For most of my life, I've lived with a lot of resentment. Resentment from people not understanding me. From feeling lonely and left out. And it's taken a lot of self reflection to realize that it's my own fault for it. I was always described as being independent, and the reinforcement I got through childhood of being an easy kid made me learn to take pride in it. However, that title caused me to neglect my feelings and needs. And from it, there became a disconnect from how I was on the inside and how I tried controlling how others perceived me. There was a part of me scared to ever be needy or to be disappointed by people that I chose to opt out of it all. If there's something I need that's easy for someone else, I honestly rather go out of my way to do it on my own. I'd rather be in my own anguish than to be rejected or get neglected. There's a sense of shame attached to every need I have. I mentioned it very briefly in my last post about how it's a little embarrassing to have needs. However, in the past year, I've tried doing a lot of work to undo the expectations that are on me and voice out my true feelings.
I definitely learned this a long time ago—probably in a self-help YouTube video or something—but you gotta use "I" statements. It's like, the most basic, elementary advice in the psychology world, and for those unfamiliar with it, the "I" statements essentially direct the focus onto yourself rather than the individual you're speaking to, allowing you to take responsibility, not direct blame, and own your emotions and needs. Even with this tool, I don't think I've used it as much as I did this year. With the amount of new relationships I've made this year, it was a lot easier to start fresh and create boundaries and communicate how I felt.
For example, there are multiple times where I feel like I'm misunderstood. My initial reaction when talking or confronting someone would be, "You're not listening!" Using the "I" statement, I know now to reword it to "I don't feel heard." It allows for emotions not to get heightened while still getting the point through.
The reason that I didn't think of using "I" statements was because I never was able to identify my needs. Without identification, I was unable to convey them. This one is a lot harder than communicating for me. It took a lot of self-reflection and self-inventory, something that was alien to me. I was never taught how to process my emotions or even be comfortable with sitting with them. With the change in my social circle from school, I got a lot of help. There were people modeling good boundaries and communicating their needs, and that allowed me to be comfortable mirroring that behavior. It was the first step for me to really think about what I needed.
After going to a mental hospital for a month, I learned further how to check how I'm feeling. With a mood journal, I needed to reflect 5 times a day on how I was feeling, and that made me look for the reason why. So everyday for a month, I stuck with it. After getting into the habit of doing it on my own, I was confident on self-inventorying without the journal.
Being back home has been a little disappointing in reference to my needs. I feel like I've definitely regressed without a support system readily available like I had on campus. That and there aren't people modeling how I need to express myself. I've been a lot more tired and low on energy, and I think I'm going to do the mood journal again. I feel frustrated that things are going up and down in terms of my improvement mentally, but I think we can get into that more in another post. Just hafta keep thinking that I'm getting there!
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