I have been realizing lately how often we seem to confuse what it means to love and support others with putting our own needs aside. It’s as though we feel that we either give all we have or we are selfish and there is no in between. Looking at the picture above, think about your relationships, where do they fall? The first image shows what we often feel we have to do, to sacrifice ourselves to get someone else where they want or need to be. We give all of ourselves, we put our needs aside…and only one person makes it out. (Or we expect someone else to be the one on the bottom getting us out.) We don’t talk about our own struggles so as to not overload the other person, when we provide space for them to work through everything and help them carry that. We apologize for, or dismiss, our feelings so as to not hurt someone else’s. We make the other person the priority. Meanwhile, we are left in the darkness; hurting, alone and often times, we become resentful. We don’t understand why no one sees us, hears us, seems to care but we have accepted and almost demanded this role. We are so fearful that we will be selfish if we say that we matter as much as someone else, that we will give everything we have until we have nothing left to give. When did self care and self love begin to be defined as selfish? Saying you matter is not the same as saying someone else does not matter. Why can’t those both exist?
Look at the second picture…both are able to get out because they are supporting each other. No one person is having to sacrifice themselves. This is what support is, what a healthy relationship is. We help each other get out, we lean on each other, we allow someone else to support our weight as we support theirs.
How many times have you not shared your needs or your feelings, let alone asked someone for support, because you felt you had to be everything to everyone…that you had to be the “strong one”? We are all human. We all have needs, we all hurt, we all feel lost at one time or another, we all know the darkness. Strength isn’t pretending to be fine when the world is falling down around you, n fact, think about it, what message do you actually send to people when you are always “strong”? When we are “strong” no matter what, we are telling others that they have no right to hurt, because look at all we’ve been through and we’re fine. It tells them that their experience is wrong, that they are weak… Or on the flip side, it tells them that you don’t need anything and they don’t need to consider your feelings because you will be fine regardless. It tells them that you don’t need help out of the hole.
We have the responsibility to set the boundaries in our relationships, to ask for our needs to be met and to choose who has earned and not earned the right to surround us. Surround yourself with people that support you on your way out, be someone who leans on others while supporting their weight. It’s not fair to expect yourself or anyone else to sacrifice themselves completely. Relationships are give and take…it can’t be all or nothing.