The Damned Personal Growth Fairy Strikes Again

This weekend the Personal Growth Fairy flew over and konked me on the head with her damned fairy stick.  She always catches me by surprise, because I think I’m so over my ‘stuff’.   But, noooo. 

In the end, it really was about expectations...one of my reeallly big ‘trip-me-up’ issues.  In my head, Sunday was going to look like a Norman Rockwell painting;  my husband and I frolicking through the day, giddy in love, playing joyfully in a field of wheat...if there happened to be one nearby, that was golden and, preferably waving in the breeze.

My hair is all flowy out behind me (even tho it is so short as to stay put in gale force winds) and daisy’s dot the rolling hills in the distance.

Ok, so it wasn’t this exact vision.  But, it was equally unrealistic.  And, that’s the point.

We are all just plain old human beings.  We all go about our lives doing the best we can... most of us being the best we can. Norman Rockwell’s paintings, and similar images from TV, movies, and media, are just that...images.  No one can live up to those.  That’s why people create them.  It is what life would be like in a perfect world of OUR making.  It’s a dream.

If we can take a step back and redefine our expectations so that they aren’t made of cotton candy and Little House on the Prairie we can be so much happier.  

When I took stock and asked myself:

    were my needs met and/or respected?

    were my husbands needs met/respected? (hmmm)

    was I being heard?

    

I answered yes to all, well sorta. I was being respected and heard, and honored. 

But, when I asked the harder questions, the ones I really didn’t want to hear the answer to...when I asked ‘am I hearing? Am I honoring?’ The answer was no.

And, when I asked “am I being realistic?”  The answer was a resounding “NO! Get over yourself”  

And so, I created a new plan.  It included me making me happy, which was what I was looking for in the first place.  And, as it turns out, that is my job, and not my husbands, anyway. 

The result?  A happy me. And, a happy hubby.  Win-win!  Fly away Personal Growth Fairy your work here is done.