At the end of 2015 I started journaling about my love life cause it was such a shit show. Two and a half years and a lot of drama later, I'm once again single and really appreciative to be out of the toxic headspace that took over my life during that period. I learned intense lessons about self-respect, trust, and communication, but I also learned the hard way about healthy boundaries. Getting into back-to-back push-pull relationships has definitely taught me how to walk away and stay away from unequal balances of effort and energy.
Reading through these entries feels like watching my life through the windows of a house. I'm grateful that I'm finally far enough removed from the emotions to process what happened in a detached way, but it wasn't always like that. I went through a 6 month detox of no contact, mediation, sitting with my feelings, and self care to find peace with my anger and betrayal. Folks always talk about sense of self after breakups - for me it's extremely important to realign before getting into anything new otherwise I worry I'm starting something for the wrong reasons. Having been on the opposite side of that coin, it's naive to think a relationship has a chance of lasting if someone is trying to fill a void.
I recently learned that this detached meta-cognitive state is common to people with Ni in their function stack. Introverted intuition is my dominant cognitive function, but I still have a hard time describing what it does. In most simplistic terms, Ni is a perceiving function built around shifting perspectives and singular understanding. Because it does not manifest externally without a judging function, talking about it seems abstract, but LiJo does a good job explaining Ni in the video below.
I bring this up because the common pattern in all my entries is a lot of pain from assuming why my partner is doing something that inherently would not protect us (the couple). Ni is always trying to achieve singular understanding, but it sometimes does not spend enough time gathering facts and experiences to come to that conclusion. One of the biggest lessons I learned last year was the difference between growth pain and pain pain. Having the courage to extrovert my thoughts and feelings to my significant other shouldn't be grounds for our relationship ending. And as someone who prides herself on being fiercely independent, letting another person in on my insecurities is my ultimate sign of trust. Having that trust thrown back in my face was the biggest wake up call of 2017. As cliche as it sounds, it was the straw that broke the camel's back, and ultimately what I needed to put my foot down and keep it down.
"The secret of change is to focus all of your energy, not on fighting the old but on building the new.
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