"Sometimes when we attempt to wake up in our own lives and leap forward to new levels of truth, honesty and authenticity, the resistance we encounter isn't only from within ourselves, but from the people around us,- family, friends, coworkers, even our intimate partner. I call this the Loving Conspiracy-what happens when, consciously or unconsciously, those closest to us undermine our efforts to grow or change." - Dr. Barbara De Angeles
These past few years have been a time of immense growth and healing for me. While my life has not reflected it too much on the outside just yet, in the inside there sure has been great change. I mostly notice this when it comes to my emotions. I have feelings of joy, love and peace just because. Throughtout most of life I did not know how to be in such a good place. I always tried to be in the place of true happiness by achieveing goals or accumulating stuff. Ofcourse my ggod feelings were never long lasting.
But now things are different. How I feel inside has very little to do with externals. You would think that my family would be happy for me. Instead I have been coming across great resistance. Also, some of my friends have disappeared. They loved to talk to me almost daily when I had drama about my life to share. But once I began to tell them about how good I was feeling about life, they slowly began to leave.
"We would like to believe that all the people in our life want the best for us. we would like to believe that our friends,relatives, partners, parents and children all want us to shine, to grow, to be the best we can be. When we are confronted with reluctance, resistance, disaproval or even anger from our loved ones at the advent of what we consider a change transformation for the better, it often stuns us. 'How could she/he love me so much and yet be so unhappy with my growth?' we wonder in disbelief. why would people who care for us want to hold us back or keep us stuck in a place where we are obviously not happy?" - Dr. Barbara De Angelis
The following has been what I have learned from psychologists and some of my savvy friends as to why those we least expect are not happy with out growth, healing and transformation:
- People like the outer version of you, but our uneasy with the real you so the prefer you keep the mask on so they will feel better.
- When you change for the better, people are forced to look at their own issues and that makes people uncomfortable.
- It threatens the way they are. For example if someone uses alcohol to deal with life and the spouse suddenly becomes sober, the partner that is still an alcoholic will worry that he too willbe asked to quit.
- They are afraid the new you will not like the old them. The woman that use to take care of my son when he was one year old told me that her husband became insanely jealous after she lost 100 pounds. They began to have many problems until they finally talked about why suddenly he had become so controlling and mean. However, from what I have heard from many spouses, their relationship deterioted once one of them began to change for the better.
- Seeing the way you have changed reminds them of all the ways they need to change but they haven't.
- They discourage your wake up calls because they don't want to experience any of their own.
- If they are unhappy following the rules they want you to be unhappy as well. They resent you for being happy especially if you did not follow their rules. Like a friend of mine said, "Yeah when you change for the better family or friends will tell you, 'That's not how we roll, you have to do it our way even if it means you will be equally unhappy otherwise you are not welcome.'
- They are jealous or envious. In How Did I Get Here?, written by Dr. Barbara De Angeles, there is a story of a man who was obese and because he had so many health issues he began to focus on losing weight. He eventually lost so much weight and when he went to visit his family during the holidays they sabotaged his efforts to eat normally and also resented him for going for his morning jog. There is another story of a man, let's call him Max, who was extremely unhappy in his marriage, but he wanted to keep up with appearances. When his friend, let's call him Tom, came out and said that he was leaving his wife and filing for divorce soon, Max became furious. Tom did not understand what Max's problem was. He thought he'd be supportive considering that Max disliked being married too. After several years Max also divorced his wife and was only envious of Tom because he was brave enough to do what he was not yet courageous enough to do.
"We become especially threatened when other people break undefined but vey important emotional rules. As long as I have to endure my unfulfilling job or loveless marriage, you have to endure yours. As long as I am overweight, you have to be overweight. As long as I have to be in the closet, you have to be in the closet. As long as I have to struggle, you have to struggle. As long as I have to suffer you have to suffer...If my friend can end his incompatible relationship, then why am I still enduring mine? if my colleague can break free from a stifling job and pursue something unconventional but satisfying, then why am I still here bored to tears?"- Dr. Barbara De Angelis
Sometimes our family and friends do not sabotage our change efforts on purpose. For example, if you have been losing weight and your family member or friend is uncomfortable with the new thin you because it reminds her about how much weight she should lose, every time you go to her house she will try to feed you fatty foods and if you decline she will almost pressure you into eating even though you have explained to her numerous times that you just ate a few minutes ago and you prefer to eat when you are hungry again. Your family member or friend may not even be aware that she is pushing you to eat when you are not hungry. She may believe she is just being a good host.
"As you become more authentic, more awake, more aware, some people will balk at the new you. This is both painful and perplexing when it happens. It is as if you pushed and struggled and finally made it through the birth canal and much to your surprise and disappointment, your arrival was greeted with this: " I liked you better before, when you were in the womb...Too often , it is for us as we begin to emerge from our awakenings,we rejoice at our hard-earned growth, but our loved ones not only don't share in our celebration, but appear to be punishing us for having awakened at all."
Common methods used when others feel threatened by your breakthroughs:
- Convincing you that something's psychologically wrong with you.
- Creating their own drama or emergency to pull your attention from your soul-searching and on to them.
- Enrolling other friends or family members to talk you out of concerns or feelings.
- Making you feel guilty for your growth by accusing you of abandoning them, feeling superior to them, breaking promises made to them or misleading them.
- Intimidating you by saying other people are unhappy with how you have changed but are not telling you this to your face.
- Scaring you by predicting a negative outcome for all of your new choices.
- Emotionally blackmailing you by withdrawing their love until you change back to the way you were.
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