Power in Yourself

I should have known that life is about more than just working, travelling, or making a family. I always thought that making an adult decision would be fun. I thought it would feel fulfilling and refreshing. I often wonder why it is so hard to be an adult. It is not about walking down each path and seeing the possible outcome of your decision, but realizing the influences around you when you want to move in a certain direction. 

People often say to do that thing you want to do because you do not want to regret not ever taking that chance, but what happens when you have the opposite of that without knowing it? You have people saying little comments that pull on your heart strings and play on your mind. You get the feeling of being lost and at war with yourself in silence. You start to drown internally, which makes you want to scream externally, but you feel it will do nothing. Your heart longs to go one way, but your mind rationalizes against it. At first, the fight is between two people, but it ends with you versus yourself. No one can make you happy, but they sure can make you unhappy and disheveled. Humans are funny with the way they will be their own worst enemy before they are their own supporter and friend. They do not stick up for themselves and let outdated, societal beliefs rule over what they want and feel. People think just because they are older, that younger people should follow in their exact footsteps. Ironically enough, the elders are probably not living the lifestyle or have the lifestyle that the younger person wants, but we do not usually pay much mind to that. 

We are supposed to make our own paths and create our own story, but when we do all we receive is criticism. We are supposed to make our own paths and create our own story, but when we do all we receive is criticism. Criticism can stand in our way, which gives power from ourselves to another person, thus making it hard to follow our own path and make our own decisions. The little digs that chip away piece of confidence in yourself make you lose sight of the end goal sometimes. One thing I learned is that there is a difference in someone telling you things so you are aware and someone telling you things to control your direction. 

I want to travel, go to new places, see different ways of life, and try new foods. My mother, for some unknown reason, does not want me to do that. I mentioned that I am visiting England, mind you I am a girl from California, and over the past few months she has placed punishments, gone without talking to me for days, sometimes weeks, and has now started to make me pay rent and demoted me from daughter to roommate. It has been mental torture deciding to still go on this trip that has already been paid for and cannot be refunded or stay home and lose out on thousands of dollars. Do I make myself happy or do I make her happy? I have gone through the works of her treating me poorly and making the living situation between us very awkward and cold. She mentioned that there are other things to do and told me that I should be focusing on other things. She is older so she knows best right? The older are wiser and can see things that us younger people do not, so why do I not listen and choose to go? She is my mother as well so she has always had this power over me. She has made decisions for me all the time. In her own roundabout way of course, but it has always been her way or the highway so going against her is scary. I am twenty five and an adult woman, why can I not make my own decisions and why does it make her so upset? This whole situation has been playing on my mind for weeks now. Am I a bad daughter for going? Should I not be living life and exploring while I can? When I come home everything is going to change, including my status in the family. I mean, she basically disowned me as her daughter for going through with my travel plans. Listen to this though, the last few days have been her telling me that I do not have to go. She told me that I can still change my mind and she has been nice to me all week. I feel like a toy, she is playing with my head in more ways than I can count, from the punishments and cold shoulder to the family outings and encouraging words. This is my life and I am an adult, so why is living my life how I want and choosing to do something ending an entire family? Life is all about decisions and this one has the weight of the world on it. This is not the first time I have made a decision that she did not like. 

Another time is when I was in high school, heading into my senior year and all the talk around campus was college. My mom and I never talked about college, in fact, it was my high school that somewhat taught me what college was and introduced me to a few. I told my mom about a couple that I wanted to go to and she said I could not and should look at community colleges. I did that and finally chose one but when I told her the college I chose she was not happy at all. She belittled me and complained for the longest time. She never told me she wanted me to go to the college she went to, nor did I even know what colleges she went to because again, we never talked about college. My whole life has felt unfair and it has always been a battle between choosing myself or fighting my mom. 

Thankfully I started therapy and learned about controlling and abusive relationships. I knew my mom was a control freak, but there was never anything I could do. The manipulation tactics always worked or at least made me feel awful about myself and my choices. Making decisions is not hard, it is factoring in everyone and everything that matters to you which is hard. Through all of this I learned that you do not need to factor in everyone, you need to choose yourself. Give yourself that power and do not let anyone else try to persuade you differently if that is truly what you want. Life is about more than work, more than travel, more than family even, it is about learning to give yourself power and taking over your own life. Life is about life and fulfilling yourself through doing what you want and telling yourself that you are enough. You have the power and giving it to someone else takes away from your life. Life is about power, not over other people, but making sure you always have it for yourself. This may be the biggest lesson to learn.