Every friendship requires trust in order to become a friendship in the first place. You don't know a person isn't trustworthy until they betray that trust. And naturally, when that trust is betrayed, it is very hard to earn it back. Hard, but not impossible. Most people who betray trust do so as a reactionary measure to their own insecurity. Fear is usually temporary though, so the person who has wronged you knows it--whether they admit it or not. While time does not heal all wounds, proactive action indicating genuine sorrow and a true desire to make reparations does. Sadly, the same destructive insecurity will more than likely prevent the person who initially hurt you from returning as well. At least, not for a long time. In my experience, they always come back--it just doesn't always mean what you want it to.
None of this behavior makes sense to those who live proactive lives, as opposed to reactive lives. What's the difference? Think of proactive as confident and decisive...a proactive person is always moving forward. Being proactive is solution-oriented. Positive in nature, not judgmental. While reactive folks are essentially insecure and unsure. They may be able to mimic confidence, but it's pretense. By the time you know it, unfortunately, the damage will be done. Reactive people resist forward momentum because they see problems instead of solutions. Reactive means fearful, negative. These people should be avoided at all costs.
To the proactive, it's counterintuitive not to recognize your mistakes. When you acknowledge your responsibility in another person's pain. it's healing. For both of you. Why would you ever deny that to someone you cared for? Or, to yourself??? You wouldn't. But it happens. And it happens because, frankly, the person who hurt you is terrified to face you. If their fear led them to choose ruining a true friendship over preserving it--that same fear will also prevent them from ever truly making amends.
For reactive people, pain is their joy. Even if they appeared to get joy in the same proactive way you did. True joy causes them pain. Because, joy leads to bliss, to peace. And, people who cause pain don't feel they deserve anything more than pain. That means, betrayal is inevitable. If you create joy for a person who lacks self-love and self-worth--though you want them to see that they are worth every ounce of those good feelings--your best efforts will not change their underlying self-loathing. It's like trying to help a drowning man in shallow water who refuses to put his feet on the ground; he'll pull you under with him, no matter how strong you are.
Self-loathing comes from events in childhood--usually some kind of abuse or trauma. As children, everything is magnified. So, even something an adult would not see as harmful could be to a young child. And, if it's a repetitive pattern, at some point, the child will adopt that pattern and incorporate it into their psyche--they are simply trying to survive when they do. It's a variation of Stockholm Syndrome. A child is dependent on the adults around them, similar to a captive. Parents see the relationship differently, because we are the adults who chose to be parents, taking for granted the fact that the life we created depends wholly (and solely) on us--at least, from the child's view. Emotional stability is not only needed in that scenario it's required. Because, all a young person can do when faced with repetitive trauma or abuse is internalize it. And, as everything is about the emerging self in childhood, children naturally take responsibility for it--believing the problem must be with them. Children are innocent. Naïve. As an adult, you know when a person has abused you. When you start to verbalize it, that's when an abuser tries to turn the tables. When that doesn't work, other abuses follow, including abandonment.
That's the beginning of emotional pain--whether you're the giver or the receiver. And emotional pain is something we all feel instantaneously--no matter what "superpowers" we possess.
Let me state--for the record--that a person who abruptly disappears does so because he or she is guilty and ashamed. There are no reasonable reasons for such behavior, only excuses to justify what is considered a literal crime. Abandoning a child, a spouse, or failing to support the pregnant mother of your child--whether you're married to her or not--is considered a felony in Georgia, and many other American states.
Abandonment is never the fault of the party who has been abandoned. There are two people in any relationship, but your agency--as the abandonee--is completely stripped away by the unilateral decision making of the abandoner. You can't be responsible for another person's choices, especially when you aren't even aware of them. A person disappears without telling you because of insecurity, usually surrounding omissions and lies. And, as those omissions and lies become exposed over time, there are only two options for the reactive individual (who almost always plays the victim to family and friends in order to keep their social acceptance): 1) Take responsibility, or, 2) Leave. I'm not talking about a divorce situation. I'm talking about pure and utter abandonment. The kind where you never see it coming until you come home to an empty house.
I don't want to write about this. Take hours of my precious time on this planet exploring the scum of humanity's collective pond. Because, I feel every syllable of every word I write, or I wouldn't write it. My real fans reading this do, too. We good souls find each other. Across all boundaries. From #77 countries around the world (I'm humbled and grateful by your continued support every day...). And then, there are the traitors in our midst. Like anyone who's ever betrayed me. They read whatever I write as well, but it's only because each one hopes to see themselves. Narcissists. Like the man who abandons real love from a worthy woman but not before packing the Gap jeans she gave him.
The word "fool" was created just for that guy...and, believe me, you don't want to be him.
#Roses