The comfort of familiar misery

Photo by Jonathan Elbaz

I’m gonna share something personal.
I have been in my share of bad relationships.
Honestly, I feel that I’ve had enough for a lifetime; finally learned my lesson!
Seems like the universe heard me - now I have met someone who might not be “who I expected to see myself with” (you know this dream image in your head with a horse and sh*t), but he loves me beyond words and treats me incredibly.
And you know what?
I FEEL HORRIBLE.
How can that be, you might wonder?!
Well, in the previous relationship, I was always pulled back and forth; the whole thing was full of drama, fighting, insecurities, emotional and physical abuse, and overall just total insanity. I was given “intermittent reinforcement” which is a highly addictive form of control (I’ll put a link here about what it is, just click the button below), which TOTALLY wrecked my nervous system.
I was high strung and tense, ALL THE TIME. CONSTANTLY. Not enough words to describe how bad it was, and oh, how desperate and nuts I was… damn.

Relationship before that was no picnic either, and before that, and before that, and my parents always fighting… long story short; I’ve had loads of drama in my life.
Anyway – now that I am in something healthy, loving and stable, all the unprocessed emotions come up to the surface! Sometimes I cry, sometimes I laugh, sometimes I cry and thank him for being here, sometimes I doubt the whole thing and feel SUPER BORED… it’s a roller-coaster.
SO, I can say that I both feel immensely happy, and very very awful.
I’m detoxing from a life of anxiety and bullshit, and even though my conscious mind so badly wants this STABLE love and affection that I’m getting now, I can feel my subconscious crawling under the surface, whispering, and at times screaming – “RUIN SOMETHING!! This can’t go on this way, this is not right, you have to f*ck this up, you HAVE TO do SOMETHING so things go back to normal!!”
Sounds nuts?
I bet you, you have a little bit of that too, at least.
Let me explain:
As humans, we are beings that thrive in comfort, confirmation, and social acceptance. Some of us might be daring enough to go outside our comfort-zone and face our fears, but still, it’s proven time and time again that without social acceptance (aka. Any type of love) we die, wayyy quicker then we were perhaps meant to die.
So, many of us therefore grow up in our comforts.

Don’t you like your comfort? I bet you looove your comfort. You love it so much, that most likely you will stick by your comfort, even when it is proven bad for you. Our comfort is not necessarily what is good for us, but what we like because of it’s familiarity.
For example a specific way to hug, some smell that triggers pleasant memories, a fluffy blanket that our grandma gave us; those are all things that are nice and familiar.
But what if I told you for example: “Hey, did you like the way your parents screamed at you as a child?”
You will most likely say “HELL NO, I hated it!”
But then we’ll have a look at your intimate relationships, and both you and I will clearly see how your life is imprinted by their screaming; perhaps even, you stay in relationships that involve loud fights, even though you claim to hate it.

So, even if you hate something, even if you KNOW and FEEL it is bad for you, it can still be so familiar and comforting that you will lose yourself and all you own before you lose what gives you this familiar feeling.
But why, you might think? If I know it’s bad for me, why would I keep in my life/keep doing it/allowing it?! It’s just plain stupidity.
Why yes, my friend, while it might sound stupid, it is the absolute truth.
There are way too many things in this life we cling to that we know are bad, not because they (only) are physically addicting (perhaps), but mostly because they have an emotional attachment of familiarity to us. In most cases linked to our childhood, but in others, it’s connected to some coping later in life, and we just don’t know how to do it any other way. Then the chain of comfort goes even deeper… it grows into an addiction.
Things such as:

• Candy, sugars, simple carbohydrates
• Other junk food
• Normal foods that you might not tolerate but that are just “so good”
• Cigarettes and other self destructive behavior
• Alcohol, and other drugs
• Fighting, “drama-holic”
• Emotional and physical abuse
• Suppression, political issues

It is unfortunately much easier for us to cling to familiarity and keep the love, acceptance and comfort we so desperately need, than to break free into our REAL core truth, or to even just live a slightly healthier lifestyle.
Oh, and let’s not forget the fact that we sometimes feel “unworthy” of good things…
But that’s another topic.
Thankfully I feel my subconscious well enough to most often anticipate it’s pranks when it wants to ruin things, and my man also knows about this.
He understands it, and is very loving and supportive.
And... Isn’t it terrible?

What is YOUR experience of such habits?
 
Love and dance,
//Gypsy Queen

P.S. I'll be changing domain soon, more blogs there, more honesty, more LIFE!
Stay tuned!

Learn about intermittent reinforcement in relationships