LOVE, Kloudiia

When I was first read this news S’porean Cheated by ex-lover on The Straits Times two days ago, I felt sad for the woman who had lost her relationship and her money. When I reached the part where she commented on how she felt about this case, I felt sadder. This, was what she said (taken from The Straits Times):

I don’t trust men anymore. I trust money more now.

I’m sure she said more than this liner during the press conference. But, based on this alone, it isn’t hard to know how deeply hurt she was from this relationship. Yet, based on what she said, I’m very concerned.

You see, when we get hurt, the easiest way out is to create a virtual shield around us. This bubble has spikes pointing outwards, in the same way that we’re pointing the fingers at the outside world and saying that it’s some other people’s fault that we ended up like this. This bubble is supposed to make us feel better, let us heal and prevent us from being hurt again. But in so doing, are we really learning the lesson we should be from that bad experience? Are we taking responsibility for what we have done to contribute to the outcome?

You may say that it’s really through no fault of yours that something bad happened. In the case of this lady, she probably is feeling angry at that man for betraying her trust and for cheating her feelings and money. She is justified to be angry, for her ex-boyfriend had indeed committed these crimes. After all, she had given so much in the relationship.

At the same time, did she have a part to play in this whole issue? She sure did. But until and unless she begins to reflect on them, she might not see how she had allowed herself to be caught in such a dire situation at the end. She would continue to be enslaved in the victim mode, together with the nasty cycle of bad emotions like anger and hurt. And this, doesn’t help to get over this episode and be a better person, does it?

Hiding behind this virtual shield and label all men as non-trustworthy is an easy way out. It saves one effort to learn the difficult part in discerning a person’s character and integrity. Furthermore, it makes it less painful not to have to admit that we have been less careful, we should have known better and we should stamp our feet down when we realised that something is indeed not right.

If you’ve made some mistakes or failed in certain things in your life before, do not be so quick to find something to blame. Granted it may be the case. But there will definitely be certain things that could have been within our control. Learning to take responsibilities for those areas is not like what others think – to blame ourselves and make us feel and look worse than we already are. But it is to empower us, because when we take responsibilities, it only means that we can do better and it is within our control to make it better the next time.

When we’re able to do this, then we’re ready to put the unhappy episode down in history. With that learning experience, we can create a better future for ourselves, one that wouldn’t be more perfect if not for what had happened before.