I was recently watching an episode of the TV show, “Couples Therapy” and couldn’t help but be drawn in by some of the questions that therapist Dr. Jenn Berman was asking of the participants. The discussions centered on issues that had occurred in the past, particularly when the guests were young, that have affected their relationships as adults. As I listened, there were a couple of things that really hit home for me and helped me to understand certain issues that I have had and what from my past may have caused my thinking and beliefs. Who knew that a “reality”
When someone else directs bad behavior toward me, I am able to look at the situation and try to figure out what may be occurring with that person that would cause them to ever relate to another person in such a negative way. This has allowed for me to stop taking things personally as that is so seldom the intent of the other person.show would be something that could make a positive difference in my personal life?
My real excitement was the recognition of the “ah-ha” moments. It was so freeing to make sense out of some things that I could never have understood otherwise. I had never encountered an opportunity to recognize these factors and the part that they played in my present life and I must say that I am so very grateful for the lessons that I learned from this most unlikely source. But, more importantly, I was very surprised at my personal response to discovering the underlying cause of certain ways that I have thought and certain things that I have believed for as long as I can remember.
As I watched and listened to the show, I felt the tears welling up as I started to identify with certain things being discussed. But, as I thought and understood, I was able to release those emotions and actually feel good about the results. There were no feelings of blame to be imposed upon those who were the causes of my thinking. There was no need to find a way to make someone else pay for what they had “done” to me. And the more I thought about it, the happier I became as I tried to understand how I was able to do this.
I quickly discovered that having written my blog and having carried on correspondence with other social media “friends” had allowed for an outlet that permitted me to face the tough issues while helping others to do the same thing. I no longer looked at any issue from the standpoint of who did what to me but rather how a particular action had affected me. I could now look at any issue and see how its occurrence created a certain belief in my life and say to myself something like “Oh, I understand! But that’s not true!” and just let it go.
I also discovered that by doing this with issues from the past, I was now in a position to look at any issue occurring in the present and do the exact same thing. When someone else directs bad behavior toward me, I am able to look at the situation and try to figure out what may be occurring with that person that would cause them to ever relate to another person in such a negative way. This has allowed for me to stop taking things personally as that is so seldom the intent of the other person.
As I result, I am so very grateful for every single person who has ever interacted with me here on the internet as this has allowed me to understand that we are all in the same boat, that we all have many of the same situations with which to deal in our lives and that each and every action is truly an opportunity to learn and create a better life for ourselves.
Barbara Jacoby is an award winning blogger that has contributed her writings to multiple online publications that have touched readers worldwide.