Recovering from not sticking up for youself in the past. How

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This is a heavy burden on me and really the biggest reason I am where I am today. I didn't stick up for myself. I allowed other people to manipulate me into doing things I didn't want to. It caused me to not do things that I should have. Things that you don't have a second chance to do.

How do I forgive myself for this? I try and tell myself that I was not mentally prepared for the world for various reasons, which caused low self esteem and not sticking up for myself. But it seems that just about everyone is able to stick up for themselves no matter what they go through. I did not.

Tell yourself it's all in the past and you can't do anything to change it so it's a waste of time to be mad at yourself about it.


Now you can stop letting people manipulate you.

A situation happened to me a short while back. I was part of an art gallery community run by a 'bossy' 'self-promoting' witch with a *b*......who pretends to be your friend, talks behind your back, and throws you out if you don't let her be QUEEN BEE. I call her Stalynn, after Stalin..... She had a manipulative, fakey *egor* woman artist who could, unlike the rest of us, do no wrong...why????..... because *she (*this semi-assistant artist) knew how to do PR and get 'grants' and 'funding'. As for me, Stalynn saw me as someone TO DOMINATE AND ABUSE. As for sticking up for yourself.....after four years I had done NOTHING BUT HELP THE GALLERY EVERY MOMENT I COULD....WORKING, DOING WINDOWS, CREATING THINGS FOR FUNDRAISERS, DONATING TIME AND MONEY DAY AFTER DAY.......and the MINUTE I didn't do WHAT SHE SAID WHEN SHE SAID IT AND SOMEWHAT STOOD UP FOR MYSELF!! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !..........she created a big scene making 'me' look like the psychologically demented villian....because she is a media hog who always gets herself in the newspapers (due to her big mouth, and smooze abilities)...... she and her husband almost violently kicked me out that night because I was right and she was WRONG....but it didn't make any difference because she lives off of gossip, gang-like behaviors, smooze, and lies all for the sake of her own celebrity and money. The minute I stood up for myself and didn't remain completely her submissive do-whatever.........the truth came out.....she only USED ME! I had NO IDEA she would turn on me like that and show herself to be IN NO WAY MY FRIEND.........she's a loser and a user, that's all. I pretended TO MYSELF that she was my friend,......... but deep down I knew, for quite some time, that she was USING ME....AND ABUSING ME! So, as it was nearing my decision to leave on my own....I decided NOT TO LET HER PUSH ME AROUND on time, by not obeying her.......but that was somewhat poor judgement on my part, because in no way could I have predicted her UGLY DEMEANER toward me when I didn't do IT HER WAY, RIGHT THEN AND THERE, WHEN SHE SAID JUMP. SHE LIED IN FRONT OF OTHERS AND ACCUSED ME OF BEING PASSIVE AGGRESSIVE in front of them, too.....in no way is she EVER interested in mediation and TRUE UNDERSTANDING.....THE ONLY THING SHE KNOWS IS BRUTE FORCE (she's a huge woman, while I'm tiny) AND DECEITFUL GOSSIP is what she engages in constantly, building up her reputation,...... that makes *her* be thought 'special' in everyone's eyes. Why did I write all this....to get it off my chest......and also to let you know that the ABSOLUTE fear I felt that night when she and her husband attacked and demeaned me in front of others was SO SHOCKING AND DEBILITATING that I'm still not over it.....I WAS SO SCARED BY HER HUSBAND......all because I stood up for myself a little bit in light of the fact that SHE ALWAYS TREATED ME WORSE THAN SHE TREATED OTHERS, BECAUSE SHE SAW ME AS SOMEONE TO BE DOMINATED AND NOT TREATED FAIRLY AND JUSTLY LIKE EVERYONE ELSE. She respects assertive self serving people more than she does helpful sensitive ones. Helpful sensitive people are seen by her as someone to PUSH AROUND AND ABUSE. Why she is like that I DON'T KNOW! But she is a mean person pretending to be 'cool' socially. I did nothing but EVERYTHING I COULD to make the gallery a better place.....but in the end......it was ALL FORGOTTEN.....because I didn't go on with Stalynn's powerful unwritten manifesto. I gave my ALL to that gallery. And that's the thanks I received in the end.....NONE.

I used to be like it for a long while. Well before I started secondary school I was ok. But something changed and I just let people get away with treating me badly. Looking back I wish i'd beaten the f**k out of them all. But I just got too anxious in those situations. But now i've changed. More and more all the time actually. Just fell out with a friend. I was driving him to town so he could do his christmas shopping. And he wanted to smoke a joint in the car. I told him no, bluntly. He then said I needed to get into new music after I played Led Zeppelin. And I told him he needs to get a new life and stop doing drugs. And called his friends scum. He wasn't happy. Then we went to some shop and he saw a guy he knew and just started talking to him for like 15 minutes, without worrying about me, he always did it. So I thought "sod this" And left him there, so he had to get the bus home. Plus I will now snap at people without even thinking.

It took me years to realize the same thing. I was always too anxious in social situations. If I was just calm, I would have been able to stand up for myself.

yeah exactly, its hard to talk properly when being that anxious. I can't help feeling like I want revenge on all the people that put me in that situation.

I remember when I've been calm and stood up for myself, but people have still "shot" my comments (what I thought were polite suggestions) down.

People have been upset and offended by what I've said (though it wasn't my intention). They've called me rude, domineering and uncooperative. I don't like upsetting people though because it makes me feel like a monster.

Sometimes I've been doing something such as walking around and people have got angry at me for breaking rules that I didn't even know existed because I wasn't told about them. I wonder if perhaps these unwritten rules were established by non-verbal communication I didn't know I had to pick up on?

I genuinely feel shocked and disorientated at these times, but always apologise saying that I won't do whatever I did again. To all those people I have offended or broken rules I'm genuinely sorry and will watch myself more in the future.

I feel like I'm fighting a losing battle sometimes even though I am really determined.

If you give yourself time, the memories of these things will fade, and you'll forgive yourself slowly. I wouldn't bother trying to force it - just concentrate on the future for now, and maybe come back and address it again in your head at a later date. You'll most probably have a different perspective on it all.

"assertiveness" as people call it is something I find it really difficult to get to grips with.

Just try not to care about it, those people being rude don't. And only be nice to people who have earned your respect. Life's too short to put yourself through that kind of mental torture.

Thanks.

The thing is that I keep making genuine simple social/rule mistakes.
It's embarrassing.
Some people think I do this deliberately to upset them and be abnoxious, but I don't.

I really sometimes am oblivious or naive to what I "should" be doing.
I have been laughed at, and yes I've tried to put it down to bad luck or bad experience and just forget about it.

That's the issue here: people expect me to know more about what to do socially (because I'm intelligent and an adult) than I actually do.
People have said that I'm my own worst enemy and it is my problem if I can't see things their way.

If I don't care about it or try to do something to rectify it, I could end up making more unintentional mistakes and upsetting even more people. I hate upsetting people.

Put me in a structured supportive environment where all the rules are "crystal clear" and I'm usually fine. I say usually, but even then some of the communication in places like that is subtle.

Last edited by AmberEyes on 14 Jan 2009, 1:28 pm, edited 2 times in total.

One time all of us in lower level management were required to take courses in "assertiveness training" and after a few hours of the first day of the first class I was thinking to myself that what we were being taught was basically how to be cruel and hurtful to people. Needless to say I didn't get any promotions.

I've taught myself how to be assertive and I found that people only respond well to it if they're already on your side in a cordial environment or know you quite well to start with.

Assertiveness, I've read, is a technique used to protect one's own personal psychological "territory" from any attacks. I don't think that it's intentionally meant to be "cruel and hurtful" to people from what I've read: it's supposed to state boundaries in a relationship.

It's a subtle technique though and if done "incorrectly" or taken too far it can be misconstrued by others as being OTT and domineering. It does depend on the people involved and the situation though, definitely.

Sometimes it doesn't work though and it really isn't anyone's fault. Some people, unfortunately, won't listen whatever you say to them. Sometimes an agreement can't be reached by this method and other methods have to be tried.

None of this is easy.

Last edited by AmberEyes on 14 Jan 2009, 2:03 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I think you're doing what I do with certain things. Your putting too much pressure on yourself, and then you are always more likely to make mistakes. Its like me at times with the last hole on a round of golf. I was thinking "I must finish this off well, otherwise i'm gonna go home depressed". That'll never work, so i'm reading a book about how to overachieve. I know I musn't think much at all, just focus 100% on what i'm doing and stay calm. Let things happen. And thats what you have to do, just let things flow. In what situations are you making these "mistakes"? And what do people say you're actually doing wrong?

Oh the mistakes, it's "unwritten rule" things.

For instance leaving a building at the "wrong time" at lunchtime so I couldn't get back inside (I didn't know that the doors were locked for lunch). My supervisor said:

"Amber. I shouldn't really have to tell you this, but you know that the doors are locked at lunchtime: you can't go out and come back in."

I said that I hadn't known at all and apologised profusely (because I hadn't been explicitly told in any debriefing). My supervisor was cross because everyone else apart form me "knew".


At school, I was unaware that the front entrance was only to be used by Prefects. I used to play a large musical instrument that had to go in the music room. The music room was directly opposite the front entrance. I was told off for using the front entrance to carry my bulky instrument to the music room.

Then I saw younger students take smaller instruments (flutes, clarinets etc.) in via the front entrance and they weren't told off like I was.

I have no idea what was going on and am confused to this day. For about 4 years, I walked the long way round using the side entrance to take my instrument in until I became a prefect. Nobody else did this even though they were younger. I was actually laughed at by people for taking my bulky instrument the long way round the building.


At College, I was told not to sit at a certain table positioned below scaffolding by the College officers because it was "too dangerous". Five minutes later, some guys sit at the "forbidden" table and the officers watch them unconcerned as if nothing had happened.

I was also told off for inadvertently using a breakfast plate for my bread-roll. The dinner lady screamed at me and I almost died of fright. I've got into trouble for inadvertently choosing the vegetarian option (because it wasn't adequately labeled). I was also told "say thank you" when I had said "thank you".

What the heck?!

It seems like there's rules for me which I can't break that don't seem to apply to anyone else. I sometimes wonder why I bother.

Why don't people just write down the rules clearly so we don't have to go through all this needless aggro?

Some of them said that I needed "help".

Last edited by AmberEyes on 14 Jan 2009, 2:41 pm, edited 4 times in total.

Quite true. I've always lamented that managers get to where they are by being tools. (In at least 2 connotations)

Sounds like stuff I have done many times in the past. It says on your profile, your not sure if you have aspergers, are you gonna try and get diagnosed? Sounds to me like you're being targeted. And the stuff your doing "wrong" is just minor, easily made mistakes. You should have put in a complaint about that dinner lady. Or just told her not to talk to you like that. By what I can tell, you're probably too nice, and people pick up on that and will see you as an easy target. I've had it, and i'm not gonna be overly nice to people out of routine anymore. I'm putting a guard up. I'm sorry about the things you've had to go through, and in the situations you've mentioned, I think the other people have been way out of line. Its like me, there are certain times when I need someone to explain clearly what i'm meant to do, otherwise I have so much trouble. I need to be reassured. And once I know what i'm doing is right, i'm fine. I only got diagnosed at the end of 2007, so before that at school and stuff, I always getting into trouble. Things could have been so different. But in a way, i'm glad they weren't. I feel like i've been through a bad patch, I was rock bottom, but now i'm stronger than ever. All you can do is be yourself, if people try and tell you off for doing that, don't be too sorry about it