Accept that you are going to hurt someone and help your own happiness
We spend a lot of our lives protecting others. It’s a trait our society values in both ourselves and others. But you’re going to hurt someone. You’re going to hurt more than one someone. You can’t protect them from yourself, just like you can’t protect yourself from them.
You’re going to be the nicest, most gentle person, the most loving you can be, and you’re still going to hurt someone.
When you feel responsible for someone else’s feelings, you lose sight of your own. You can only control yourself, you can only synthesize your experience of the world, you can only hurt yourself.
But you’re going to feel like you hurt someone. And from the outside, it is definitely going to look like you hurt someone.
Let’s not misunderstand: you will be loving, and gentle, and even careful that you don’t say something intentionally mean or hurtful. You’re not giving yourself permission to be mean, and you won’t be. But you’ll still hurt someone. You are taking care of yourself.
Just as someone chooses how to react to you, you choose how you present the situation, the words, the feelings. You choose your own actions, and sometimes, your own hurt.
You are going to hurt. You are going to hurt someone.
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