Taunting weakness

My weaknesses taunt me. They prevent me from truly loving myself and they make me doubt every thread of my being. I wish I could wave a magic wand and make them go away, but I can’t. What I can do, however, is face them and acknowledge them in the hopes that by bringing them out of the shadows they may wilt in self-realisation. (It hasn’t worked yet, but there’s still time!)

Below are five of my weaknesses (I’m sure there are more I’m ignoring!) and my personal understandings of them. I’m not asking you to tell me I’m wrong about them because I know them to be true, nor am I asking you to counter them with positive words. They are simply my imperfections, my weaknesses. We all have them and I’m trying to accept that these are mine. When and if I overcome any of these, I’m sure a new one will crop up to take its place!

But don’t worry! Tomorrow I will share with you a list of five of my strengths. Because no matter how many weaknesses anyone may have, there are always strengths to counteract them!

(1) I have very low self-esteem

If you ask me to describe myself, I will tell you that I am totally awesome. I talk big; I sound confident; I am sure of myself. But it’s lies. All lies.

The truth is that I feel inadequate in nearly every aspect of my life. I feel like the frumpy, plain-looking one in a group of people. I feel like the one who is always dressed wrong (overdressed, underdressed, or just out of style!). I feel as if I sound like a fool every time I open my mouth. I feel like nothing I do is ever good enough.

It stems from years and years of being called stupid. It stems from being told I “could be pretty if” followed by a list of things that I could do to improve my looks (wear makeup, curl my hair, dress nicer, get plastic surgery). It stems from being halfway in between a redneck hick chick and a city girl. I don’t fully belong in either category and everyone knows it.

I try to tell myself I’m pretty and smart and funny and lovable and all sorts of other good things, but it’s easier to believe all of the negative things – even if they’re not true.

(2) I am afraid to trust

I don’t trust you. But don’t take it personally, I don’t trust anyone. It’s not actually a new thing; it’s something that’s been with me my entire life. I just don’t trust that anyone will keep my secrets safe.

I don’t know if there was one defining moment that caused my lack of trust, but it’s been with me for as long as I can remember. The two people I’ve ever fully trusted in my life have both passed away (one, a very dear friend, and the other, my late husband) and I’m now left with no one to share my deepest thoughts, fears, and emotions with.

I mean, I know that there are a couple of people who would keep confidences if I asked them to, but they’re not also people I’d feel comfortable baring my soul to.

Sadly, I was [this] close to trusting a friend not long ago, but in the blink of an eye that trust was shattered. Thankfully it was before me sharing with them, but unfortunately, it’s knocked me back a bit.

So, I have to keep it all bottled up inside of my soul. And that really aches. (One day, I shall find someone to trust. I just don’t know when.)

(3) I have an intense desire to be liked

Like most people, I want to be liked. I can’t bear the thought of someone actively not liking me. I am, after all, a mostly good person. (Come on, no one is 100% good. We’re humans, we screw up.)

But this desire to be liked means that I am quite often willing to drop everything to help someone – even if that someone isn’t nice to me. It also means that I am constantly willing to be treated poorly by someone over and over again without voicing complaints because I don’t want them to be upset with me. Unfortunately, this means that I am sometimes taken advantage of which makes me really mad. But I really want to be liked, so I allow it.

At the same time, I tend to say nice things about people when I don’t really have anything nice to say about them because I don’t want to be that person who says mean things. I want to be seen as liking people – even mean people – because everyone likes nice people, right? (Wrong. Sometimes they just think that overly nice people are weak and can be taken advantage of, so the cycle continues.)

(4) I allow myself to wallow in self-pity

This is a hard one for me because it’s a new one that only really appeared after Paul died. (That’s not me wallowing; that’s me stating a fact.) I mean, I have always allowed myself a bit of sulky time but in the past four years, I’ve allowed myself to become consumed with it.

For example, I was unable to travel home to America this past Christmas and I didn’t feel like spending another Christmas as a guest in someone else’s home watching them play happy families whilst I felt like an outsider. So instead, I opted to spend my holidays home sulking. I did manage to snap out of it enough to go out running, but I mostly sulked.

And because I don’t want to burden others with whatever might be upsetting me, I tend to internalise it all which means more sulking. And because I’m not sharing my feelings with anyone, I convince myself that no one cares which makes me feel like a great big loser, which makes me wallow even more. It’s a terrible, terrible cycle!

Thankfully, I know that I’m being silly and can reach out to someone eventually who will help to get me back on track (even if I don’t tell them what’s going on) and I can move past it. But when I’m in the midst of my little pity party, I am convinced it will never end!

(5) I put too much faith in others

Despite my lack of trust, I have too much faith in the ability of others to act. I constantly tell myself that everyone is filled with good and light and that everyone is looking out for the best interests of everyone else. Now, on the surface, this might sound like a good thing, but I am doing it in a way that is filled with delusion.

I am forever making excuses for why others have done or not done something and I am convinced that they meant well or that they will do better next time. It’s not necessarily a bad thing, but it is a weakness in me because it causes me extreme stress and emotional upset, and I end up being very angry at myself because of it.

(Please note that I don’t want this habit to go away, I just want to find a healthy balance between looking for the good in people and being a total mug!)

So there you have it. Five weaknesses that I can’t seem to overcome in my life. I’m sure they all help to feed my strengths in some way, and I know that they have created the “me” that is, well, me, but they are still weaknesses that I’d love to see gone!