I want to take this time to apologize to everyone I've ever done this to...
Last night a good friend was talking to me online. I was in one of my crappy moods where nothing seems to cheer me up. Most people just leave me alone during these times, but this good friend chose to try to cheer me up. He complimented me and told me not to be sad. Instead of being a normal human being and thanking him for what he was trying to do, I took his compliment and picked it apart.
Why can't I just let people say nice things to me, about me, without freaking out and acting like an idiot? I know at the moment I receive a compliment my feelings are some mix between modesty and insecurity. Its funny, for all that I have accomplished and that I know I can accomplish, I still seem to have some pretty shoddy self-esteem. I see myself as this normal, run-of-the-mill girl, and I have never thought I was worthy of praise for just being me. There are times when I'm kinda okay at receiving compliments-like when I'm receiving a compliment or award for some specific task I've accomplished. When you're the top student in your engineering society and you have a list that is a page long with all the things you've done to earn the award, its easy to say, "well, yeah, I do deserve that 'congratulation' or 'good job' or 'I'm proud of you'". I guess it starts to fall apart when the compliment is that I'm sweet or a good friend or something along those lines. Maybe its that I feel that those are qualities any good person should possess, so I don't deserve to be complimented for possessing them. And if the compliment has anything to do with me being attractive or sexy, that's when I really don't handle it well. I see myself as an average-looking klutz who couldn't be sexy if her life depended on it.
Maybe you're sitting there saying, "but I've complimented you in one of those ways and you seemed to handle it okay". Well, if that happened my handling it probably came in one of two ways: I choked out a thanks and smiled and then found a reason to walk away or I laughed and smiled and turned it into something sarcastic. Defense mechanisms at their best.
But anyway, I hate that I'm like this. Not because I feel that I should be prouder of myself, but because of what my reaction does to the people I care about. And as much as I don't deal with it well, eventually I really appreciate that person going out on a limb to tell me they like something about me.
So, I'm sorry.
Its just not easy to change a person overnight.
Hey!
ReplyDeleteYOu need to realize... What you call normal is what makes you great. Sometimes its not what you do, or that its all that unique, its that people genuinely like being around you and the compliments are just peoples way of showing it.
I care about you deeply, and I'll never stop telling you that, and someday, I hope you understand that its not about some award, or something that noone else can do, but that you've been there for me, and that you BEING you makes me love who you are.