As survivors, we tend to give excuses.
This isn’t out of anything other than having huge hearts and a longing for love.
We understand what we’ve been through and how we feel and we don’t want others feeling this way.
Because of that, we’ll be more understanding than we should.
“He’s been through a lot, I want to be there for him.”
“His parents weren’t there for him – I will be.”
“He has so much childhood trauma he’ll be completely alone without me.”
And so on and so forth.
We feel like because they’ve been through something, they have an excuse to act that way.
But that’s not true. That’s not how it works.
In that moment, all you’re doing is enabling bad behavior.
You’re teaching them that what they’re doing is ok.
And that doesn’t help them or you.
When you excuse that kind of behavior, you’re teaching them that they can get away with using you as their personal punching bag.
Their trauma is not your responsibility.
Trauma is not an excuse to treat other people like garbage.
We’ve all gone through something. It doesn’t excuse you from being an asshole.
If someone is refusing to get help and better themselves, that doesn’t mean it’s your responsibility to do it for them.
No one will change if they don’t want to.
You can’t make someone want to change.
But you can show them that they don’t need to if you continually allow them to walk all over you.
Something I’m really big on is self awareness and acceptance of the past while being open to healing and changing your future.
As much as I truly wish I could flip a switch and make every single survivor in the world realize how worthy they are and excite them into going after a life they love, I can’t.
I used to get very frustrated in the beginning of my coaching journey because I wanted every person to just want to change.
I wanted everyone to just drop their fears, their struggles, their defensiveness and just choose to change.
But obviously, that didn’t work. Why? Because if someone isn’t ready to change or doesn’t even want to, they’re not going to.
How do you handle that?
You do you.
You live the life you truly want. You set clear and solid boundaries. You keep those boundaries. You accept that the life you want is waiting for you and you do the work to get there.
If people want to come along for the ride, cool! But if they don’t, or if they start and they fall off, that’s their life and that’s their business.
It isn’t your job to drag them along with you.
So stop allowing people to take advantage of you. Stop giving people permission to treat you as their personal punching bag.
You deserve more. So stop settling for less.
If this resonated with you and you’re ready to let go and finally live the life you deserve, then you should check out the Worthy of Recovery printable journal. Every day for 30 days you’ll complete a journal prompt and document your gratitude and your daily victories. Worried that you don’t have the time? Included with the journal is a course that teaches you how to journal your way to freedom in less than 15 minutes a day. As an added bonus, you also get over 45 printable affirmation cards. It has all the pieces that helped me on my recovery journey and I know it’ll help you, too. Click here to grab yours!
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