Self-Compromise Within Fear of Rejection
What is self-compromise, and how have I been living it?
To me, self compromise is like a tacit agreement I have made with myself to accept a lesser version of myself than what I know I am capable of. This happens within the belief that it is a more desirable version of myself, when looking at sources outside myself. This behaviour damages my self-honesty, my principles and my self-trust, and puts a veil over who I really am, so that I never get to know myself on many levels.
This behaviour, for me, started from a young age due to three main factors.
One is being reprimanded without explanation, wherein I took it personally and believed that I was fundamentally bad or wrong because I did not know the thing I was doing shouldn’t be done, or was undesirable for whatever reason.
And the second factor is within human interaction, also at a young age (where most patterns are created), when being bullied, ostracized, or simply not having others reciprocate friendship or interest.
In both cases, my automatic reaction was to take things personally, and make it all about me being bad/wrong/undesirable.
The third factor is wanting people to like me, whether it within friendship or relationship. I would act in certain ways as like a reaching out in an “I really like you” kind of way, which would become desperate if not reciprocated. And then I would again take it personally and turn inward, feeling very undesirable.
‘Undesirable’
I want to look at the words undesirable/desirable and how I have been living them.
Having been shy and fearful of people in my youth, I always preferred a conflict free environment where no attention was drawn to me. Within this, I learned through consequence how to distinguish which behaviour is desirable.
How I feel today, being more confident and open, is that I spent so much of my formative years compromising myself into desirable behaviour, that I never developed a healthy sense of self and who I am, my likes and dislikes, my preferences. I have become highly adaptable and open to trying new things, but I see that I now have the opportunity to develop myself as Who I Am here, in this body and in this life.
The first step is to put an end to self-compromise.
Self-compromise
I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to compromise myself as who I am as a mind, being and body, and how I am in terms of living what’s best for me, by instead doing what I perceive as ‘desirable’ to others, without looking at how I may be neglecting and ignoring myself: the needs of my body and my own self-development.
I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to compromise myself by ignoring myself within myself, forcing myself to do and be different than what I would have normally done or been, or completely changed myself due to the want, need and desire for others to like me, want me, need me or desire me.
I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to compromise myself for others.
I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed self-compromise to exist within and as me.
I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to fear being rejected and so compromise myself instead to avoid being rejected at any cost, not seeing, realizing and understanding that the cost was immense, as the cost was and is who I am and the potential that I can become.
I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to fear being rejected to the extent that I would compromise myself to avoid it.
I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to equate rejection from others as self-rejection.
I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to act in ways that I perceive as desirable in order to manipulate others to like me and not want to reject me.
I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to use my words, my actions and my body language to try to control and manipulate how others feel about me, with the goal of having them like me, be attracted to me or feel they need me.
I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to compromise others by manipulate them into feeling certain ways about me, which I have seen, in the end, only ends up hurting us both.
I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to think/believe/perceive that being rejected by another would leave me with nothing, when in truth what I have seen as it has only actually placed me directly in front of myself to see how I have compromised myself. I see, realize and understand that it is the facing and admitting of self-compromise that I fear, and not the fear of being rejected, because I have been rejected many times, and I have seen that I am fine, I am still here, and in fact, with each rejection I developed self-intimacy.
I commit myself to take on the task of getting to know myself for real, and to live my 'Who I Am', regardless of if I view it as desirable or undesirable.
I commit myself to, within self-forgiveness, push myself to face myself in how I have compromised myself in my life.
When and as I see that I am altering my behaviour in order to fit a certain mold of perceived ‘desirable behaviour’ I stop, and I breathe. I give myself a moment to ask myself, is this really who I am/what I want/what I am feeling within myself? And only when I am clear within myself will I proceed to express myself externally.
Here are some resources that assisted and supported me to see more clearly how I was/am living self-compromise: