Episode 68: The freedom in personal responsibility

I was having a conversation with my friend Kate-- I’m not even sure what we were discussing and I started telling her about about how amazing it felt to finally take responsibility for my life. Let me back up…

I hit my own rock bottom in early 2007. About a year prior to that my husband had left me for another woman, and I immediately got into a new relationship. This new boyfriend ended up being a drug addict and faked cancer to cover up his addiction. Our break-up was horrible. I found myself on the floor of my apartment, crying my eyes and begging The Universe to help me. Not to spoil the story-- but the Universe did show up to help me, however there was something really important I had to do first.

See, the reason I found myself in two back-to-back messed up situations was because I made two very big mistakes in my life: 1) I looked to other people to make me happy and 2) when it didn’t work out I blamed them. For everything. My addiction to control was so strong I had unknowingly convinced myself that if only I could make other people change, I would be happy. If they would just do and be what I said, everything would be fine. Throw in some perfectionism and avoiding feeling my feelings and I was a serious mess.

But, that day when I picked myself up off the floor, I knew one thing: The only thing these situations had in common was me. My ex husband and ex boyfriend were not solely responsible for my feelings and future. Sure, what they did was lame, but I had to take total responsibility for myself. For once.

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