UNCONDITIONAL PROOF: Why I Sometimes Wish Awful Things Would Happen to Me

Have you ever felt like you wanted something horrible to happen to you, just as a test, to see if someone cared about you enough to do anything?

I know it's the morning after Christmas, but I've been feeling so down lately.

I was wondering if anyone else has experienced this feeling. I have it quite often, actually. I talked about it recently with a friend of mine.

Now, I've only mentioned this feeling twice, to two different people. One said I was completely insane. That's why I've been so reluctant to share this emotion. I had a feeling I was crazy, and I didn't want to hear it from multiple people, I didn't want that confirmation that there is something wrong with me. But I finally opened up about the feeling to another friend when we were both questioning a few of our relationships.

We were walking out in the cold that night, and just talking about everything as we saw it, felt it, experienced it. And, because I kept thinking it and couldn't hold it in any longer, I blurted, "Do you ever just wish that something bad would happen to you just to see if anyone actually cared?"
There was not even the slightest pause in conversation. She gasped and said, "Oh my gosh, yes!" and started telling me of the times she's felt it, too.
After this discussion, I believe I've figured it out. It's not that I actually want to get hurt or enjoy pain or wish any severe harm on myself or others, because I really don't. I don't want others worrying needlessly about me, and I don't want to need the help of others. I just want to know, without a doubt, that, even in the hardest of times, the people in my life who say the words "I love you" to me, actually mean it. I want the security of "we've been through some of the hardest times ever, but we're still strong and we still love each other". I want that more than anything in the world.

It's the difference between having a pair of earrings that might be diamond, and knowing that those diamond earrings are real. For example, you know someone loves you when, if you end up in the hospital, that person rushes to your bedside the moment he or she finds out, no matter where he/she is, and what he/she may have been doing. There are those people in your life that think, "Oh well, I hope she's okay..." and go on scrolling through their status updates on Facebook. There are those people who think, "It's 3 am, I have to work in the morning, I'll go see her tomorrow night or something" and roll back over. I don't want that. I just want to know that someone really, truly, unconditionally loves me.

 

Which pair is real, can you tell? The first or the second pair?

There's a difference between saying it and meaning it. In fact, we abuse the word "love" in today's culture. "Oh, I love chocolate!", "Oh my gosh! Your boots are so cute, I love those!", "I love tulips! They're so pretty!", but there's a difference. If a chocolate bar was in a car accident, you wouldn't try to rescue it. If those boots were being stabbed by a strange man in an alleyway, you might be afraid of him and look at him funny, but you're not going to fight him off and call the cops. And if a vase of tulips was trapped in a burning building, you would hardly be the one rushing in to drag it out. So, why use the word "love"? We use it all the time without thinking about the implications of the word, what that word is really supposed to mean. And it's causing doubt. Doubt in people like me. Doubt because this word doesn't mean what it's supposed to. Doubt because we never really know if it's truly love. Doubt because we don't know the strength of the word. Not without proof. And that's what I want. I want to know, without a doubt, that the word "love" is unconditional, forever and for always, and without judgment or reservation.

Instead, we're throwing around the word "love" like we should be throwing around words like "like", "enjoy", "prefer", and "favor". "I enjoy chocolate", "Oh my gosh! Your boots are so cute, I like those!", "Tulips are my favorite. They're so pretty!" Save "love" for the big things. The things that mean more to you than anything else in the world. The things you would give up your life for. The things you would rather die than live without. Your mom, dad, siblings, children, step-relations, half-relations, significant other, aunts, uncles, cousins, pets, best friends, etc. I know, I'm guilty of it, too ("I love Zelda, chewy spree, and books!"), and doing so places the most important people in my life on the same level as The Legend of Zelda, Chewy Spree candy, and my bookshelf full of fiction novels. As much as I enjoy having those things, I wouldn't risk my life to save them in the event of an emergency. Now, my family and friends, on the other hand? I wouldn't have to think twice. Heck, I probably wouldn't even have to think once, because I know I love them.

I want to know that my devotion, my unconditional love, is returned. I'll prove it to them, if they need me to. I'll find a way. I'm here for them, no matter what, and I've told them that, but do they really know it? If it came down to the wire and they desperately needed someone to do something drastic for them, like donate a kidney or run into a burning building, do they know for sure, without a doubt, that I would volunteer? I wonder if they know that I would, because sometimes, I don't feel like I know if they would. As much as they coo at me that they love me, I can never be sure. It's like those big family reunions where you feel kind of left out because you're the cousin who lives on a different continent and your long lost relatives all tell you they love you and give you those careful, guarded hugs with their unfamiliar perfume that stings your nose and makes your eyes water, and their hard slaps on the back that force your spinal column in so you have to actually stand up straight for once instead of slouching all the time; but then you realize that you won't hear from these people again until the next family reunion in ten years, so why does it matter if they tell you they love you, because it's not going to mean anything for the next decade? It's like when you walk past someone you know in a hallway, and you smile at each other, and proceed to ask each other, "How are you?" and you both always respond with, "I'm good, how are you?" and then the other person responds that they're "good" and you keep on walking by. Neither of you is simply "good" and both of you know it. It's ceremonial. You do it simply because it's expected of you. Just like, when someone says "I love you", you feel obliged to say it back, whether you mean it or not, so as to keep the relationship alive.

 

But I want "I love you" to mean something more than it does. That's why I'm searching so hard, underneath all of the obligatory responses, forced hugs, and ceremonial behaviors to find the real heart of the people around me. Do they really, truly, beyond the shadow of a doubt, love me in the way that love is meant to be expressed? That's why I sometimes wish something bad would happen to me, in spite of the fact that I despise most types of pain and am afraid of a lot of things. Because, deep down, the most important thing in the world to me, more important than my fears and pain, is just knowing that I matter. Just knowing that someone loves me.

Is it selfish to want this? Probably. In fact, unconditional love is given out while expecting nothing in return. I give out unconditional love. And no, I don't expect it in return, but that doesn't mean I don't want it, I don't need it. We're all human, and being selfish is our nature. And it's naturally human to want to both give and receive unconditional love. It's what makes this life worth living.


{{For those of you who were curious, the real pair of diamond earrings is the first pair. The second pair is CZ (cubic zirconia).}}

Merry Happy Christmas Holidays!

On my last blog, I did a holiday post that I thought I ought to rewrite and repost. There's a subject that keeps coming up around this time of year that we have a tendency to push to the back of our minds. 

"Merry Christmas" or "Happy Holidays"?

Now, I'm going to be honest, I say "Merry Christmas". Why? First, it's the holiday I grew up with, being raised in Catholicism. Second, it's a country custom. Christmas is a widely celebrated holiday in America, and that's not something you can ignore. In fact, companies advertise for Christmas, make special deals for Christmas, change hours and hire more employees around Christmas, etc. In America, Christmas is the holiday. So we say "Merry Christmas".

To those of you who don't celebrate Christmas, please understand that, when someone says, "Merry Christmas", it's hardly a measure of ill will meant toward you. The truth is, it's impossible to tell by simply looking at someone what religion they are, what they believe in, and what holidays they celebrate. If you're Jewish and someone wishes you a "Merry Christmas", you don't need to get offended. How could they know you were Jewish? Besides, "Merry Christmas", "Happy Holidays", or any other phrase used around this time of year is just wishing you well. No one says anything like this in the hopes of offending someone.

Granted, people who say "Merry Christmas" shouldn't get up-in-arms about people being polite and saying "Happy Holidays", either. If you call your tree a Holiday tree instead of a Christmas tree, that is your decision based on your belief system. Here in America, we have the freedom to do things like that and call our trees whatever we so choose. So, yes, you have the right to say "Merry Christmas", don't abuse it and yell at other people for choosing instead to say "Happy Holidays" because there are numerous other holidays during this time of year.

I'm sure, if you went to a country that didn't celebrate Christmas, but another holiday on a country-wide scale, you would wish each other well for a different holiday all the time. Would you get offended if you were, for example, in India during October, and someone mentioned Diwali and wished you well for the festival, even though that may be something you don't celebrate? Would you then get offended if they didn't wish you a "Merry Christmas" in December while you were there?

The fact that people can fight over the proper way to wish someone well during a time of year irks me greatly. Would you get offended if someone said "Good morning" when, in your part of the world, it was night? No, you shouldn't! Nobody ever means offense, so everyone needs to climb down from their high horses and be happy that someone wants the best for you during this time of year.

No offense? Good. None taken.

TRUST Part 2: Pouring Salt in the Wounds

So, in my last post, I told you part 2 of the TRUST saga was coming, and here it is.

These are going to be some more specific examples from my own life, and the lives of some people around me. For the sake of protecting the innocent, names have been changed, and situations will be a little vague.


STORY #1
When Alice went off to college, she entrusted a family member with control over a bank account full of money she intended to use for school. At first, this family member was pretty good about giving Alice the money she needed for whatever she needed. Alice would simply send a text or call, and the money would be transferred into her checking account, like they had arranged. One night, however, Alice was studying for a test, and when her family member texted to ask her if she had received the last payment, she didn't respond. Some short time later, that family member decided that Alice clearly didn't need that money anymore, and that it could be used for other things. So that person took all the rest of Alice's college money, and used it for something else. When Alice found out, she was furious. How could her own family member steal her college money like that? She needed that money, and her family knew that. So, after Alice had put her trust in this family member, it was betrayed. Alice has been trying to make amends, but it's hard. At family functions, she says there a lot of fake smiles and hugs and kisses, but she's still upset about it. It was a lot of money to trust someone with, and clearly, that person was not to be trusted in that way.
So now, is Alice supposed to just forget that it ever happened and forgive this person? Even if/when she does, she will probably never trust that person with money again. Experience says not to, so why should she?

STORY #2 and STORY #3
Now, I'm going to combine two different stories into one, explaining the two different outcomes because they have almost the same scenario.

Kiley was dating this guy Brandon, and they'd been dating for a while, when she found out that her best friend, Simone, was hitting on him. She ignored it because she thought Brandon loved her. After all, they'd been together for a while, and they were the two people Kiley trusted the most. Simone told her she would never do something like that to her best friend. Needless to say, Brandon cheated on Kiley with Simone. Well, now what? Here are the outcomes as they've been experienced:

1. Brandon and Kiley broke up. Kiley went her own way, but she's too hurt at this point and even still to try and make up with either of them. (Brandon and Simone actually got together in this version of the story). Her boyfriend, who claimed to love her, and her best friend, who said their friendship was more important than that kind of stuff, have both betrayed her. She kind of lost touch with a lot of people, and lost almost an entire friend circle that was based on her dating Brandon, and even a friend circle around Simone. (Now, in this version of the story, Kiley didn't believe that Brandon really did love her, and she was talking to guys behind his back while they were together, but she never actually performed an act that could be officially considered "cheating"). Of course, all of Brandon's friends agree with Brandon, and all of Simone's friends agree with Simone. Now, there are alliances, and if you're friends with one of the group, you can't be friends with both sides. Kiley doesn't want to be around them, if she can ever help it. People are telling her constantly that she's not handling the situation well, and that Brandon and Simone are happier without her.

2. Kiley took Brandon back, despite what he did, and tried to make the relationship work. Even still, she has a lot of insecurities about him. Every time they fight, she asks herself, Is he going to go off now, and be with some other girl because I made him upset? She's afraid when he talks to and hangs out with other girls, and she doesn't always trust what he says when he's out with the guys or doing stuff. (So, in this story, Simone is actually Kiley's roommate, and, despite everything, still tried to make advances on Brandon for a while afterward). Now, everyone begged Kiley to make up with Simone because, after all, they were in the same friend circle. But how could she? She didn't think she could trust her, and their entire relationship was based on that trust. (In this version, Simone also never confessed that what she did was a mistake, and hardly ever talks to Kiley, hanging out instead with all of Kiley's old guy friends). Kiley lost friends because she couldn't make up with Simone, she couldn't control her insecurity/paranoia, and she couldn't make everyone in the situation happy. Now, all she wants to do is leave, so she doesn't have to deal with all of these people anymore.
If you were Kiley, how could you forgive Simone and/or Brandon? After the two people who were the closest to you, who you had the most trust in, betrayed you..?


Do you see what I'm saying? Sure, eventually, the wounds will heal. But the fact of the matter is, they'll become scar tissue, instead of healing seamlessly.

Trust is key to relationships. It's strong and can withstand some wear and tear, but once you break it, it's not easy to put it back together, and it'll never be exactly the same again. That's why, when people are frequently hurt, they have a harder time trusting others.

TRUST Part 1: Why It's Virtually Impossible to Forgive and Forget

It takes time to heal, and that's something we all need to understand, but clearly don't.

I'm going to provide an analogy that I'm sure we've all experienced at some point in our lives by now. You break something: a mirror, a mug, a toy, etc. You have one of two options now that you've broken that thing: 1. You throw the broken object away, or 2. You keep and try to repair the broken object. Well, it makes perfect sense to throw it away now, doesn't it? I mean, it's broken after all, what good is it? But let's say it's your favorite coffee mug or tea cup or something (it can be whatever you want for the sake of getting the point across, as long as it's your favorite). You don't really want to throw it away now, and honestly, you can fix it if you find something to put the pieces back together with, right? So now, let's say you do try to fix it. You find all of the missing pieces, you manage to figure out how they all fit together, etc. Immediately after you're finished repairing it with your incredible handyman skills, you'll notice two new things: 1. If you mess with it, touch it, poke it, etc., the object will (more than likely) fall apart again because you haven't given the glue enough time to dry yet or you haven't repaired it very well in the first place and if you keep poking it like that, it's going to cave in on itself, and 2. It will never be exactly the same as it was before it was broken.

A person's trust is the same way. If you betray someone, that person will never regard you the same as they did again. So now, combine my analogy with real life:

A person you want to be really close to decides to give you his or her trust. It's like giving you a gift, a brand new, shiny, glossy ceramic mug. When you betray him or her, it's like pushing that mug off a counter and allowing it to crash to the floor and break into a bunch of tiny pieces. Now, even if you try to fix it, picking up every last tiny piece and meticulously puzzling them together to form the original mug, it will never be the same.

People are made of porcelain. You can't expect them to forgive and forget so easily. If you've hurt certain people, but you still want them in your life, you have got to make an effort to keep them. Yes, turning to that person and saying, "Man, I really messed up, didn't I?" is helpful and it's the first step on the road to recovering a relationship from a betrayal punch, but, contrary to the popular beliefs of everyone who seems to be around me lately, you can't stop here. Once you show the initiative that you want to keep this person in your life and work to fix the relationship, you have to prove that you're worth it. You have to make sacrifices and prove that you really do want to be in these people's lives. And you definitely can't expect them to trust you right away again. If it worked like that, we might as well have a world akin to that of fairytales, where everything is sunshine and rainbows and, when bad things do happen, there's some random handsome nameless prince ready to ride in on a white horse and save the day.

And, while I'm on this rant, I might as well tell you the science behind why the phrase "forgive and forget" never actually happens, even though we tell each other all the time to do so. We're conditioned when we're young to learn from our mistakes. When you're two years old and you touch a hot stove top and you burn your hand, you learn pretty quickly not to touch it again. It's the same way with relationships. If you're with someone or have a friend betray your trust and hurt you, you're going to learn pretty quickly that you can't trust that person anymore. It's evolution, and it's based solely on a need to survive. Injury is weakness. Weakness leads, in the end, to being weeded out of the population. Emotional hurt is a weakness, and we have to rid ourselves of anything that can cause it in order to be successful and survive.

The reason I'm writing all of this is because I've had several cases happen in my own life. It's happening all around all the time, and I get so annoyed by the fact that people expect the people they hurt to be healed in no time. They expect them to just make up and move on with their lives. But betrayal isn't something that can easily be forgiven and pain isn't something that can easily be forgotten. It takes time to heal a broken heart. We hear it about it in songs and read about it in books, but we often forget how true to life it really is.

So, when someone is betrayed or hurt by someone close to them, please give them the proper time to heal and understand that things will never be exactly the same again. If you don't, it will be like pouring salt into that person's wounds, and then, the healing process will only take longer.

Stay tuned for Part 2. I want to provide some examples of things that have happened recently that I think would help to better get my point across. If you have your own experience that you'd like me to share on this blog, feel free to email me at mesapanaro@yahoo.com. I won't use any specific names in anything, just basic situations.

Questions? Comments? Concerns? Rants? Feelings? Anything to say at all? Go ahead and comment!

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