This was my journal art several years ago. I remember sitting in the therapist’s office choking back tears.
I couldn’t cry. I needed to be strong, to have it all together. To show up ‘fully in my power’. I had just made a most difficult choice and needed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that my decision - albeit highly consequential- was ‘the right decision’.
She listened carefully to my reasoning as I laid out my “well thought out” (read: agonized) plan. She was mostly compassionate, highly educated and fairly intelligent—and yet her response shot through me like a high-voltage electrical current.
“Are you sure you are making the right decision?” She asked.
I shut down. The rest of the session passed by through a blur of defensiveness and intellectualized emotional reasoning (gridlock style 😬).
At the time, I felt misunderstood, unsupported and slowly withdrew from society. I saw people everywhere as a threat to my freedom. I had made some significant life changes but wasn’t ready to be challenged. I armed myself with people who agreed with me and avoided confrontation at all costs. I didn’t have it in me to be wrong- not when so much was at stake. I was surrounded with people who understood my position and validated my choices— but somehow, despite having all the evidence to support my case, I still felt trapped as ever.... I was still miserable.
Freedom came many agonizing decisions later when I internalized that people only understood things from their perspective—and while they WERE NOT wrong, neither was I. I had the right to choose.
It sucked. It meant that I needed to take full responsibility for my actions and decisions. It also meant that I would inevitably screw up at times and would need to face the music. All of it. And sometimes on my own. The thought of which nearly paralyzed me but also blew my people-pleasing to the wayside. Through embracing my power of choice and trusting my own decisions in the moment, a newfound sense of freedom emerged. I was free to be fully human. I wasn’t wrong, I was experiencing life like the rest of humanity- one wild experience at a time.
留言