I don’t know whether it’s the change of season, or whether it’s my age that’s starting to act up on me, but I have been thinking seriously about where I am in my life and the people I have around me.
Lately I have been contemplating the word complicit (Complicit – adjective (Com*pli*cit): involved with others in an activity that is unlawful or morally wrong), and it had me asking myself many questions. Questions I may or may not find the answers to, but questions that have led me to the point of critically looking at the role I play in various relationships around me.
Have I been complicit in my failed relationships?
Have I been complicit in my children’s behaviors?
Have I been complicit in shaping my children’s views on life?
Have I been complicit in my state of unhappiness?
Have I been complicit in bad habits being formed by those near and dear to me?
Have I been complicit in ignoring things that require confronting?
I guess the picture is formulating in your mind now, and you may be taken on a journey of your own through this. To each his own! This is my journey and I have been forced to look at this now due to a profoundly deep sense of unhappiness with myself.
It all started for me towards the end of August, when I woke up one morning feeling deeply sad about my situation. I lay there in the early hours of the morning contemplating how I got to where I now am. Did I communicate enough? Was my communication not clear? Am I even communicating?
The questions just rolled over me like a tidal wave, and I could feel the weight of all of this, as I could feel that I was not living right. The energies around me were all wrong! I have been living in a compartmentalized way, and the walls had started closing in leaving me feeling decidedly stuck. I thought I had made the requisite changes! I thought I was limiting my access! I thought I had insulated myself enough to continue working on me!
Turns out I was wrong. As I started to audit my immediate surroundings, I became aware of how broken things actually were and I immediately felt the weight of it all on me.
Several months had passed and I felt like I had made no strides since then, and it just felt like things had worsened around me.
I immediately started looking at what I had done to get to feeling this way! I had learnt to always look internally since my journey to self had started, and based on the book “As a Man Thinketh” by James Allen, to see what actions I had taken and what thinking I had applied to get myself into the rut I now find myself in.
Several days passed with this contemplation and I was critically analyzing everything I was experiencing in that time in order to get to an answer. Everything pointed to the energies around me! Boy oh boy was I in for quite a shake up!
I started seeing how communication in so many areas of my life had just started to stagnate and get to the point of putrefaction.
I started seeing how helping or trying to help others was a farcical endeavor, given that people only want help on their own terms. I started seeing that many of the factors that had led me to make emotional decisions were irrational to the point of being nonsensical!
One such fallacy that I had held was that I never wanted to end up alone, and this drove me to always want to be in a relationship, assuming that I would never be alone. The reality at the best of times is that being in relationships is often where you find yourself to be the loneliest. You find that a significant other is able to disrespect you so easily as time rolls on, to the point of you trying to help them without seeing how you debase yourself in the process.
All of this happens knowingly, although some have indicated that it happens unknowingly as either party on making the realization would say they were not even aware of it.
Was I complicit in making someone feel this way as a result of being with me? I had never wanted to be alone, and that drove the narrative in my head of needing to be with someone, but once I started looking at certain aspects of my life, I realized that I had disproved that theory, and I was actually very comfortable being alone.
I looked at the amount of time I spent on my own and measured that up against my time spent with others, and the results spoke for themselves. I spent an inordinate amount of time by myself, and I found myself to be exceptionally peaceful at those times. Had I reached a new level of growth and understanding of myself? The critical analysis was starting to show me things about myself that required me to make some serious changes.
I looked at my upbringing and the many things I had been taught, noting that many of the things ingrained in me had been done so with a tremendous amount of repetition.
I would often look at how similar I was to my parents in drilling certain things into my kids, like constantly reminding them to greet, say please and thank you, as well as harping on about chores that needed to be done. At a point we all get tired of doing this, as we feel that the lessons are not getting through, but we push on anyway, and when we see the fruits of that in our children, we feel vindicated in having been incessant with the lessons.
I have had to unlearn certain things I was taught as a child, as I have come to see that the practicalities of some ingrained teachings have not served me.
I have come to learn that helping people is thankless, as they don’t generally want your help, even if they say they do.
I have come to learn that as much as people want honesty, they can’t handle it, and actually don’t want it.
I have come to learn that people choose to only communicate to a certain point.
I have come to learn that loving someone can come at the expense of losing yourself in that process.
I have come to learn that even the most logical person can be destroyed by emotions that defy all logic.
I have learned that in trying to help someone, you actually have to let them experience the pain associated with their situation in order for them to learn the lesson and be helped.
I have learned that knowing your place in people’s lives is critical.
I have learned that the pain of letting go is much less damaging than the pain of hanging on to something that isn’t going to change.
In the process of auditing the energies around me, I came to a point of clarity on the fact that any negativity around you, will eventually affect you, given that energy is not a shield. The stronger energy eventually wins out and starts to affect all other energies in it’s path.
Sometimes it’s not you that is the conduit, but a loved one, a colleague, a friend or just someone that is always in your energy field.
The lesson learned is, be careful of who you find around you!
My son has shown me the wisdom in keeping your energy exchange extremely limited. I admire the clarity and level-headedness he displays, and it just gives me the assurance that the next leg of my journey will unlock a more aware version of me. A version of me that requires nobody other than me to be happy and at peace.
I had never been “alone” since I could remember, as the fear of loneliness drove me to always be with someone, but I am ready to explore me in a way I have never experienced myself! I want to be complicit in making me better!
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