Cosmos of Kate

As children, we often do things to learn our boundaries, and push them as far as we can. I know I certainly did. I ended up with a dog bite to my face and a lifetime of guilt from various other childhood acts that I am not at all proud of. However, my father told me recently he had been reflecting on his childhood and had come to the realization that he was a terror as a child. I know that feeling all too well, but my response to him was to not perseverate on it, not to dwell on the past that we can’t change. Easier said than done though, amiright?

The problem is, after childhood we grow in to adults (or at least some of us do). Adults who should certainly know better than to make the horrible mistakes that many of of berate ourselves for. Yet we still make them. Time and time again, history repeats itself, in our own lives and in our future generations. But then again, if we all made good choices every day, what would therapists do for a living? Maybe one day evolution will erase the ability we have as humans to make horrible decisions. The problem I see there though, is that we oftentimes don’t know we’re making a bad decisions until farther down the road, when they already have their hooks in us and we can’t wriggle free from their grasp. At that point it feels like the only thing we can do is lay there quietly and suffer through the agony. But is it…?

I recently rediscovered my absolute PASSION for reading fiction. I crave getting lost in a book, in characters whose stories aren’t my own, who have grand adventures, love fiercely, and make all the wrong decisions, and eventually the right ones. I love books because I get to live vicariously through the characters. The problem is, a lot of the bad choices they make, and the hard lessons they have to work through and learn from, are starting to resonate with me. Instead of just escaping into their world, I now feel their pain, experience their guilt, and walk that hard line with them.. because I too have made some of those bad choices in my life, or had those hard things happen to me from no fault of my own. I now know what life really feels like because I have lived, and I feel that pain with others (fictional or real) because I know what it is to be empathetic.

The two main characters in the book I am currently reading have both been struggling through the entire thing. Together, but in their separate ways. One of them is living with so much guilt, loss and despair that they keep sinking farther into a pit they have metaphorically dug for themselves within their own mindscape. The other has so much anger and rage in them that they can’t see past it to really understand the other person right in front of them. They both try to outwardly solve their problems together, but soon discover they are focusing on entirely the wrong parts of their problems. The turning point comes when one of them realizes the solutions to their problems aren’t external at all, and can only be discovered by looking inward. Though it’s looking inward that is the truly difficult task because the monsters that hide there are the ones of our own making… ourselves. The overarching moral of the story is you can’t truly make progress without taking a long, really hard look at yourself, at who you are, what has made you that way…

and giving yourself grace.

We are TRULY our own worst enemies. We constantly judge ourselves, hold ourselves to ridiculous standards we would never hold anyone else to, and focus on every single “flaw” that we can find about who we are, what we look like, and what we have done. It’s no wonder most of us worry about what others will think of us, because we absolutely hate ourselves. But it’s that infinite internal battle that slowly cripples us on the outside, the part that others can and do see. If we let ourselves fester and allow ourselves to wallow in our own self loathing for long enough, we end up creating a self fulfilling prophecy of others seeing us the same way, but we only have ourselves to blame.

So I leave you with this. No one else sees you as horribly as you see yourself. They don’t see the weight you need to lose before you can be happy again, or the graying hair that you can’t keep at bay, or the crooked tooth you have always hated since childhood, or the scar on your neck that announces to everyone your body failed you in some way. They see a friend or a loved one whom they care about dearly, who they can’t wait to spend time with and laugh with. They see someone who has their shit together, someone they are envious of because you’ve always had so much going for you. They wish they could be like you, have what you have, be as confident as you seem. They think you are beautiful just the way you are. The only one passing such harsh judgements on you is yourself.

We all make mistakes, we all regret moments in our lives that we wish we could go back and change, we all wish we looked better, we all wish we were different in some way, or in many ways. But instead of focusing on all the ways we wish our lives were different, focus on starting to love yourself, healing yourself, seeing yourself the way others see you. Instead of constantly fighting with that voice inside your head… take a deep breath, settle into a comfy position, and give yourself some well-deserved grace.