The Mind and Self Awareness

On the "Light" and the "Dark"

I spoke lightly on a topic I referred to as the "Light" and the "Dark". This is something I'd like to talk about because it's a topic that many could think of as referring to a person's character. It isn't. There are bastards in the light, there are people with golden hearts and helpful hands in the dark. What I'm referring to is someone's view of themselves. There are as many layers of light and darkness as there are people in the world. We each coexist in the middle layers, our default is in the light when we're babies. We don't know self-hatred as children. We live comfortably in this blissful, pure light until someone changes it. Usually an adult, even a parent. No one stays on the same level their whole lives. 

The first time I can say I remember my level shifting, I was about 5. My parents screamed at me a lot at that point in my life and that stayed going until I was thirteen. I was told I was a sociopath, a narcissist, manipulative, a liar. I began to resent myself. I remember seeing all of my friends with their families who were loving and kind to them, and realizing that the parental view of their kids should be a loving kind one, so what was wrong with me? It was at this point I descended out of the light, and began scaling downward slowly into the dark. I was blamed for everything, and I learned that everything was ok if it was all my fault. In that way, I began to have to be at fault for everything. If everything was my fault, I could fix it. Through learning this coping mechanism, I thought I was getting better, but more and more things were blamed on me, and I began to realize that carrying that burden was making my plummet into darkness faster.

When I was thirteen, my childhood struggle came to a head. I got kicked to the curb with my sisters and my dad. My dad and I got on for the most part, only fighting occasionally where we once did every fuckin day. Through making friends, and things not going wrong, I began to climb back upward. Then I was destabilized again, and just before reaching the light, I was thrown back down. 

After that, I fell in love with someone who was one of the people I mentioned in the last chapter. A darkness dweller who wanted the light so badly that they masked themselves with it. He was... special. He had fallen in love with someone like himself who he had been on and off with for 5 years by the time I gave up on him. I could see that specialness, I could see under the mask, the problem is with people like me, is that we don't understand how deeply that mask ties into who these people are. If they were only the darkness dwellers like people like me are, they'd try to climb back up. They wouldn't have to mask it. They wouldn't have to make themselves feel better that way. 

My mistake was allowing myself to keep going back. Every time I dragged myself away to lick my wounds, I swore that it was my fault. I swore that maybe if I tried harder to show my intentions of saving the both of us, he'd let me. he wouldn't rip me apart and throw me back down. I know I'm responsible for my own self-image, but he went through my mind like it was his personal plaything, and I was. I was his plaything. I gave myself to him as a plaything. That ruined me for a good while.

After we were over, finally, I got to get back to my climb. I met a good man who is still with me over a year later, and I'm almost to the light again.

If any of you find yourselves in this wrestling match, between things out of your control (destabilization, parental abuse, etc) and things in your control (relationships, jobs, etc) just remember, you are a decent person. Just because these people treat you like shit, doesn't mean you are shit. Everyone has flaws, but no one deserves this. Take a breath, and let go of the pain. Lock your knees so they can't push you into the darkness until you can get away from them. If you always could walk away, stop holding on to them so they can get a better vantage point to rip you apart.