When I was going through a difficult breakup, I wasn’t ready to move on, as I didn’t want to let it all go. I understood that it wouldn’t make any sense as it won’t work, but for some reason, I thought I could change the situation.
When the moment of euphoria dissipated, I started to notice all the psychological features of my partner. I guess at some level I had always known about them, but like most people, I truly believed that love is so powerful that it can change a person.
I searched the internet to find articles about relationships, about ways to change your personality, about the nature of infantile behaviour and manipulations and so on. I posted all these articles on my page so that my partner would see them. I was like ’Look! This is it! It’s all about you! This is what is happening to you!’
And I bet you’ll guess what happened next. Yes, instead of gratitude I got only aggression and insult. And it’s really not surprising. This person’s imperfections, which I was insistently trying to point a finger at, really hurt. All the special behavioural models are just psychological protection against wounds inflicted on your soul. It’s only the thoroughly developed strategies that allow us to comfortably coexist in this world together.
Now in my view, it’s safe to say that a person can change. A person really can change. But only under one condition (read this carefully!) — when they themselves want to change.
You probably think you’ll become their motivation — for your sake, they’ll want to change, right? Don’t get your hopes up. Your influence is like the weather outside. A person will adjust to you and take the umbrella in case of foul weather. But no one will be able to change their own beliefs or even alter the structure of their personality just because of a cloudy sky.
Only if that person suddenly find themselves fundamentally unsatisfied, when they feel dreary in the rainy weather or that the sweltering heat is unbearable for them…Only when they’re fed up with being unhappy and unsuccessful will they think about how to change. Only then do changes become possible.
And when that happens, it’s better for you to be as far away as possible from the epicenter of the explosion in order to not be hit by the blast wave. Because to admit that ’I was the reason for everything that happened in my life’ is really, really hard. As a rule, someone who is always there for us becomes the main reason for all our failures. Or alternatively it’s someone who we used to be close with. But it will take a long time for another person to understand with whom everything bad in our lives really begins. And only provided that this person is ready to understand it.
Someone once said that ‘the best thing we can do for our beloved is to give him a large portion of himself’. It’s neither anger nor revenge. It’s not like ’hey, look at how your life is going without me’. It’s just a conviction that every person has a right to be who he is. Even your temporary relationship (because it’s always temporary) doesn’t give you the right to change a person.
We are responsible only for ourselves. We are born separately from each other and we leave by ourselves. Everyone has their own life and destiny.
Your will applies only to your life. Don’t pretend that you are God and you have a right to think that you can influence another person’s destiny. Leave him and take care of yourself.
Psychologists have a rule — they don’t try to solve the client’s problems if he doesn’t ask them to. In fact, the person doesn’t become a client without a request. You should also follow this golden rule — mind your own business. I want to emphasize that any grown-up and mentally healthy person is able to deal with his problems himself, or ask for help if he needs to.
The best thing you can do in your life is to become the creator of your own destiny. If someone close to you wants to change, it will happen. By your own changes you will motivate the other people to change as well. If your way of life doesn’t inspire another person then that’s absolutely fine — it just means he has his own way. After a while, you will be surrounded by people whose ways are similar to your ways.
