And so you inspire me to a sermon of sorts from my most vulnerable self. Be gentle with me, as this is a risk for me. I guard my soft parts well. But, you and me, we are both worth the risk. Hear my words below spoken from an open heart with love.
Put away the tired cliches and old ways of thinking: what is going on with your need to stop the unhealthy friendship and dysfunctional contact has nothing to do with loving XH enough.
Instead it has to do with *loving and respecting yourself enough* to let go of being someone's Plan B.
Do not be afraid. Love Yourself.
"No work or love will flourish out of guilt, fear, or hollowness of heart, just as no valid plans for the future can be made by those who have no capacity for living now." Alan Watts
"Love takes off masks that we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within." James A. Baldwin
When you find yourself evaluating your choices and decisions based on how you think they will affect XH, or what they mean about your R with XH, STOP. It is disrespectful and unloving to yourself. It is selfish to use another thusly as a crutch to avoid confronting and moving through your fear. Love is the answer, and now it is time to learn love yourself.
Start with loving care and concern for a woman who is repeatedly injured by a man who regularly treats her as a thing made solely for his comfort and convenience, a man who she sees treats other women similarly.
Would you encourage her to continue to accept such treatment? Would you suggest that she stop allowing it for *his benefit*? Or would you hope to gently persuade her to recognize *her own value*? Would you hold her hand, hug her, and try to get her to see that to continue to accept scraps of attention out of fear of deprivation and emptiness and loneliness prevents her from finding the bountiful happiness life has to offer her?
Your life is a creative process to define the shape of your path through life. It is not a time to spend monitoring the path of another, edging it for weeds unasked, making building plans and buying supplies for a design the other does not seek to follow. Nor can you build your own path to block another's. It won't work and the effort to evade your obstruction will only be resented by both, understandably so. For, measures to control the path of another and countermeasures to block such efforts both squander time that each could have better spent on making one's own path beautiful and serene. That is quite enough work in itself :-)
Who are you to continue to deny the world the beautiful force of your free-from-fear happy shining productive life? You are strong. You are valuable. You are worth it. Confront the old deep soul-wounding hurts within that make you flinch in any way at such true words. Acknowledge the beauty and value of your being. Out loud. Right now. Say: "I am a person of infinite value, profoundly worthy of my own love and respect, beautiful in my heart and mind. I matter. My thoughts matter. My feelings matter. I will not hide from the pain that recognizing my own value brings. I will love and respect myself. "
No really, say it. Say it three times. And again in the mirror. Just try it. No one will see. It is OK. And, I already know it is true, so please don't feel foolish. It's just an exercise in stating the obvious, but sometimes the obvious is what we need to hear. Just do it already. Yes, really. OUT LOUD :-)
Step away from fear into authenticity. There is no betrayal in being true to one's best self. Indeed, it is the first step to being true to anyone or anything. It is OK. Come into yourself. Joy and peace to you.
