A Quiet Way Back to Myself
For the longest time, I thought being a good person meant knowing how to put other people first.
I learned to understand people before I learned to understand myself. I learned to consider other people’s feelings before asking what I was feeling. I learned to be patient, to forgive, to give people the benefit of the doubt, even when I was the one getting hurt in the process.
And somehow, I became really good at it. Too good, maybe.
I became the kind of person who would think twice before saying no. I would worry about whether my words might hurt someone, whether my actions might disappoint them, whether they would think differently of me. I wanted people to feel comfortable around me. Maybe that’s why I often gave more than I should have.
There were two different people in my life who taught me the same lesson, in completely different ways. I considered both of them my friends. My close friends, even.
When I care about someone, I don’t really know how to do it halfway. If I consider you a friend, I will try to be there. I will help you with whatever I can. I’ll give my time, my energy, sometimes even things I don’t really have to give. Not because I expect something in return. But because that’s simply how I treat people I love.
So finding out that they didn’t see me in the same way hurt. Not because I believed they owed me the same feelings.
They didn’t.
Everyone has the right to define their relationships differently. Someone can mean a lot to me without me meaning the same thing to them. And as painful as that was to accept, I know that’s their right.
What hurt was realising that something I had considered meaningful was not shared in the same way.
And for some reason, instead of simply allowing myself to be hurt by that, I immediately looked at myself.
Maybe I cared too much.
Maybe I expected too much.
Maybe I was too available.
Maybe I misunderstood everything.
Maybe there was something wrong with the way I treated people.
That has always been my first reaction when something doesn’t work out.
I blame myself.
Even when I don’t really know whether I did anything wrong. I think that’s what being a people pleaser has done to me over time. I’ve become so used to checking whether everyone else is okay that I forget to check whether I am.
For a long time, I thought being mature meant being able to accept everything without feeling hurt. Now I think maturity can also mean allowing yourself to feel disappointed without turning that disappointment into self hatred. Because not every relationship that doesn’t work out is proof that you weren’t good enough.
Sometimes, you simply cared about someone in a way they didn’t care about you. And that doesn’t make your care foolish. It doesn’t make all the things you did meaningless. It only means the relationship wasn’t felt the same way from both sides.
I’m slowly learning to accept that.
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I’m also learning that giving everything I have to someone doesn’t guarantee that they will stay, choose me, or see me the way I see them.
And maybe that’s okay. I don’t want to become someone who stops caring just because I’ve been hurt.
I don’t want to become cold.
I still want to be the kind of person who helps when I can, who remembers the little things, who shows up when someone needs me. But I don’t want kindness to become a reason to abandon myself. I don’t want to keep giving until there’s nothing left of me, only to wonder why I feel empty afterward. I want to learn where my responsibility ends. I want to learn that someone’s distance isn’t automatically something I need to fix. That someone’s disappointment doesn’t automatically mean I did something wrong. That someone not choosing me doesn’t mean I’m not worth choosing. And maybe most importantly, I want to stop making myself the villain in every story just because I was part of it.
I know I will still make mistakes.
I know there will be times when I genuinely need to apologise, reflect, and do better.
I don’t want to lose that part of myself.
I still want to grow.
I still want to become better.
But I want to grow from self-respect, not self-hatred.
I want to improve because I care about the person I’m becoming, not because I believe the person I am now isn’t enough.
Maybe choosing yourself doesn’t mean putting yourself above everyone else. Maybe it simply means refusing to put yourself below everyone else anymore.
You can care without constantly proving that you care. You can accept that someone doesn’t see you the way you see them, without questioning your entire worth.
And you can be hurt by someone without making yourself responsible for the hurt.
I’m still learning all of this.
Some days I get it.
Some days I don’t.
Sometimes I still catch myself thinking, What did I do wrong?
But now, I’m trying to ask another question before I blame myself:
Was it really my fault, or am I just used to taking the blame?
I don’t know if I’ll ever completely stop being a people pleaser.
Maybe a part of me will always care a little too much.
But I don’t think I need to get rid of that part of myself.
I just need to teach her that she deserves the same kindness she keeps giving to everyone else. Because I don’t want to spend my whole life being someone who knows how to love everyone except herself.
I want to learn how to choose myself, too. Not because other people don’t matter. But because I finally understand that I matter too.
