text/ Zhang Defen
Can "payment" really be exchanged for "love"?
In the past year, I have been traveling everywhere, seemingly free and easy, but I am constantly reflecting myself and wanting to understand myself better. I keep "grasping" all kinds of "modes" in my life (shared in the empty mind training class), and then bring more awareness to my words and deeds.
One of the most obvious ones is that I trade “payment” for “love” mode. It comes from the emotional and behavioral habits I inherited when I was a child - I always use "performance better and give more" to exchange for the love of my parents. The way they treat me makes me feel that I can’t be loved as I am, and I always have to do something to exchange for their love and attention.
Mother is very good at this. Even after I became an adult, because I did not continue to be a Christian as she wished, and went to make up the messy and indecent body, mind and soul in her eyes, for a long time, she used her cold and alienated behavior to tell me: if I could not meet her wishes, she would not be able to love me. At the beginning, I was really trapped. I was in pain. When I thought of her, I would cry and try my best to please her, but the effect was limited. Later, I became a little confident in practicing myself. I worked very hard to repair this relationship, and with my gentle persistence, she finally accepted me and now she has almost no requirements for me.
My father kept appreciating me. Whenever I got the medals and dazzling transcripts, he was always so happy and proud, which forced me to do my best in school to win more glory to please him. My parents love me very much and people are very kind, but the way they love me makes my energy constantly absorbed and deprived, but emotionally there is no support or nourishment.
This is how I grew up. In exchange for appreciation and the so-called "love", it forms a pattern of intimate and friendly relationships in the future. I definitely give a lot to my intimate partner, and good friends will think that I am really a "paying". However, because a large part of this kind of effort is to exchange for "love", the result is often disappointing. Whenever they disappoint me, I can’t help but show resentment when speaking and behavior, and the other party feels wronged, and conflicts and disputes arise.
You don’t have to give anything to be loved
Ask yourself, I am actually very happy to give because of myself that I am loved by God—
often do things that have nothing to do with me but can benefit others, and I really don’t ask for anything. I often recommend new Chinese spiritual writers because I think it is really not easy to get into spiritual writing.
I often introduce courses or books from spiritual teachers I think are good, and there is no reward, just think that "everyone should know good things." Donating money anonymously to public welfare institutions is something I often do, and these are all very good. However, when it comes to dealing with close relationships, I tend to pay too much to the point where the other party cannot bear it, and that is the problem.
After realizing this problem, I decided to start observing what my intention was when I gave. If there is a motivation behind it to "please love" or "seek appreciation or gratitude", I would rather not give. I am also learning to find the care and support I want to get from others in my heart, and this field has been ignored by me before. I thought I loved myself very much, so that I could give so much to others. Later I realized that I had not been able to give my love to me, so I needed to ask for it from others.
Because parents don’t make us feel that we are loved without doing anything, which is really important. So I often tell my children that I love you not because of what you did or became, but because your existence is my child, which deserves all my love. If each of us could have been loved like this when we were young, then there would be much less psychological trauma.
If you are the same as me, you give a lot but never get the reward you deserve, then we really must take a good look at what your motivation is for giving. takes back the momentum of "wanting to give", stay in your heart, accompany yourself, and tell yourself: You don't have to give anything to be worthy of being loved.
You must believe: your own value is enough, and you don’t need to earn what you should have by paying.
hug yourself!
Author | Zhang Defen
awakens, heals, and creates, here meets the unknown self
