“I let people betray me because I am afraid of independence.”
If this resonates with you, what follows may help you see something about yourself. It is a real self-inquiry — one person’s inner dialogue on this question, unaltered except for readability.
Self-observation on why I let people betray me
- Betrayal has been around me all my life.
- I want people to be fully trustable.
- When someone betrays me the first feeling I have is sadness. I am sad for the other person and for myself that our unity has fallen apart.
- It is so much part of my life that it usually takes quite some time for me to understand that I feel betrayed.
- Actually, it is not just feeling betrayed. I can very easily fall into situations where people really do betray me.
- I understand that I have a part in creating the situation. I don’t like to admit it but I have to.
- What is strange is that I justify the other person’s behavior. No, it is not strange… I realize that it is a coping mechanism.
- Why do I let people betray me?
- I want people to be fully trustable. And I want to be so close to them; And so much together with them.
- And then comes reality.
- And I hate myself to be betrayed again.
- One of the things I do is to try to ‘make them understand’, and convince them.
- Of what?
- It is disgusting for me to accept that people are not always 100% trustworthy. I am not always 100% trustable.
- It is just one fact of human life.
- I put a lot of trust in people. This is natural to me.
- When I observe myself trusting someone, it is a good feeling. I don’t want to lose it. I think it is something very valuable to me.
- When someone betrays me the first feeling I have is sadness. I am sad for the other person and for myself that our unity has fallen apart.
- Betrayal is something very much part of the human experience.
- I need to see what part I have in creating the situation.
- I see that it has to do with me not being mentally and emotionally independent.
- I am looking for unity at the wrong place… through connecting with someone through their ego.
- I realize I am afraid to accept that I shall be independent.
- Though it is easy after all: Until I am dependent on another person, it is not even love and unity. Just a form of dependence.
- I trust that I can find unity even after becoming independent. Though it still feels odd. I want unity and still, I know that I have to give it up to really find it.
- I don’t trust but I know that the unity I am looking for comes after independence.
What would you lose if you stopped needing someone to be fully trustworthy — and trusted yourself to be whole without that?
If you want to sit with this question, SelfChatter’s journal is built for exactly this kind of inner work.