Loving Yourself by Letting Go of Having to be Right

How often have you been in situations similar to the following?

• Your partner messes up and then attacks and blames you for it.
• Someone promises something, doesn’t do it, and then finds a way to blame you for it.
• Someone is blatantly unloving to you – attacking you, blaming you, projecting their issues and feelings on to you, withdrawing from you – and then denies that this ever happened.
• Someone lies about something important and then denies that they ever said what they said.

What do you generally do in this situation?

• Do you get angry and try to get them to see what they did or are doing, trying to get them to admit that they are wrong or unloving?
• Do you shut down, punishing them for their unloving behavior in hope that they will see what they are doing and apologize?
• Do you defend and explain to them what they are doing wrong, hoping to get them to see it?

What generally happens when you do this?

When people are behaving in an attacking, blaming, self-absorbed, untruthful or bullying way, they are coming from their ego wounded self. When someone is in their wounded ego, all they want is to get approval, avoid pain, be right and avoid being wrong. Therefore, anything you do to try to get them to see what they are doing wrong will fall on deaf ears, and in fact, all of the above behaviors – your attempts to get them to see how unloving they are being, are coming from your own wounded self, wanting control over getting them to see that you are right and they are wrong.

What a mixed-up dynamic! Generally, nothing good comes of this.

What Else To Do…

What if you were to completely accept that you have no control over getting them to see how unloving they are being or how wrong they are about you? What if you accept that, when someone is in their ego wounded self, there is nothing you can say or do to get them to see the error of their ways? What if there is no way of being right?

I know it’s very challenging to accept that you cannot get someone to see that they are crazy-making you with their projecting, lying, attacking, blaming behavior, but the reality is that you can’t get them to see it. Not even after the fact. Because, when they are in their ego wounded self, they often don’t remember it the way you do, so even if you bring it up later, it likely won’t get anywhere. They will keep denying it and you will feel more crazy-made.

Loving Yourself By Accepting Reality 

Once you fully accept the reality that you can’t get them to see what they are doing, then you are free to focus on taking loving care of yourself. You are free to say nothing, to lovingly disengage and do your own Inner Bonding work. You are free to compassionately embrace your pain over being treated badly. You are free to help your inner child to not take the other’s behavior personally. You are free to tune into your feelings and your guidance, asking for the truth and learning to trust your feelings and your higher guidance.

Once your focus is on loving yourself rather than trying to control someone else, you will be amazed at how wonderful you feel, not trying to control. A major cause of stress is trying to control what you can’t control, and a major result of letting go of control and loving yourself is inner peace and joy, even in the face of others’ unloving behavior.

To learn more about stress see: Discovering Self-Love