Acceptance is a critical part for both sides in my view.
This is how it works for me and as usual I got here the other way around but still I share as I see similarities in what I observed as well in my personal journey.
I don’t believe we are defined by our actions but we do often allow our actions to define us.
I am neither good for being faithful nor my wife is bad for being a cheater. In the absolute meaning, that event didn’t define the baseline person as good or bad.
What she allowed herself to do was evil at towards me, for her might have been a dream or whatever she told herself that was, that turned out to be again judged as evil the moment she discovered that the OM was not the dream partner she wanted but trash to her.
To me? Yes it did destroy my life because it was evil, it was abused and caused trauma ptsd and so on. But also Because I allowed it.
I might have never allowed myself to choose to actively do a similar evil to a partner, but I have allowed someone else choices to destroy me.
See what I am talking about? Agency.
The moment you take back your agency to allow yourself to chose what is good and not allowing yourself to chose what is evil, it is no longer the action of behavior that defines you, but is you defining the decisions.
Is basically what we teach kids but that’s not making it any less relevant to us adults (again we allow ourselves to forget the basics).
If you consider yourself a good person, no matter the flaws, that’s likely your baseline, your set of values and boundaries about what is "good " and what is "evil".
This is what WE define, our agency. You choose someone who aligns with your values as a partner, reject the rest.
For some reasons at some point you allowed yourself to betray your values and cross those boundaries, and when we do that we feel it even if we aren’t the recipient of the biggest amount of harm our decision causes, we do know we betrayed what we held dear, so we betrayed ourselves first.
That’s the contrast and conflict you feel, the choice and its fallout makes you identify as it changed your baseline from good into bad.
It’s not, or else you would not be reformed or reforming, your baseline would have embraced unapologetically the way of the betrayer (in this example).
That you loathe it is telling is not your innermost self, is the betrayal of the self that pains you.
I will expand later
— later being now — expanding—
Your moment of acceptance was not a recognition of "I am bad" it was likely the moment of stepping up, reclaiming your original identity and values and giving a hard but rewarding recognition
This is who I am and what I want to be. And I betrayed it, I betrayed myself. I allowed my ghosts to overcome me and I believed in the lies I told when I indulged in this.
I chose to, and it proved me exactly how evil and bad and destructive it was. I am not like that but I convinced and allowed myself to become like that. I accept that I did it. No way I will allow it to define me anymore, I created that persona I will destroy it and keep its memory as a testament to never betray myself again.
I accept that I can’t take it back, but I will never allow it again
This is perhaps what you said to yourself when accepting it, here and now, not in the past. (Maybe less dramatic but that’s how I can convey it best)
Since this is your inside feeling and not a story you tell to the people hurting from your past choices, it’s not a fantasy.
I’d say you are at the stage of owning it, if yes your repulsion for those behaviors is likely to grow over time self reinforcing itself until you will eventually return to your original baseline, yes the story is tainted but you are not anymore, is just a scar.
Talking about your healing here, I don’t know if you left your bs or are still in the process of trying to rebuild. But it doesn’t matter because whatever is your goal the healing is the cornerstone, and I’d say this is a big, big step forward on that journey.
PS - a hunch?
You were stuck in shame you said.
I think shame is a symptom of the mental state of convincing you have "become bad". Shame is no empathy though, is a trick trying to both acknowledge the evil (I feel shame so after all I am not completely corrupted, there is still good in me) and at the same time excusing your actions as unavoidable because, after all, you "now became bad " hence that was the likely outcome, you couldn’t have done a different choice.
Yes that’s shame’s function, justifying your behavior due to lack of agency because you are like you are. And is a bitch to unmask as toxic because it works alongside your own betrayed values trying to recover. Cognitive dissonance does the rest, transforming shame (from self pity - justification) into something that must have positive value.
The moment you realized, accepted and understood it, is likely the moment shame will begin to fade and die away, because now you own it, but you are no longer identifying yourself with it.
If I am right, it should fade and be replaced by regret and remorse in the next future, and those may feel as much or more painful, but they are positive healing signals, full of empathy and drive to learn to love and make amends, not shame’s empty and toxic self loathing.
[This message edited by BackfromtheStorm at 1:47 PM, Monday, April 20th]
