A few things came up now I am failing!

[Livgivare]

You all read about the letter I had to write. I hated that stuff, that made me feel so bad. Then I got a minior caugh and gave in to an advice my boyfriend told me, and I tried it out. That one was to sleep longer and I got up at 10 instead of 8 a moring and now I am back at my old sleeping pattern that I so hate. I read less in the books and feel that I am getting back at where I came from. Only with the feeling that I do like fruits more and buy them at the store and that I walk but feel that it is bad to walk when I have a caugh, because that is what my boyfriend told me too, to not walk if I got sick and the weather is bad. And the weather has been strange lately, and I have been unable to really figure out what to wear to not become overly swetty or overly cold. (That's the way it is with fall in Scandinavia).

Today I watched a Dr. Phil show where he told the audience (it was a show on single girls tired to be single) that if you gotta get a good man you gotta stay on the road and find your authentic self. I find out that when I listen to some advice from my boyfriend I loose that authentic self just because he tells me that I need to be able to compromise with what I want and what I can do, and what other see is bad for me at the moment. Yet again I feel like each and every time I try to pull myself back together in life, someone tells me that I am doing it the wrong way and that I need to make changes that please someone else who feels that I am not that well fitted for pulling myself back together.

Sometimes I just wanna scream out: Hey I might have had a long tirm depression and a really strange childhood with nothing working, and that lead me to even more depression, but I wanna be fine now and try to love myself and get back up on the horse (that life is supposed to be like a wild good horse that you just take controll over and ride into the night with) and for the first time really be able to be me and do what I want. The worse thing is that when I say that I always hear from my boyfriend: But what do you have me for then?

My therapist say that I need to think like this: I am not sick, I want to feel healthy be able to be who I am, and I need a relationship that is equal to me too. And then she also says that I need to ask the same question back that my boyfriend asks me. I've done that, get no good answer out of him. Then he starts to show off his good side and tell me how much he have helped me and all the love he has for me. Then he tells me that I do have good sides about myself and I tend not to listen because that is just coming as an reply on a question I have with him all the time to not make me feel so bad.

I do love him, I wanna marry him. But how do I tell him, that if he don't stop giving me advices and take no for an answer. And some times he even give me challanges that I have to say yes to (no is not an answer here either) it before I even know what it is all about. I do try to tell him what I need but he then says that I am just too complicated to understand.

Somethimes I blame myself just because I had the history and that I am a single child with the strange act of wanting to do all things my way and when someone tells me not to, I change and make myself loveable the way they like it, and I hate myself even more after that, because who loves a person who changes just to feel loved.

Is it OK to say no, to do the same thing my boyfriend does to me: Tell him that there is a challange and that he has no option to say no as an answer. Tell him that if he wants a healthy relationship with me he has got to help me with the things I want help with and then just be happy about who I am and leave it there. I also want to Stop feel so guitly about me failing when I do give in. Because I do feel that the trouble is part mine to get the blame on.

Sometimes this turmoil turns me into a girl telling myself that I am not a good girl with an intelligent head and sometimes I even think that there is something wrong with my verbal self, the one that always is my greatest joy in life, the fact that I can write and say things just the way I want to say it and not even have to correct myself much afterwards (just tiny spelling errors or gammar faults or something like that)...I hardly even go back an change a single word when I write anything here becuase I know how to say things when I write them and don't think that the thing I want to say the way I say it is bad.

What is wrong with me. Why can't I have enough of strengh to just live my life and have the authentic self I want and be perfectly happy about it. I so think that my problem is there and that my boyfriend needs to just step back a bit and try to be happy for what I do is right when I do a right thing...just at times tells me when I fall off the horse and need to get back on top of it again...that is what I really want...

Love Leelene

[Lola]

Dear Leelene -

First, everything, and I do mean everything looks worse when we don't feel good. So keep taking care of your physical needs until you're feeling better. You probably do need extra sleep right now. That doesn't make a failure of your previously established pattern.

And speaking of failure - having some challenges along the way, slipping a bit from time to time, not maintaining your convictions 100% of the time DOES NOT make you a failure. It makes you a human who's learning a new way of life, who's improving her life, who's making it what she wants. It's hard work making changes like that. But you strike me as a level-headed, insightful, courageous young woman and I have no doubt you can do it.

As far as your boyfriend is concerned, it's a fact that when we start altering ourselves, often the people closest to us are the ones most resistant to those changes. They really like for us to stay exactly how we were - how they know us to be defined. For the most part I think Dr. Phil is full of shock-value cr*p but you did hear one good message. For you to achieve the fulfillment in life you're seeking and to have a mutually loving, respecting and fulfilling relationship starts with you knowing and BEING your authentic self. If BF doesn't like the authentic you or battles to alter the authentic you, then you'll know he's not likely to fit in the role of the relationship you seek.

Be good to yourself. Be true to yourself. All the rest will fall into place.

[cdn2wheeler]

Originally Posted by Lola

First, everything, and I do mean everything looks worse when we don't feel good. So keep taking care of your physical needs until you're feeling better.

This is SO TRUE that it should be written in indelible ink anywhere you frequent. It's also one of the reasons why you should never fall into the trap of "trusting your feelings" or "going with your intuition" at the exclusion of everything else, because feelings and intuition and all the rest can easily be influenced by factors like you're describing; tiredness, hunger, etc.

There's a chorus in a song that sums this up and I think is worth repeating here:

I believe in what I see
I believe in what I hear
I believe in how I'm feeling
Changes how the world appears

(Legal stuff, cuz it matters: Totem, words copyright by Neil Peart, music by Geddy Lee and Alex Lifeson, on the album Test For Echo, released in Canada in 1996)

[Cantando]

Originally Posted by cdn2wheeler

... you should never fall into the trap of "trusting your feelings" or "going with your intuition" at the exclusion of everything else, because feelings and intuition and all the rest can easily be influenced by factors like you're describing; tiredness, hunger, etc.

Surely, if you were in touch with your feelings and listened to them, you wouldn't have reached the stage of being adversely affected by tiredness, hunger, or whatever. You would have felt it coming.

If you consider yourself to be just an observer, i.e. a receiver of what you perceive to be as external reality, then you will never understand that you are the creator of your own reality. You will just continue to adopt and reflect the tone or vibration of that which you are observing, whether it is the 'outside world' or your own body.

[Livgivare]

@Lola: I wrote down what you said about me but translated into Swedish and other stuff that I've heard that is positive about myself on a peice of paper, and boy what that felt good. And sure you were the one to trigger that.

I will read and think through you others replies some more and try to stay focus and have the feeling of that it is ok to have a day off, but on the next day I gotta get back on the horse sadle and ride again...

Love Leelene

[Kaspian]

Don't be too hard on yourself for slipping up a little. See what you can learn from the experience, notice the thinking and behavior patterns that don't work, and move forward from here. Almost all of us slip up from time to time; the bigger measurement of our success is whether or not we choose to pick ourselves up and keep walking down the path after we've stumbled.

Go back to getting up early - not because you "should," but because it makes you feel better about yourself. Get the exercise you crave. If the weather is lousy, you might consider finding a way to exercise inside. (We've got an indoor rock climbing gym nearby, and climbing sure works your whole body!) If it really is walking you prefer, experiment with dressing in layers. You might start out with a hat, coat, scarf, and mittens, but plan on taking off the hat and scarf as soon as you feel warm, for instance.

I am also someone who prefers to do things my way, on my own terms, and for my own reasons. I think it's important to be who I am, and not try to change myself to be "more loveable." Trying to change because someone else thinks I should only makes me miserable, so I don't (anymore).

The friendships that I value most are with people that appreciate me for who I am. These people do not try to get me to change in some way, although they support my efforts to grow on my own. They rarely offer advice unless it's clear that I want it. (I might ask, "What do you think?" for instance.) In particular, my husband will not tell me when he thinks I'm wrong unless I ask. He recognizes the value in me figuring things out for myself.

[Kura Ookami]

I'm not sure if what I'm going to write will help or not but I've got to try. One quote that i remember is this: "There is no failure, except in no longer trying." Write that quote down as many times as you need to to remember it. You might also find it helpful to remember that the inventor of the light bulb said something like: "I have succeeded in finding 1000 ways to make a light bulb that don't work." when he was asked what he thought about his 1000 failures in making light bulbs. I hope this helps a little.