great expectations

i am probably the only person under the age of 40 who can remember Jermaine Jackson's one-hit "don't take it personal." how i became a Jermaine Jackson fan i will never know, but i am [almost] ashamed to admit that i actually owned the tape--yes, the TAPE--of his album. and "don't take it personal" was my favorite jam. if you don't believe me, look it up on YouTube.

years later, my best friend recommended a book to me called The Four Agreements (which, btw, i recommend as well!). one of the Four Agreements is "don't take anything personally." simply put, the author's argument is that 99.99% of what people do to/towards you has nothing to do WITH you, and is instead borne out of their own realities/life experiences etc. ppl are, for the most part, inherently good, and not out to be purposely malicious/hurtful.

i've tried to remember that Agreement many more times than i can count, as i am a person that takes pretty much EVERYTHING personally. as i've mentioned in previous blog postings, i am uber (i love that word!)-sensitive, almost to a fault, and tend to internalize most things, both good and bad. i'm getting better at it, but i still struggle with it, and it reared its not-so-cute head day before yesterday.

so, last Thursday was my bday and as i mentioned in that post, i don't normally do much of anything for my bday...atleast i haven't for the past few years. via prompting from a friend, i decided to do dinner, and invited a group of ppl. because i was so indecisive about where i wanted to go, i gave a little less than a week's notice on the invites, so i didn't expect the greatest turnout, but was still holding out hope.

long story short, out of approximately 10 invitees (not including me), there only ended up being 3 of us (including myself) at the restaurant. we had a great time, and i am absolutely grateful that those 2 friends were there with me...but, i still walked away feeling slightly disappointed. the spoiled parts of me felt that some of the others who didn't attend should've rearranged their schedules to come celebrate with me--after all, it was my birthday...and...*arms crossed*..i would've done the same for them.

so, as it festered in my mind yesterday, it started bugging me and making me feel weird and personally slighted. i started thinking back on all of the times when i've planned events and the turnout has been low and ppl who committed have flaked out at the last minute [hence why i don't do events anymore]. i started comparing my own sacrifices and commitment to attending their milestones/events. and it made me upset.

and then i thought about this whole idea of expectation/validation...about how sometimes I (we) expect ppl to do things the same way that we do them. we expect them to feel/operate in the same way that we do, just bc we're friends. and, how that is unfair. it's unfair to take things personally that most likely have nothing to do with you as a person. it's unfair to place expectations on ppl, many times without their knowledge. it's unfair to look at a person's commitment...or the lack thereof...as an absolute validation/invalidation of how they feel about you.

and, so i made the decision to feel "a way" about Sunday....give myself the right to have the emotion....to plow thru it...and then to move on. i think my tendency to take things personally will probably always bubble below the surface, itching for a trigger to set it off--my soft heart won't allow it to completely go away. but, i'm learning how to face it head-on when i feel it coming on, and to conquer it.

i'll get over it :)