A FRIENDSHIP REFUSED

I offered my friendship to someone a few weeks ago. That sounds sort of silly to say... but I let it be known that I'd like to get to know them better -- and left it in their court.

Which they... walked away from.

It's not that they said "No way, why would I want to be friends with you?"  They just simply digitally left me hanging.

Of course that stung a little. The message was "No thank you. You're not someone I want to know." But... over Lent this year, I dove a lot into my need to people please, my need to have everyone like me.  And when Lent was over, what I was left with was a new mantra for myself in those situations where I feel less-than and that I need to change myself to please someone else.

It is simply this: "You have lots of people who love you just as you are. It's okay if there is someone who doesn't."

So, that's what I said to myself... and I was fine. I just let it go. Why chase someone who doesn't want to know you?

---

This week, that same person sought me out and I thought, "Well, maybe I was wrong? Maybe they do want to get to know me?" So I was friendly, or at least I hope I was... and I tried to continue the conversation they started. And again, they just walked away.

So, I tell myself again, "It's okay if there is someone who doesn't like you."

And I am fine.  Honestly, I am.

At this point, I'm probably more irritated by the whole thing than anything. I'm too busy to play games. Like me. Don't like me. It's fine...  but don't play with me. I'm worth more respect than that.

THURSDAY TALES: FORGET YOU KNEW MY NAME

(on Saturday)

"Forget you ever knew my name."

He had pulled me into his arms, his scent filling me, and whispered those words into my hair. He had pulled back to cup my cheek in the palm of his hand, seemingly on the brink of saying more...

And then he was gone.

Forget I ever knew his name? I laugh now.

Maybe it would have been easier if it hadn't been for all the other things that were so hard to forget.

If I closed my eyes, I could still feel his hand on the small of my back as we walked, his lips on my neck when he woke me in the early morning. I could still feel the warmth of his hands as they skimmed my skin.

The beat of his chest. The scent of his hair.

I think of him when I touch my coffee cup to my lips each morning. I think of him when an old song comes on and I remember the way we danced. I think of his laughter. The hard spots and the soft spots. The ways he made me crazy and the ways he made me love him.

Forget I ever knew his name?

How can you ever forget something so terribly right that went so terribly wrong?

CHASING MY OWN WORTH

I used to believe that it was me. I used to believe that if a relationship went through a dry or untended period, it must be because of me.

It was something I had done. It was something I had said.
It was something I hadn't done or said, but that I should have.
I had gone too far. Not far enough. Crossed a boundary without respecting it.
Mostly, it must be because I was lacking in some important way.

I would make myself crazy -- actually crazy -- trying to figure out what it was. I would blame myself. I would think less of myself. I would earnestly believe that there must be something wrong with me. Something I needed to fix.

But that was something that proved impossible because of one important detail.

It was never about me. And eventually, I learned that.

Maybe it was about how busy they were.
Maybe it was about the stress level in their lives.
Maybe it was even about the priority, or lack thereof, they put on our relationship.

But it truly wasn't about me. It certainly wasn't about my worth as a person. And there really wasn't anything I could do to change what was.

Somehow...  somehow that was freeing. And I stopped chasing them.

NEVER GOOD ENOUGH

I always felt like I wasn't good enough with her.  --
Or that she thought I wasn't good enough.

She always had to be smarter. She always had to be wittier.
She continually took the credit for things I had done.. and I let her because the only person it hurt was me.

If I had a story, she had one that topped it.
If something good happened to me, it was because of something she had done.

If I ever tried to keep something as just mine, she'd guilt me until I gave her that too.

One day, I said "I'm sincerely sorry that I'm not good enough for you..."

And I walked away.

Not because I wasn't good enough... but because I knew that I was.

NOT EVERYTHING IS ABOUT YOU

I've been struggling with a relationship lately. Lots of angst, lots of feelings, lots of frustration. I was dumping my heart out into the lap of one of my dearest friends this week and she said this to me:

This isn't about you. 

This is completely their issue. 

It isn't yours.

And as I thought about it more and more, it became something that was more and more important for me to internalize... because I've kept trying to make it my issue. And I probably try to make a lot of issues into my issues.

Because, you see, if things are my issues, well I can fix those. If something is off because I did something wrong or I said something that offended, if I'm the one being unreasonable... those are all things that I can fix. And if I can fix those things, then I can fix the relationship, right?

But if they're not my issue... well, there's really only so much that I can do about that. There's only so much of that I can fix. In fact, there's relatively little of that I can fix.

At the same time... it's a little bit freeing to start to internalize that. I'm very good at making things my fault. I apologize for everything. I have apologized for a lot of things that I didn't really think were my fault at all. But acknowledging that not everything is me... Well, that's freeing.

And maybe that doesn't fix the relationship. Maybe it won't ever be.

But it starts to fix me... and that's a start.