So I wasn't shining at my best every moment but I didn't slip back into the extreme that I used to be.
OK, don't take this personally, I'm not picking on you, but I see it on this board a lot and wish to reveal it for what it is, because it undermines us in a big way.
It's the way we tend to minimize our behavior and its consequences, and excuse it in ourselves. This is good stuff to know!!!
People excuse their behavior by first making an admission of not being perfect. Ever notice that? "Hey, I make my share of mistakes, but at least I didn't do anything as bad as what she did!" or "I'm far from perfect, I'll admit that! Yeah, I blew my top at him!"
The funny thing is, we minimize the very real consequences of our own behavior on others, but are prone to seeing the other person's behavior through a magnifying glass. We neglect to understand that the other person is doing the very same thing to us! They're thinking that their behavior's affect on us is negligible and not detrimental, while they see things we do as big bad doings.
So, while you're thinking "I wasn't as bad as I usually am", your partner may be thinking, "Heck, I know what I did wasn't right, but boy, that doesn't excuse her behavior last night by any means!".
That's just human dynamics at work.
So, the point is, rather than justify errant behavior by admitting it or comparing it, we have to delete it! That means not focusing on the second part of our excuses as we tend to do, the part that treats it as negligible:
"but I didn't slip back into the extreme that I used to be"
and focus instead on the first part, because that's really the important part that needs to be worked on:
