My therapist told me that the personality continues to be formed mostly until around 9-10 (and continues to after the fact) When I was nine I was reeling from the death of my mother. At 11-12 I was reeling from the loss of my stepmother and father.
My identity/personality developed around tragedy, thats why heartbreaks feel like normal to me and happiness or contentment feels like abnormal.
It also explains why I see my heartbreaks that are universal, that everyone experiences, as only ever happening to me. At the time my mom died I was the only one I knew without a mom, and when my stepmom left and my dad stopped interacting with me I was the only one I knew who had just begun recovering from a parent's death and then was hit with a parent's alcoholism at this level. I had learned, at an age that I didn't know any better, that I was the only one who knew pain at this level. I hadn't met anyone who could begin to understand. It makes sense that now, when I am overwhelmed with my bills or my job, that I think no-one else in the world could begin to imagine how bad it feels.
The key for me is I am going to have to un-learn or combat these two erroneous mindsets. Agony is not how life feels like most of the time yet suffering occurs, and I am not the only one who understands suffering, everyone suffers and many suffer worse than I do/have.
mood: suffering/clear-headed/optimistic
3 comments:
That's a bit step - it's actually one of the last leaps we usually take between young adulthood and adulthood, finding out that we are not as unique as we think we are. Everybody hurts.
Adulthood? Maybe thats a bigger leap than I want. ;) Hee hee
Thanks for commenting
Good luck with your growth. I'm sure you'll be fine!
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