It Hurts Like Hell....

I'm sitting here thinking over the last few years astonished at how far I've come and how much I've grown. How I've exited my box of darkened solitude into the marvelous light of social interaction and deep rooted friendship. I've experienced things that I never would have if I were not indeed goaded into exiting those familiar confines and stepping out into "the world". For that, I am immensely grateful. I would not be as open to and cognizant of my surroundings as I am today if not for this. That said, I think it's time that I try to fix something that, in hasty extrication from my box of comfort, was left unattended to.

...... **** .....

After much deliberation over the constant messages my parents have instilled in my head over the years and the comments, occurrences, and eventually painful experiences that I have lived through, I've come to realized that I am a living breathing manifestation of what happens when idealism and realism collide.

I give to the point that it hurts. Unsatisfied until every one is happy, I take from myself until I am left in tears at the foot of the stairs, bed, or person who feels that I have not given enough, tears that will never cease to fall because the giving that they require only ends when they no longer take. They want, attention, consent, comfort, love,
and give complaints, frustration, indifference, and anger when these things are not supplied in the ways that they desire. Used as ammunition in arguments and as threats overhead, their giving is something that, though genuine (and sometimes often), can quickly turn into the very thing that takes the most.

...... **** .....

I was talking to a friend yesterday and was asked, (in apparent frustration) why I don't own up to my mistakes. I didn't say anything then because I couldn't form an intellectually coherent response. But if posed the question again, I would answer: I can't own up to my own mistakes until I learn to stop owning up to everyone else's. It amazes me how people scold you for behaving in ways that they through their actions make it perfectly clear they don't mind you acting in. It amazes me how they can't see the blaring inconsistencies in what they request. How can person A on one hand reprimand person B for being giving to a fault, and on the other complain that person B doesn't give enough? Therein lies the crux of the problem.

People want an idealistic world when they are (with active contentment) living in reality. They say that one should give and proceed to take from those who heed that advice. They maintain that one should not allow themselves to be taken advantage of and proceed to do just that to those who expend themselves in pleasing others. They ask for a messiah and crucify him for doing and being exactly what/who they desire.

All this to say, I'm tired of being the (even unintentional) scapegoat, and sick of being injured from following advise from the same sword that eventually cuts me for heeding its suggestions, because, as Aretha sang, it hurts like hell. I'll never cease to give, because I can't do otherwise ( despite multiple attempts on my behalf). I'll just make a concerted effort to leave some of me left when I'm done. Despite (and partially because of) what it means for/to others.