Confession, I have wanted to break up with people before just because I think they don’t like me anymore.
Despite the facade I put on during any social occasion, deep down I cannot be more insecure involving romantic relationships, friendships, or even with my therapist. Once I start to care about the person I am in a relationship with, all I think about is how that person thinks of me. When I care, I fear. I fear that those who I care and value so much in my life will get sick of me and leave me. This kind of insecurity has ultimately lead to multiple ruined relationships.
At this point, I have found a pattern in my destroyed relationships. My antipathy towards one starts to increase drastically once I find vague (perhaps even, nonexistent) evidence indicating that the person doesn’t like me anymore. It is like a black hole sucking me in. I start to distance myself from that person, and then eventually we fall out or we fight. Either way I end up losing them from my life. I would argue that my unhealthy behaviors are results of my insecurities constructing a defense mechanism. Here’s my attempt at understanding my own subconscious.
If I am the one to initiate the breakup that means I won’t get hurt…right?I consider such a mindset as one of the main explanations to my behaviors. From listening to all the break up songs I can find on Spotify, I have come to the conclusion that it is always the cold hearted one who initiates the break up. My misconception is that these cold hearts are like some magical creatures that can never get hurt.
So are there any initial causes that creates all these insecurities? Or have I just simply been in so many toxic relationship by coincidence? That is some questions I would hardly have answers for. I am not able to break my childhood down and figure out what messed my whole adult life up. However I have figured out ways to avoid being caught up by negative thoughts which assists me to think logically when such situations happens.
One of the most helpful skills is a quick fact check. Often times, when stepping back and reflecting the situation objectively I find out that no one is really holding their knives ready to stab my back. Such realization prevents me from going any step further and acting on my emotions. Communication is another key factor to prevent cases when emotions are too overwhelming for any skills to stop certain rational behaviors. If having doubts about relationship with the ones I truly care about, it is usually a good idea to communicate about my feelings and work things out together with the person who I am in the relationship with.
They say it takes 21 days to break a bad habit, which I would assumed usually means biting nails or something. When it comes to the cases of breaking a bad interpersonal behavior I would only cross fingers that it won’t take me 21 months. I hope that I won’t take 21 more failed relationships to truly learn.