I grew up thinking that in order to be loved, be loveable or worthy of love I had to hustle. For healthy connection I needed to fix everything first. I couldn't rock the boat. That never ended well. I had to measure up, do what made everyone else happy and fix all the problems. Then maybe there’d be peace. Maybe there’d be happiness. It didn’t work - so I’m entirely unsure how that mentality made it into my adult life.

Time and time again, I would seek to understand what the meaning of life was. Searching the recesses of my mind asking myself “Who am I? Why do I operate the way that I do? What is my purpose?”.  The questions may not always look so deep and meaningful they may have been quite negative, more like “why am I such an idiot?” Or “why me?”.   I spend a good portion of my life feeling sorry for myself, blaming my outer circumstances…

The more we have to do with people, the more likely it is that someone will say something that hurts our feelings, or offends us or upsets us. So how do we get strong enough to not be so hurt?