.
The thought of disappointing someone, especially someone close to me, breaks my heart. So I worry about it constantly. It drives me insane but I haven’t really learned how to turn it off yet.
I’ve gotten really used to getting props for doing so well that I really try and avoid the disappointing stuff. If I think it’s going to disappoint someone, I shy away from having the conversation. I know this is part of me avoiding being uncomfortable or having uncomfortable conversations.
It’s also partly in the way people have responded to me when I share things that have been disappointing. I have felt judged or like I have to explain the “why” behind my decisions and that becomes overwhelming often times. The burden of being so public about my life and choices is that sometimes I feel the need to really justify what I’m going or try and decide if some things are things I should just keep to myself.
In any case, I’m at war with myself internally. I wish I could care less about what others thing, but I do care. I really do care but that is part of the problem I have with myself. I care so much more about what others think that I end up neglecting myself or what I want.
Sometimes I just want what I want whether it’s good for me or bad for me. I have to learn to make decisions for myself and not worry so much about what everyone else might think.
Basically I’m a work in progress and I have to get more comfortable with the idea that I might fail and I might disappoint and that is okay.
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