“A peony grows next to a rose. And, in your limited capacity to accept something new, you deemed the peony trash because it did not look or smell like a rose. You even missed that you were finally given a flower without thorns, so intent were you in thinking you know exactly what a flower should be. The peony was an upgrade. One you horribly missed because, to you, flowers and love always come with prickles. Time to redirect. Time to open those eyes. The peonies are coming in with a great surprise.” ~ Sunni Gail Shafer
Why do we sometimes stay in relationships that we know are toxic and bad for us?
Because sometimes, that is the only way we can learn. Learn that we deserve so much better. Learn that we are worthy of so much more. Sometimes, we need those feelings of discomfort. They help us level up. They show us the way to something bigger. And all we can do is lean the fuck in.
Many of us have been in toxic relationships. And often, we just keep going back. What we sometimes do not know is that we have to keep going back until finally we just do not care anymore. All our friends, and anyone who cares about us, will tell us over and over how bad our situation is. And how we deserve so much better. But we will ignore everything they tell us. We will not listen to their advice.
We will not look at all the signs and we will keep painting all the red flags green.
Why do we keep going back for more? We have to. Why? Because sometimes, we cannot learn any other way. No one can tell us what we should or should not do. We can hear or read all we like on narcissism, toxic relationships, and trauma bonding. But until we are ready to level up, we just need to stay there. Knee-deep in the shit. The shit of our own making.
Because at the bottom of all this is the truth, that this experience is everything we signed up for.
We have to learn and decide ourselves that we want more. That we are more. No one else can tell us that. People can tell us over and over how amazing we are. But we will be unable to see it. And then, suddenly, through all the crap we experience in this relationship, something happens. One day, after we try and try to make things better, we start to wake up to the truth.
That when someone hurts you over and over, they really do not give a fuck. We realize, for ourselves, that we do deserve more.
When we see that truth, that they really do not care, that realization really hurts, and often we will turn that pain into anger and hate. Because we finally stop filling our heads with the bullshit. We learn to read between the lines, and we start to hold on to the facts. Because all of a sudden, we have to. Even though it hurts so much. We put away the fairy tale of how we want things to be. And finally, we see how it really is.
When we actually start to see how things really are, that becomes the start of the road that leads us towards giving up the anger and the pain, and we realize we actually do not care anymore either. And then we are truly able to say, Fuck that! I am done!! And finally, we actually are.
The truth of our relationship often brings us to our knees. But it needs to. We need to be brought to our knees, because sometimes life does suck, but if we look back, we can always see there was a point to it all, and that we learnt some valuable lessons about ourselves. And we can spend all day analyzing what exactly we did learn, but sometimes we cannot know what this was until years later.
But one day, we will see, and we will know.
So why do we stay in toxic relationships? Because in the end, it did not really matter what anyone said to you or did to you. What mattered is how you felt and what you needed to experience. That is why we all ignore the signs, and all the bullshit, and dive right in. Because this was a lesson we needed to learn. And our education could only be gained in those moments.
And while we were in that school, maybe the truth hurt, and maybe we were scared. But when we finally rose up, and realized we deserved more, god that felt so good. It was the best feeling ever.
Maybe that relationship did not add up or make sense to you right now. But you know what does? That everything that happened in that toxic relationship pushed us to where we needed to be. Not where we wanted to be. We had to learn firsthand that if we wanted to rise in life, we had to fall first. And in the end, we learnt one more thing.
That no amount of heartbreak will ever make us forget who the fuck we are, what we bring to the table, and just how amazing we all are.
All of these experiences also helped us learn to stop being blinded by the beauty of the roses, and those other flowers we always ignored started looking so good. We learned we could love without the prickles.
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Kim Turfrey is a mother and lover of life who lives in New Zealand and has spent a lifetime working with plants as well as Earth and Spiritual energies in order to find healing for herself and others. Being born with the gift of disability has enabled her to see the world through different eyes, and develop a deep love and gratitude for life. She works with people all around the world through the vehicle of her business Confirmations of Self, and empowers them with sets of tools that enable them to identify and move through the current and future challenges they face in the unification process. If you would like to contact Kim for enquiries about this work, you can get hold of her via email or Facebook.
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Kim Turfrey is a mother and lover of life who lives in New Zealand and has spent a lifetime working with plants as well as Earth and Spiritual energies in order to find healing for herself and others. Being born with the gift of disability has enabled her to see the world through different eyes, and develop a deep love and gratitude for life. She works with people all around the world through the vehicle of her business Confirmations of Self, and empowers them with sets of tools that enable them to identify and move through the current and future challenges they face in the unification process. If you would like to contact Kim for enquiries about this work, you can get hold of her via email or Facebook.
