Quote:
Originally Posted by Chado2423  How can I forgive without mending the relationship on some level... if there is no mending of the relationship it isn't real forgiveness is it? If I give up on her as you suggest, is that really love?
You may be right that I need to find myself, but I found myself when I was with her... but now that she has left me I have lost myself. |
I think you're confusing forgiveness with healing the relationship. You can forgive anyone for anything without the other party's involvement. On the other hand, a relationship requires the assent of two people, and clearly, your ex g-f doesn't assent. So that's something you have to respect. There's no healing a relationship that's dead.
You did not actually "find yourself" when you were with her; you found that some aspect of the relationship enabled you to feel somewhat better about yourself. It's a common misconception that one "finds" oneself in a relationship. The truth is, it can be rather tricky not to
lose yourself in a relationship. You had better find yourself FIRST.
No relationship is healthy if the relationship itself is necessary for you to feel whole. I don't know the reason your g-f gave for pulling the plug but I wouldn't be surprised if, whether she actually came out and said it or not, she felt smothered by your desperate neediness and instinctively knew that she didn't want to carry that responsibility.
You have to come to an intimate relationship with something other than your own brokenness and need. You have to have something of your own to contribute to the other person. It's a two-way street. And what you contribute has to be meaningful and valuable to them, not to you.
In addition, love demands that you have to be willing to risk the relationship itself if necessary to maintain the honesty and integrity of the relationship. For example if your g-f had started some behavior that is destructive to herself, to you, or to the relationship, you have to have an honest discussion about that, even if her initial response is to pitch a snit about it. How can you do that if you're terrified of losing her? You'll back off and put up with all sorts of unacceptable cr_p, and by not holding her accountable in the relationship, the relationship could die anyway, or perhaps worse, become an empty husk.
Consider whether you have an illusion (a belief that something is so because you want it to be, rather than because it empirically
is) that an intimate relationship will complete you, or save you. I submit to you that a relationship has the
potential to
enhance you,
if you chose your partner wisely and put the right kinds of effort into the relationship. In order to do that you need to educate yourself about yourself, your needs, the kind of person you need in your life and the things you have to do to prepare yourself to enhance that other person's life in kind.
It doesn't just happen, and even then, it's not absolutely guaranteed, if for no other reason than that sometimes, sh_t just happens. People get sick, or die, or grow in different directions than you, or reveal a dark side deep into a relationship that they are pretty good at concealing. Relationships are a messy and uncertain business because they involve people. If you saddle the relationship with the additional burden of solving all your pre-existing personal problems, you're just about guaranteeing failure.
I'm not saying you have to be some kind of saint, or perfect -- just that you must have your own sh_t together sufficiently not to drag the other person down. If you don't have it together, you're not a bad person, you just need to take care of that first. We all have to. The problem is that sometimes we wish that a relationship would just make it all better, like magic. It doesn't work that way. We have to work on ourselves first.
--Bob