bounderies
Jun. 6th, 2010 08:45 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
anansi133Sometimes I find it very easy to shrug off those moments when I have irritated or annoyed, or actually wronged someone. Mostly, though, I let that kind of stuff fester. Often, such little regrets will come bubbling out of my memory at the most unwelcome times, giving me yet another useless reason to dislike myself.
One thing that makes it easier to sort this stuff out, is the expectation of being punished. When I overdraw my checking account, I expect to make it right. I don't expect to be punished for it, especially when I haven't given the bank permission to play the parent on my ass. Government traffic tickets or overdue library books, same thing: let's make it right, but don't expect me to accept punishment for it.
So today I was a craigslist flake, the person who promises something and then doesn't deliver. And the free prize went to someone else and not me. I accept that as consequences of my (in)action, but I don't accept it as a "serves me right for not being better at followup".
There's a related idea that's helped me with anger issues: I can be annoyed with someone, and I can wish for them to see the error of their ways.... But when I want to see them suffer for it, and when i want to be the one making them suffer, that's just bad juju. Maybe my Xtian upbringing.
/moralizing
One thing that makes it easier to sort this stuff out, is the expectation of being punished. When I overdraw my checking account, I expect to make it right. I don't expect to be punished for it, especially when I haven't given the bank permission to play the parent on my ass. Government traffic tickets or overdue library books, same thing: let's make it right, but don't expect me to accept punishment for it.
So today I was a craigslist flake, the person who promises something and then doesn't deliver. And the free prize went to someone else and not me. I accept that as consequences of my (in)action, but I don't accept it as a "serves me right for not being better at followup".
There's a related idea that's helped me with anger issues: I can be annoyed with someone, and I can wish for them to see the error of their ways.... But when I want to see them suffer for it, and when i want to be the one making them suffer, that's just bad juju. Maybe my Xtian upbringing.
/moralizing
