Perception Is Everything

I have to remind myself to be okay with being misunderstood sometimes. 

While it is a strange concept to me, and mostly I would rather dig my heels in and defend myself. I know that with life, comes people who may not understand you. Regardless if it is character, intentions, or perceived actions— sometimes it is safer to allow someone to stay in their perception. 

You can’t control or change what someone else feels, thinks, or how they react, so I am learning it is in my best interest to choose my battles. Even that concept can feel icky to me, because with my history being misunderstood has come with being criticized, judged, reduced to something I am not, and blamed for things that were never mine to carry. 

So now when I am misunderstood, it can be hard to let up when I have often been put in a position to defend myself. In being put in that position I learned disrespect can come in many forms.

It can come in a sly look or expression when you’re defending yourself, it can come in whispers underneath someone’s breath, it can come in direct invalidation, and indirect. It can come in someone's tone of voice, on the surface the words sound understanding but the slight condescending and coldness in their voice say otherwise. It can come from someone else trying to tell you what words came out of your mouth or actions you took, but always in a way of rewriting what they say about it as true. It can come as a label, given by someone else— that isn’t theirs to give. 

I want to make peace with the fact that sometimes I won’t be understood, and I have learned enough to be okay with it sometimes. That not every misunderstanding deserves correction. Even though my brain perceives it as an attack. 

Some people are committed to their version of you, and no amount of explaining will change that—only exhaust you. Sometimes their version of events is keeping them from crumbling as well.

I've struggled to accept that what I perceive as obvious, isn’t so obvious to others— or that they turn a blind eye to it. 

Either way it is my power to control what I think, to let myself feel how I feel, and to know I am valid in it. Even if someone might think otherwise.

A person struggling to reconcile others might feel differently is someone in their own right, learning. 

So I continue to remind myself to be okay with being misunderstood, because at the end of the day as long as I am grounded in my truth— anyone else’s opinions or projections don’t have control over my narrative, my dignity, or my feelings. 

I feel deeply, often take into account others' feelings, wanting to make others feel comfortable. It has been a hard realization to learn overtime not everyone does the same. And that’s okay. Perception is everything. 

I had to learn to not care for others' comfortability at the expense of myself, hence another reason I have become so protective over myself. It is a gift that has to be protected, and I have learned firsthand what happens when it's not. 

And in learning how to defend and protect myself I realized:

Another’s invalidation can’t crumble my truth, nor can it condemn my story.