And these last few things, I’m still struggling with but getting better about every day.
The first is that I have this insane need to please everyone.
That’s right… My name is Michelle and I am a door mat!
It goes hand in hand with the need I have to be accepted and loved by EVERY SINGLE PERSON ON THE PLANET! Because if I’m not, I just know that I am going to lay down on the floor, curl up into a little ball and DIE an HORRIBLE death!
I know… it’s crazy… but I think, “if I do whatever this person asks, no matter how demanding, expensive, tiring, etc., etc.”, they’ll love me for it. Of course that isn’t the reality. The reality is “oh look… I’ve found a sucker who’ll do anything. How pitiful, but at least I know who to get to the crap I don’t want to do”.
So, now, I try to remind myself, that just because someone asks me to do something it doesn’t mean… 1. Their going to love me any more or less than they already do because I do it and 2. It doesn’t mean I have to do it, PERIOD.
It’s actually been a revelation to me to find that the world does not come to a screeching, flaming, bloody halt if I say the word NO.
And it’s been a lot better for me health-wise. Not being this crazy, stressed-out person running around trying to do EVERYTHING.
That brings us to another thing I have been working on. It’s also part of what I like to call the “Super Woman Complex”.
I also have an insane need to FIX EVERYTHING AND EVERYONE!
In fact, right now… it’s driving me crazy. You see, I have a couple of very good friends who are fighting… well, not fighting really… you have to be talking to each other to be fighting.
What I want (need…?) to do is give them step-by-step instructions on how to fix their problems and be happy again (yeah, like I would really know! LOL)
And, actually, I did email one of them and say something along the lines of “if you’re both so miserable, you have to find a way to work things out”… but, I did not try to suggest just what it is she should do. I still feel like I overstepped some boundaries though and should have just left it totally alone. So… to that friend, I apologize.
My urge is to tell them both to go to their rooms and not come out again until their ready to talk things out like adults. And unless they both actually read this blog (and I’m pretty sure one of them will), they’ll never know just how strong that urge is. My “need” to fix everything is as strong as my need was for that next cigarette (before I was finally able to quit smoking for good) or drink (I was also a a problem drinker for a lot of years). It’s an actual physical and emotional compulsion with me. I pace floors, and get nauseous and give myself migraines because of it (though nowhere near the extent that I used to). But I know, in the end… this is something they have to make right for themselves. All I can do is sit back and hope that they can, and pray that they will.
And in turn, all of this makes me a chronic worrier.
But, this too is something I am getting much better at.
In the end… it all goes back to my insane need for control in my life.
But as I am learning, and as I said before, control is an illusion.
I just have to remember to follow one of my AA mottos: “Let go and let God”.
Class Dismissed!
