Pixabay: Ben_Kerckx
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We see ourselves in the mirrors of others’ eyes and behaviors, and our stories reflect what we see there.
Who you believe you are began in your early relationships with your caregivers, and it was in these exchanges that you decided if you were worthy or unworthy, adequate or inadequate.
Your story has developed within this original theme from then on.
If you feel inadequate, for example, you may seek a sense of adequacy from people or things, from what you’ve done, or from your appearance, your talents, or your performances.
This never works out.
A sense of adequacy doesn’t come from any of these things; it comes from who you are. This is why so many of us feel deficient and unworthy no matter what we do.
We perform. We get wonderful things.
We may even succeed in proving our adequacy to others, but we never quite prove it to ourselves.
Shortly after every standing ovation, the sense of inadequacy returns and follows us as inexorably as a shadow.
The sense of inadequacy also follows us into our love relationships, where we tend to play out our role in some of the most dramatic ways.
Surely the one who loves us will give us what we always longed for.
Surely this person’s love will be enough, and through it, we will finally be enough.
This never quite works out either, even when our partners do their best to assure us that we’re okay, or even far more than okay.
In fact, the distortions of our self-authorship often manifest more dramatically in these relationships than anywhere else, due to the extraordinary perceptual distortion known as projection—attributing your own thoughts and judgments to others.
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PTSD - A Way Out.com 