Allison Howard – Walking heart

“The stained-glass window” (original title)

You know this isn’t going to make me look nice, but I must confess that I don’t really like many people. In fact, believe it or not, I am not a real people person at all. And as I get older, I have discovered that there are very few people I actually feel a genuine affection for, some I find it hard to even be around. Inwardly, my interaction with others seems to be something more like an obstacle in order to complete my day or week, and I find this exhausting. 

OK STOP!

Before you keep reading, I need to intercede. Several weeks ago, I was digging around my desktop folders, moving everything around, cleaning up, and erasing old writing, when I found this text. Initially I was going to delete it with the rest but after a quick read I thought, no, I needed to revisit this as I found not only the text interesting but the context also fascinating. With this writing, just like a little emotional time capsule, I could clearly see where I was, what I was doing and how my healing journey was progressing; allow me to take you on this ride.  

PLEASE CONTINUE……

Now, with this of course, I don’t go around outwardly being super unpleasant to everyone. Over the years I have managed to develop a great social skill where I appear quite approachable, chatty, even friendly to those that I interact with, and apart from the minor slip up here and there, only a small group of people know the real “colourful” me. 

Unfortunately, for the rest of the population a lot of people fail to notice this mask and do not see how exhausting it is for me to interact with them or anyone for that matter. This is entirely my fault as I have expertly developed a social mask, where I can move and act in a way that is congenial to society and what everyone else expects me to be. This usually goes quiet well except when it doesn’t, and well, depending on the social situation and the angle you are positioned, this can be either tragic or entertaining. 

STOP! 

Now as I started reading, adding, editing, (and slightly cringing,) I rediscovered an interest in this writing partly because I found that this piece spoke a truth which I still hold close to my heart, but something else sparked my interest that I couldn’t quite put my finger on, up until now. 

Please…. Continue Reading

You see, I have come to realise that this feature to my personality was developed a long time ago and is a combination of genetics and certain aspects of my childhood of which have been spoken about in other posts. With this, I have only just come to realise that my “people pleasing” tendencies are just a fear based response by my subconscious vainly trying to prevent me from being abandoned over and over again. Which, ironically, is the main reason why, from time to time, I find myself in this very situation. 

Um….. me again…

Hindsight is funny isn’t it? You see when reading this text, I now can see the moment of time and space I was in, which was one of disappointment and frustration. I do not need to get into the details of this as that is not relevant. But during this time I was feeling a lot of powerful emotions towards being constantly miss-understood, undervalued, overlooked, and I felt taken advantage of. 

PLEASE CONTINUE

You see I thought that making everyone else comfortable at the expense of myself was fine: No issue + No conflict = No problem. Everyone needs to be happy right? And since I didn’t really care about what was happening with me or rather know what truly made me happy and was used to being told what to do, I didn’t really care what happened, I just went with the flow, which worked out great, until it didn’t. 

This “flexibility” all changed when I had a family of my own, and my need for true independence started to emerge. It is quite amazing how you naturally put a little person needs before everyone else’s, even your own. And it was interesting noticing what happened as I started placing boundaries for my child and what was “expected” for her care, and invertedly started creating them for myself. Basically, in a nutshell this newfound independence I was asserting was not met with much understanding, or favour by quite a few people.  

Excuse me… interrupting again…

This is why I find this piece so interesting. I wrote this text just as I was starting to piece together what I had been doing my whole life and how wrong I had actually been. I finally saw how horrible I had allowed myself to be treated, under the guise of being a “good person” i.e. saying yes when I really didn’t want to, silencing (trying) myself in order to keep the peace, shrinking myself because I didn’t want to make anyone uncomfortable. You see, by trying to make everyone happy and aspiring to be the “Good Girl”, I thought I was doing the right thing. However, by bending my needs to the other person or situation regardless of how I truly felt I was actually denying my own truth and I suddenly saw that I was hurting myself, and I was upset. So, like all realised mistakes I was embarrassed by my error. I felt humiliated by allowing myself to be walked over, thinking it was all my fault, and angry at being made to feel so much less than I deserved to be.   

PLEASE CONTINUE……..

Let me explain, over the years this Mask I had developed, has been great and served me well. It has been a marvellous tool to help me interact in the world and has gotten me through various employment roles that require some resemblance of helpful civility and has even assisted me socially with developing friendship groups and managing relationships. Meaning I would morph my behaviour to the specific group I was currently interacting with in order to fit in and be likable or at a foundation level not be alone. 

Now, as I grew, I became so expert at sculpting this mask that for many years I even believed it was real myself. You see I found it easier to chameleon my way through life than deal with the alternative and I even believed this was a good character attribute of mine, up until now. 

You see, like all veneers over an extended period of time, eventually the pretence starts to become brittle and crack, and up until recently I have only just connected this with the fact that every 15 to 20 years the group of people, I am at the time friendly with dissolves quite rapidly. (This is where I found myself not too long ago and if you are a regular reader, you will know what I am speaking about). 

Now this dissolution has occurred with 2 major Friendship groups in my life which has left me feeling friendless, isolated, and alone. As much as it hurts, the truth is that there is only a finite time you are able hold something in front of your face until whatever you are holding becomes too heavy and your arms must drop.

Now this may sound awful but, in my defence, I did not realise what I was doing. I mean I knew deep down that I wasn’t being completely honest to the open world, but who is right? To be honest I was kind of embarrassed of the real me, I was frightened of doing something wrong or getting in trouble, and it was just easier for everyone and myself to keep the real me hidden. So, when eventually my mask came down and my true personality came to light, some people couldn’t handle the change and reacted towards me in a negative way.  

Just interrupting again…

Now, similar to the shock you receive when standing in a dark room and the lights suddenly come on. With a life altering realisation such as this you find yourself flinching with the illumination that fills your mind, and it hurts. I wrote this piece in my flinch. When I was writing, I was experiencing a hurt of suddenly seeing the lie. The kind of hurt you feel when you realise that there is absolutely nothing wrong with you but was made to feel wrong anyway. This hurt was coming for a space of healing.

At this time, I was feeling a little battered about the way I had moved with in life and confused about my new way of being. I didn’t know what to do with the knowledge that I am fine, that I am not hopeless, and trying to balance all of this at the same time as holding on to one of the most awkward concepts ever, selfcare and boundaries. I felt lost in who I actually was I had no idea what I wanted, liked or even loved. And with this I found myself angry at everyone. I felt so incredibly let down that I didn’t want to be around anyone. I couldn’t trust people, and my fear of being completely alone was realised. 

When writing this piece, I was looking for someone or something to blame. Basically, I was in the anger stage of grief (or my inner teenager was coming through). Either way, what I hadn’t figured out yet was that the only person I really needed to be upset with was me. You see I created this mask, no one else did. Admittedly I did this as a “survival” technique from events that moved around me, but I held this mask up no one else did this, it was me. 

PLEASE CONTINUE….

Now this mask I have, isn’t a full lie, there are true aspects to myself within the mask which I choose to accentuate so that I can make that group or individual feel “comfortable”, thus in turn opening a window so that particular group or people can see and relate to me better from their understanding, not mine. Resulting in me covering up the parts of myself that I feel that particular group may not “like” and then in turn may “reject” me.

It is not all that bad on the rare occasion some wonderful people have not even been phased by the appearance of “me” and probably never really saw my mask in the first place. Here I have discovered the truest friendships are the ones that see through all the different colours and levels that I throw and project. Granted this can be chaotic but these amazing people can see what is behind the façade and simply see me for me. Just like an ornate stained-glass window throwing and reflecting 100’s of different colours, shades and hues. These amazing people can see behind the loud noise and view the plain clear glass resting in a simple window frame.  

Me Again… for the last time I promise.

Little dramatic don’t you think? That is why I find this piece so interesting. When reading this text in its raw form, (I have edited it quite a bit, I was super upset,) it is just so wonderful to see how far I have actually come. You see sometimes when you are on a self-improvement/ healing journey, your growth can go unnoticed. However, this piece of writing is like an interval during the climb. By stumbling upon this writing, I have found a beautiful rest stop that has allowed me to look around. I am able to witness the view and to revel in what I have achieved, how far I have come, and where I need to go. Most importantly I can now see the space to forgive not only the reasons why I built this mask but I can now be gentle with myself for hold it up in the first place.

So again, I must be honest and say that I was wrong at the beginning of this piece. I actually do like people, I always have. I love interacting with all different personalities, situations and events, and fascinated with what people do and how they behave. I am please to say I am an extrovert and this is not a bad thing. I feel real happiness and joy seeing all the varied hues and colours that each individual can reflect and sometimes project as we weave in and around each other. I can also forgive myself for hanging on to memories events and people that have not served me kindly in the past, but now also see the freedom of releasing this. I can now revel in the realisation that not only do I see the shadows in life, but I can now truely see the beauty of a new light, and this is a happiness that I have never felt before. 

And with this I leave you with my latest illustration titled “Taking Off The Mask” acrylic on canvas. It is actually not so much an illustration but a painting. I am starting to advenure into more complex meduims that encourage slow working and calm and careful thought in regards the movements required to manipulate heavier and thicker paints as aposed to the fluid and light movements of water colour. I feel I am growing not only in my personal wellness but also with in my craft as well and this is super exciting. 

And with this I will leave you. I hope everyone is keeping well and safe during the transition of seasons. How exciting it is Christmas soon. See you next month for a big announcement. Yes I am going to leave you hanging.