They say misery loves company. I've seen this in many situations, especially since I have had many bouts of being miserable. What I've noticed is that when we are content with being miserable we tend to seek out those who will join us in our misery and get down and wallow in it with us. If we are content being miserable, we love to share our stories of misery and sometimes get angry if people try to cheer us up, cheer us on or offer a point of view that isn't all steeped in misery.
I was stuck in misery for a long time after my first marriage ended, I was an expert wallower and subconsciously attracted many miserable people and I seemed to attempt to drag others who were not miserable down into the pits of misery with me. I was looking for some company for my misery.
Fortunately for my friends and loved ones, and myself, my contentment with misery ended and I began to seek new ways of being in the world. I stopped focusing on my misery and stopped looking for someone else to pull me out of it and began to focus on pulling myself up in whatever way I could. I stopped looking outside of myself for what was wrong and began to look within. I stopped trying to change everyone else and began to focus on myself and what I could do to improve myself and the way I coped with the world.
Gradually with a lot of help from very loving, patient friends, family members and several professionals, I began to see who I could be when I wasn't stuck in my suffering and misery. As I began to see a new vision of myself, I gradually began to become a different version of myself, one who was more loving, accepting and compassionate to others and to myself. As that happened I became less miserable.
As I became less miserable, something interesting happened, those who were also content being miserable became angry towards me. Sometimes they simply dropped away and sometimes they openly attacked me before leaving. For the longest time I found this very upsetting and wondered what I had done wrong and how my "friends" could turn from me in such a manner. What I slowly realized was they did not want to be around me if I were not miserable. Many of my friends who had shared my misery and raged about how the world should treat everyone fairly and accept everyone for who they were and love everyone unconditionally were now not able to accept me unconditionally.
If I expressed a view point that wasn't in line with what they thought or felt, they thought I was judging them in some way or thought that I thought I was better than them. Some thought I was just sticking my head in the sand and playing "Mary Sunshine" with them. They seemed to forget the lowly image I have of myself, the struggles and deep misery I'd gone through myself. They seemed to have no interest in stopping and asking how my view point had changed and how I'd pulled myself out of my misery. Instead of seeking to join me, some seemed to want to drag me back down. I have had to learn to be very careful to not let that happen.
I am a very persistent, sympathetic friend, I can get down in the dark mud and wallow in misery with the best of them, but I don't want to stay stuck in that mucky mud wallowing there forever, so I have to know my boundaries.
It feels very important for us all to have great compassion for those who are stuck in misery, but that doesn't mean we have to join them and stay stuck with them. We all have choices and we shouldn't judge the choices that we make, if someone stays stuck that is their choice, if we want to move on, that is our choice, both choices serve some purpose and we shouldn't place judgment on them. This has been a very difficult lesson for me to learn.
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