For as long as I can remember, I have always lived my life by trying to fulfill the expectations of others.  I was told what I should do, when I should do it, how things should be done and how I should execute something.  In reflecting on this, I discovered that regardless of my best efforts, whatever I did was never good enough and only resulted in greater expectations and of course, greater consequences when I did not meet those expectations.  Well, I am tired of being told what to do.  And I am tired of being shamed, cajoled, teased, pushed, rammed, etc. into doing things that I don’t want to do or am not comfortable doing.  Therefore, I am officially declaring my independence and learning that it is okay to say “no” if that is what I need to do for myself.  And I am inviting everyone else to join me in this movement, if you, too, have been allowing others to push you around and deciding for you how you should think and feel and be.

Don’t get me wrong.  I acknowledge my part in allowing others to control me.  I know that I constantly strive for perfection even though I am aware that there is no such thing and if I fall short of expectations, I see only the part where I feel I failed.  There are some people who have had the ability to make me feel so badly about myself when I am not in agreement with what they want for me to do but here again, I have allowed it.  I find that I get so very upset whenever someone succeeds in turning things on me by finding a justification for their own behavior that is so contrary to the reality of the situation.  But most importantly, I have reached the point of no return on this matter and have decided that on a going forward basis, I will not allow myself to accept such behavior from others.

I know it won’t be easy.  After so many years of accepting being pushed around in so many ways, it is habit to respond in the same old way.  But, it will be so worthwhile in the long run when I find that I am doing what I want to do and I am doing it in a way that works for me.  The benefit is that if I do what I want, on the terms that work for me, I will become so vested in the project, or whatever it may be, that I give it all of my effort and dedication and regardless of the work involved, it will actually be fun for me.  The fun factor always changes everything.  I don’t think that there is a thing in the world that I can’t accomplish if I am having fun while doing it.  And if you think about it, I am sure that the same thing applies to you, too, so come on and join me.  Life from here on in will be so much better by allowing for the fun in everything that we do and our accomplishments will be so much more meaningful to us.  Now that sure sounds like a much better quality of life to me.

I always love your COMMENTS.

I have spent a great portion of my life allowing others to make my decisions for me.  When I was a child, I did everything according to what my parents dictated.  As I grew older, the peer pressure kicked in and off and running I went with the pack.  Then it was in the work place where I acquiesced to all of the rules and regulations of the office.  And at the same time, my social life was governed by all of the usual ways of meeting and getting to know others.  That was until I started to see that all of the tried and true methods of existing with others didn’t work for me.

The first thing that I had decided to tackle was religion.  I had been raised to believe that God was someone/something to fear.  This worked for all of the time that I was under the thumb of my parents and religious studies but once I was on my own, I started to question this premise.  That wasn’t my God – my God loved me and helped me and I was made in his image.  Ding, ding, ding!  So what everyone else had told me was true was not my truth. 

That wasn’t the end by a long shot.  As I moved through the work place, I worked very hard and was able to work my way up through the ranks in a segment of government dealing with taxation.  When I reached the top position that I could attain without a political appointment, I knew that it was time to move on but that did not happen until I learned another very important lesson.  There were rumors going around that said that the only way that I could have achieved what I had was because I was “sleeping” with someone higher executive.  I was having a really hard time dealing with that and I chose to discuss it with my dad.  His response to me was that at the end of the day, I had to answer to myself and if I wasn’t doing anything wrong, then it didn’t really matter what anyone had to say.  Now that was something that fitted with my thinking.

Well, I guess I still hadn’t learned my lesson because the next big event in my life was my marriage to a controlling and abusive man to whom I gave my power for 10 years.  It took me that long to understand that I did not deserve the abuse that I was receiving and that all of the things that I was told that were wrong with me just weren’t true.  I believe that that was my true turning point.

Please don’t get me wrong.  I still do ask for people’s opinions especially when I need to make a decision in an area where I don’t have any expertise.  But, I will take that information and do my own research and if something doesn’t make sense to me or doesn’t feel right, I will not stop until I can reach a decision that feels like the right thing for me.  This has ruffled more than a few feathers along the way but if my relationship with another person has to be based upon what that person thinks about me, it won’t take long until we part ways.

So to anyone who comes my way in this lifetime, I don’t care what you think about me.  I will appreciate you for exactly who and what you are and I expect the same in return.  I will support you in any decisions that you make and I will accept nothing less in return.  And should you choose to talk negatively about me or do things that are harmful to me, I will not do anything in retribution but will quietly remove myself from your sphere, knowing that what goes around comes around and you can set up any karma for yourself that you choose.