greetings, good people...
the thing with writing to get free, to reclaim
being free and to understand what that truly means,
is repeatedly sitting down across the table from
those doubts and demons and hashing it out. in
this case, this particular session deals with
the idea of how being trustworthy can make you
both invisible and expendable.
i have been told, by a great deal of folks i've
come across, that i'm a 'good guy'. 'reliable'.
but there is a danger in that, one i never really
understood until some years ago. see, there are
those individuals out there that love people they
feel are trustworthy & reliable not for those
qualities - but for how they can take advantage
of those qualities for their own needs. you may
know these people. hell, at one point in your
life or currently, you might BE one of these
people. or have been, as it were. these people
that do this, are mostly doing it because their
flaws, their inner pain, drives them to do it.
there's only a small number that do it in a
malicious and twisted way. but i'll get back to
that.
see, i bring this up because you begin to realize,
as you get better within yourself & be better,
you start looking at how these people operate.
they praise how 'down' you are. they exalt over
how you always come through. but if you stop to
think about it, how often do they need you to
come through? how one-sided is the situation
between you two? i'll provide an example. at my
last full time job, i was praised for being a
reliable & trustworthy employee. but i soon saw
just how the company leaned on me. one particular
situation came up where we had to change offices
due to an explosion in the street that caused
damage to the building. the experience was
traumatic. my boos at the time managed to get
us relocated, to start the very next day. i was
reluctant to go in, and said so. my boss calls
me at home and says to me to begin the conversation,
'what, you don't wanna work?' to this day, i
don't know if he meant that as a joke. but i can
tell you that i was livid. i didn't go in the
next day, and when i did return, i saw that the
attitudes of my boss and a couple of my co-workers
cooled towards me. i had dared to actually be
concerned with my well-being instead of being
old Mr.Reliable.
i had dealt with that from a couple of friends
and in some small ways, i still do. part of that
issue is that i'm always the one to be concerned
with others' well-being, how they are doing. but
as i looked at everything in totality, i saw how
being that way set me up to be taken advantage of
by others. it's damned hard to have that knowledge.
but, in that moment i told myself that i had to
stop feeling so forlorn that someone would do that.
i had to check my triggers from that feeling and
make sure it wouldn't affect my day to day. and
so, i basically began to only display that ability
to be dependable to those who i felt deserved it.
you don't get that from me right off anymore, not
like i used to display it. you need to earn it.
and if i've known you for a minute, guess what?
you need to renew that spirit of earning if you
feel you're slipping. does it seem harsh? on the
surface it could. but i'm protecting me, and i'm
also protecting my faith in the good people and
spaces i can be fully reliable & dependable with
and in. it is an act of self-love and self-care.
it's also a balancing act. there's days where i
fall back into the morass of feeling under-appreciated.
feeling unwanted. those days and moments show up
unwanted on the doorstep like hustling salesmen.
but i get through them by reaffirming the values
i believe in, by trying to get past those doubts.
by not allowing those folks to have dominion over
my emotions. and then there are the days when i'm
like Robocop with it - clinical, precise and at the
ready to either ignore or shut someone down. those
days catch some off guard, but its always those
who are culprits.
so i'm finishing this off by saying, if you are
reliable, dependable, trustworthy...hold onto that.
cherish that and be an example. but make sure you
guard yourself and your spirit so that those
wayward & hurt folks don't make you an example of
how to be taken advantage of just because they
need your shine to cover up their tarnished selves.
as always, thanks for reading! until the next
time, walk good.
