The Space Between Who I Was and Who I Am

The problem with growth and self reflection is that you do not realise how far you have come from the person you used to be and how you are viewed by others.

I am not the same person that I was twenty years ago.  Ten years ago.  Hell, one year ago.  

The problem with finding out who you are, becoming that person and living that life is that you change a lot in the process; and some people will not like the new you.

Ironic really, isn't it?  You spend so many years trying to become the person that you knew you could be, and now people don't like or are unsure about the new you.  

What is important to realise is that not everyone is going to like you and you need to realise that that can include people that you know.  You need to understand that people change, not just you, and the relationships you had before were based on the person you used to be.  Which can be quite different to the person you are now.

I never used to have an opinion on anything.  If I did, I kept it to myself.  I looked to other people's expressions on a topic before forming or showing my own.  I was quiet.  I gave up pieces of myself in the hope of being liked or loved.  But I always knew that that was not me.

Now, I have thoughts and opinions on everything.  Some controversial (to some), some not.  I know who and what I am and I like it.  I like who I am.  I have no wish to change.  I change for me, not anyone else.

I am the flip coin side of myself and while I am happy with the person that I have become.... No.  That is wrong.  I have changed, yes, but become is the wrong word.  Because this is the person I was meant to be.  It is akin to the metamorphosis of the caterpillar to the butterfly.  

The butterfly was always meant to be.  As was I.

I have not become somebody else.  I have removed the things that were stopping me from being myself.

I think that the problem I have not fully realised until very recently is that I have lived inside all of the changes inside me within my own head.  All the updates.  Others have not.  I have always been a person who had seemed to be one thing for a long time, but then moves quickly and that change can be jarring for people.

Seeing someone improve their confidence, their outlook, their happiness is one thing.  Seeing someone who appears completely different from the person that they knew, is another.  They may not like that new person.  You have to accept that.

That, I think, is the hardest thing about becoming the person that you were meant to be.  That relationships may change or you may lose people.  The latter is the hardest to accept.  That the person you have fought so very hard to be is one that they no longer like, or perhaps just understand.  

They may just need time to adjust to the new one, or, they may distance themselves from you.  It is important to take a step back and re-evaluate.  Do you need to take a step back from trying with that person.  Do you need to simply wait and see how things are.  

Decisions do not need to be made overnight.  But relationships cannot be forced just because they were the same way for a long time.  You are different now and as such, so is that relationship.  That does not mean that you have done anything wrong.  It does not mean that they are wrong for not liking or understanding the updated you.

Ultimately, that is the final (and hardest) lesson in accepting yourself.  Not everyone will like your butterfly self, and that is ok.

No Is A Complete Sentence

I think that it was the Olsen twins that coined the phrase "No is a complete sentence".  

I have a checkered past with the word no.  Something suggested to me that would push me out of my safe zone, past the walls I had built; that was an easy no.  Saying no to someone wanting me to do something, change myself for them, give in to what they wanted over what I wanted, impossible.

But I grew slowly to discover is this.  Saying no is liberating.  Not changing or giving in, feels wonderful.  Every day, I take a step further away from whom I was and walk towards who I am.

Take hobbies for example.  I love writing and usually try and get something written down, even if it is only a paragraph or two, every week.  At the moment, I try to write a post a week but it depends on how I feel on any given day.  You cannot force writing.  It just comes.

My partner has many hobbies.  He is always doing one hobby or another in the evening and one night he suggested that I should get another hobby for when the writing did not come. He doesn't watch TV and does not understand the binge watching of TV series.

I laugh now, but I thought that getting another hobby would please him so....I came up with knitting.  

I got some needles, some wool and one night, I gave it a go.  Except.  I did not want to fucking knit.  I wanted to watch the damn TV.  I lasted a night.  There was a lot of swearing.

I think that probably shows just how comfortable I already felt with him back then.  Giving up after one night.  The old me would have tried, and tried and tried.  I would have made it my vocation to please him.  To succeed.

I remember him laughing the next night when I threw away the needles and gave the wool to the cat to play with.  He said "Baby, just because I suggest something, doesn't mean you have to do it.  You don't have to try to please me.  You already please me, just as you are.  You need to please you."

You need to please you.  How often do we just stop, and please ourselves?

That was one of the many steps that I learned.  You don't have to try and please people for them to like you.  They either like you, or they don't.  You do not need to earn anyone's approval.  If they think you do need to earn it, screw them.

I have discovered that there are many phrases I that I did not feel comfortable saying.  It is only in the past year that I find myself able to start using them again.  

No.  

I don't want to.  

You can do that yourself.

I was always the caretaker, the organiser, the fixer.  

The one who always said yes, even when I secretly thought no.  

On the outside, I was the good organiser, the one who you could count on to take care of the "thing" that needed sorting.  But the truth was that I was trying to find love and acceptance by giving, then more giving.  I gave so much of myself that I thought that there was nothing left.

I am still the organiser and the fixer.  I have found that it is a part of me and I do enjoy it.  But the difference now is that I take a step back when I want.  I say no when I have too much on my plate.  I say no, just because I do not want to.

The temptation to help people will always be with me and is part of who I am.  But now, it is on my terms.

Trying saying no.  I don't want to.  Leave it to someone else for once to arrange.  If you are like I once was, it will be hard.  But you can do it.  You owe it to yourself.  You deserve it.

And if you fall off the bandwagon, just remember, no is a complete sentence.