We've all been there. We're in the middle of a disagreement with someone - it could be a partner, it could be a parent, it could be a friend - and as words fly back and forth, we think (or say) something along the lines of "You're making me crazy!"
But are they?
Outside of intentional gaslighting or boundary-crossing, is someone "making" us feel a certain way?
I've touched on this before, but this concept is a big one and it's probably one of the most challenging to explore. We believe that something "makes" us feel a certain way, when in fact it's probably pretty benign. What isn't benign is our belief system and the meaning we attach to people and experiences.
Here's an example to clarify what the heck I'm trying to articulate. When I still lived in New York, I would often carry a lemon or an orange around with me in February because it made me happy. Now, that might seem weird and it probably was, but the bright citrus scent felt like a shot of sunshine when I needed it the most. The poor fruit wasn't actually doing anything - it was just hanging out, being a piece of fruit. It wasn't innately causing me to feel anything. The scent, for me, was attached to the concept of sunshine and I was the one attaching that meaning to it. The fruit was just fruit.
Here's another example of something a little more complex: a friend texted me the other day about a film she saw and said I had to see it too. Knowing what the film was about, I immediately thought "Hell no - that'll make me feel awful." (It's a very heavy film about true events.) And while the filmmakers no doubt provided graphic imagery to emphasize the subject matter, the film and images are just that: celluloid and graphics. It's the meaning that I'll attach to it that will cause me to slide into a dark place. My mind will reinforce that humans are capable of atrocities against each other and, given events in my own life, I'm just not emotionally up to that these days. But, the fact is the film won't "make" me feel badly - my thoughts attached to it will.
I'm writing about this now because the holidays are approaching and with them come family gatherings that can be fraught with tension. It's worth taking time to sort through our thoughts about different people and relationships. Is someone deliberately trying to harm you, or are you attaching meaning to their words that they might not have intended? By taking ownership of our feelings, we can relinquish ourselves from unnecessary conflict and that alone seems worth trying.
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