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toxic relationships

To Be Engaged

November 1, 2018 By Bean 1 Comment

On this final day of Domestic Violence Awareness Month, I reach out with an open heart to all of the women and men in abusive relationships. Sometimes this conversation neglects to acknowledge the men who are also victims of narcissistic and abusive behaviors from their partners. I want you to know that I see you. I stand by you, also.

“Every love story is a tragedy if you wait long enough.”
(The Handmaid’s Tale series)
No relationship should begin as one.

First of all, let me start by saying that you don’t need to be in an abusive relationship to want to leave, or have “permission” to leave a relationship. I also believe that the end of a relationship, although it can be painful and difficult to one or more parties, is never a bad thing. Like sex, if just one person doesn’t want to be involved, ever or anymore, even if one party is happy and interested, it’s best for it to stop. If there is ANY reason to end a relationship, it’s usually a good reason.

For nine years I talked myself into staying in a relationship, which by all accounts, wasn’t healthy. I didn’t have a lot of confidence when I met him at 19 years old, which coincided with a college assignment where I delved into analyzing the language of users of new-then dating websites. I had to create an account to access other profiles, and Eharmony told me I was unmatchable. I ended up marrying the next boyfriend I had. Online dating still makes me cringe.

Despite all of the warning signs in that relationship (which started pretty early on) — the arguing, the manipulation, the insults and disrespect he dished out in the form of eye-rolls, I largely ignored how he made me feel. I ignored it just like I ignored the actions and words of my younger brother, who suffered from the same personality disorder as the man who is now my ex-husband.

The dishonesty with myself made me increasingly vulnerable to his continued attacks on my self-esteem. I literally used to tell myself that other things in my life were good enough, so what if he wasn’t that nice to me behind closed doors or didn’t like my family? Maybe true love wasn’t really in the cards for me. At least he could cook well and we wouldn’t be poor. I know, desperate and sad.

“You accept the love you think you deserve.”

Granted, every relationship (strong or struggling) looks different, and abuse takes many forms, so I won’t get too personal here by revealing every detail of my 9-year long relationship. I also want to acknowledge that I, my Self, played a big part in letting the abuse (verbal and sexual) continue for so long. By staying with him despite all of our problems, I mislead my partner into believing that I was ready for the big step into marriage, and I was too scared and too weak to end the relationship by the time we were planning the wedding.

I dreaded many aspects of our future together, worried about all the future arguments we’d have, worried about losing my friends and family, worried that I wouldn’t be able to be a mom because I didn’t see him fit to be a dad.

The constant internalized worrying made me ill. I couldn’t eat anything without getting sick, so I was weak and scrawny as I glided like a ghost in my white dress down the aisle.

I saw myself in the magazines that mentioned in colorful blurbs that 1 in 5 women knew before the wedding that the marriage was doomed, but something inside me said it would be OK, that it was the best I could do. That eventually I wouldn’t feel that way about him anymore.

But I believe there’s something I could have done differently during the engagement that might have helped me step away before I stepped down the aisle. I know for sure that divorcing him after four years of marriage was no less hurtful than if I would have called off the wedding, so I want to talk to you, anyone who might be in this stage of their life, about the word engagement.

After the proposal, before planning a wedding, we both should have engaged in months of thoughtful marriage planning.

Being engaged is a time to figure out if marriage is really the best thing for you and the other person. We need to stop the taboo of ending an engagement. It is the time you should be discussing everything about your relationship and futures, if you haven’t already.

Calling off a wedding can feel like an unconquerable mountain once you’ve accepted or presented a ring. But in planning any event, new discoveries sometimes prevent the event from taking place. For until an exchange of vows occurs, there is nothing holding you into that relationship. No matter how much time you’ve spent with (or working on them as we sometimes see it) that person, no matter what experiences you’ve been through together, you do not owe that person anything except a respectful, honest goodbye.

In our society, it seems that the weight of an engagement ring comes with the same degree of commitment as the actual marriage certificate. Despite all of the people I know who are divorced, I only know one person who ever called off an engagement, that I know of. I likewise know a large number of people who are unhappily married, the normalcy of which might be why I accepted years of verbal abuse and a dysfunctional sex life. I am NOT advocating for divorce; I am advocating for you to have a happy life by taking your engagement very seriously.

Unlike a recent advertisement I saw for Match.com, I do think a great person is worth the wait.

To be engaged should be viewed not as the ultimate commitment to the other person, but as a time to engage in a thoughtful process about if they are really the one with whom you want to make that commitment. Engage in serious and tough conversations with the person (even if you already had them when you were dating). When people use this time to plan their wedding but not their marriage, they are doing serious jeopardy to their relationship.

Engage in activities that help you identify exactly how that person confronts challenge, how they treat people in stressful situations, how they manage their money. Engage in a deep look into who the other person truly is. If warning signs (trust yourself) come up during the engagement, put off the wedding. Honestly, don’t even think about planning a wedding celebration until you’ve been engaged in meaningful work about planning a marriage.

Observe everything. About yourself, and about your partner. And about how they act around your family. And how they act around their family. And how you act when they do something that disappoints you.

If a person can refrain from changing or parenting his or her partner, they have a greater opportunity for putting themself in a position of respect. If one of you is always doing everything for your partner, you risk being walked over. And if one of you is above the other, that does not make for a stable foundation for a marriage.

Be very mindful about how you speak to each other. How you greet each other. How you feel when you’re apart, when you’re together, the moment right before you’re together, the moments after. Listen to your body. 

Engage in conversations with the people who care most about you. Engage with your family and friends and ask them to be completely honest with you about how they see your relationship. You are the ultimate decision maker in your life, and if you have people you confide in for anything important in your life, you should most definitely talk to them about this.

If you find yourself avoiding those people or those conversations, I beg you to think about why you are doing that. If the people whom you most respect don’t see the good you see in your partner, if you find yourself making excuses for them, being embarrassed by them, avoiding your favorite people or activities when you are with them, there is probably a good reason for that. Definitely worth engaging in those feeling fully and contemplating the reason.

Speaking of reason, humans are capable of talking ourselves into anything. Our minds are extremely powerful; we can justify anything to ourselves if we think it’s what we want or deserve.

Don’t let marriage be something you have to talk your Self into.

Engage deeply with your fears and doubts.  Take time alone to think (maybe write) about the life you want, your values, your dreams. Engage with your Self on a very deep level. Be completely honest with yourself. It’s OK if you discover along this journey that you don’t want to marry this person. And better yet if you discover through all of that work that you truly do. That you do truly respect and value their presence in your life. That you find they really do help you shine your inner light even more brightly than you do on your own. I’m just asking you not to take that for granted.

Divorce sucks. It’s hard and it’s expensive. Even if you’ve invested years with this person, have been through major life events with them, own pets with them, own property or a business with them, or if you’ve already put down deposits on a location and purchased your dress and sent out invitations….none of that matters more than your long term happiness. Ending the relationship before the wedding takes place is worth the saved pain.

Marriage is a union, and it’s perfectly ok to be selfish before you enter into that commitment.

And you don’t have to be a victim of domestic violence to justify ending a relationship either. A marriage, maybe, but a relationship–no matter how long you’ve been together,–can be left whenever a person, just one person in that relationship, no longer wants to be in it. No contract. No obligation.

If you are unhappy in your relationship, even if you are unable to put your finger on exactly what is wrong, you have a good reason to leave it. (Do you ever hear yourself saying, It’s not that bad, or At least she doesn’t…?) Give yourself permission to step out of that doubtful place and invest in your Self.

A dear friend lovingly told me once that if I felt any doubt about my fiancé, that I should reconsider marrying him. I talked myself into the challenge of staying instead of into the challenge of leaving. If you have doubt about the relationship you are in–maybe more than concern about your differences in taste of home decor or travel destinations–you will be doing yourself and your partner a favor to trust yourself and end the relationship. They deserve someone who has no doubt about them. And so do you.

If two people want to be together, no marriage is going to change that. If a person is pressuring you to get married, there’s a good chance they might be hiding something, and it will come out once they have “secured” you into a permanent arrangement. Or maybe they have some self-improvement to work on before they are ready for marriage. Or maybe they don’t respect you. If you are getting any pressure from your partner, take a good hard look at where it might be coming from. 

A wedding is not a way to improve a relationship.

Strong, respectful relationships do not need weddings for them to last  or for them to be strong or respectful. If you feel like your does, then maybe you shouldn’t get married right now. What would it look like if you just kept dating? What would it look like if you took a break? Marriage is not about being in shackles, for either party; it is about forming a partner-ship with someone whom you love, respect, and admire. That foundation does not come from spending the most crucial moments of your relationship together planning a (wedding) party, but can come from planning a life together.

Looking back, I know there were so many signs all along that I ignored. While his friends and family expressed gratitude and excitement to me about our relationship, told me I brought out the best in him, etc., the same feeling wasn’t coming from my friends and family. That should have been my first clue. Our loved ones really do want the best for us, some of us just aren’t that good at communicating it (or hearing it).

I have so much more to say about this (like 4 more pages…)but I’ve tried to put my most heartfelt and pertinent advice out there tonight, just in case anyone needs to hear it.

You deserve so much happiness. You are the only one who can make it happen. You are worth it. 

If you think you are in an abusive relationship, or even just an unhappy one, reach out. If you aren’t ready to tell your family and friends yet, maybe you just start here: https://www.thehotline.org/ or read more about signs of abuse here: http://www.crossroadssafehouse.org/

 

P.S. If you want to know more about the “warning signs” from my relationship, don’t be shy. I am an open book. But I also know that no one wants to read a whole book about this, even though I’m pretty sure I have enough words on the topic to fill one!

Filed Under: Self-Love Tagged With: engagement, growing, happiness, help, love, marriage, self-love, toxic relationships

About Living with Intention

July 26, 2016 By Bean 1 Comment

Girl, Special, Bokeh, Back, Hands, Blond, Yoga, SportsSTART HERE IF YOU WANT TO HEAR MORE ABOUT MY BACKGROUND AND WHAT INSPIRED ME TO WRITE TODAY: (Skip down if you just want to hear about what’s going on in my travels)

Over the years I have practiced yoga on and off. It started in college, mainly because I thought the instructor was really cute–though I was never “crunchy” enough to catch his attention–but I did learn that I enjoyed the time on the mat, as it was so very relaxing–so much so that I would sometimes fall asleep during savasana. Relaxing exercise was brand new to me, but clearly something I needed. I grew up in a rather stressful household, and my first year in college taught me a lot about what I needed and enjoyed rather than what I had been conditioned to think I needed. (I LOVE my family, and I have a ton to be thankful for regarding my upbringing, but with seven of us in one house, there was often chaotic fighting….over the remote, the computer, the last chicken wing, and a plethora of other things.) Exercise had always been a part of my life, but in more aggressive forms: volleyball or basketball, wrestling over aforementioned remote controls, or maybe a bike ride or a run, never something calm and soothing like yoga. And I quickly learned how much I needed something relaxing like that, just like I learned in college that I didn’t need the TV on to concentrate on my studies.

I’m already getting off subject…carrying on as I tend to. Anyways, what brought me to write today was a yoga video. https://youtu.be/oBu-pQG6sTY if you’re interested. Although I am not a beginner, I am trying to build a new habit, and I am WAY out of practice, so this seemed like a good way to get my body back into the flow of yoga. And what stood out to me during this short workout–other than how weak my core muscles are—was the instructor’s word, “Intention.” This word also came up recently when I walked a labyrinth in Denver about a week before my move to Sao Paulo; both exercises ask that their participants set an intention for their time spent completing the activity. Before walking the labyrinth, you were to set an intention for your meditation, and the same is true with yoga practice. My argument is that we adopt this into our daily lives–into each action of our day. To set an intention for our life. Each day. Every morning. My intention is to have a peaceful day, to listen to one new song, to say hello to a stranger, to smile when I notice I am becoming frustrated—whatever it is, big or small, I believe calling attention to our desired outcomes could do us all some good. It raised your awareness and causes you to act intentionally.

My intention for doing yoga today was simply to feel better, because after a nauseating bus ride home, and eating SOOOOO many calories at my new job today (more on that later!) I knew that I needed to be deliberate when I got home (to my first EVER solo-living quarters in my nearly 30 years of life) to do something to relax. Just to feel better. To breathe deeply, to slow down, and to feel better. I used to smoke pot and put on TV at the end of a long day, or if I had a headache, or when I came home to my toxic ex. But that’s over now, and my intention is to create new habits for myself. My main intention for leaving the country was to push myself to become a better and more complete version of myself, and to leave behind the version of myself I created in order to survive. Survive what, you might ask?…..cropped-119H.jpg

I was in a really unhealthy place for a looooong time. Unhealthy emotionally, and unhealthy physically. I lost myself in a bad relationship for way too many years. Maybe people didn’t know it was bad because I did a good job hiding it (at least I think I did–some people could tell how bad it was even before I knew). I lost my voice, I lost way too much weight, I lost some friends (the best ones are still around–thank Goodness!), I lost a lot of connetions to my family, and I lost faith–in the World and in myself. I lost the ability to trust myself. I nearly lost my love for teaching because the person I was with worked so hard to make me hate my job, my number one passion. Just thinking about how low I was by being in that relationship makes me lose composure as I write this……but I am so thankful that I didn’t lose all my strength, that I hadn’t lost ALL my self-trust and self-worth, that I was able to finally see it for what it was and get myself out of an extremely unhealthy and toxic environment. For any of you out there who have given up hope and feel stuck in a bad place, please know that you can get out of it and get back on your feet. It won’t always be easy, but leaving bad relationships (romantic or platonic–toxic is toxic) is necessary for you to feel good again. (And you can’t change people unless they want to change.) I’m not saying it will be easy…..I mean, just that 30 minute yoga routine was not easy, but I did it because it fulfilled my intention. And I left a marriage because I realized my true intention for life: to be happy. The hard stuff is what makes us better. No pain, no gain.

And although my transition into my new life in Brazil has been nearly pain free (not the saying goodbye part—that was hard and painful as hell), it is hard. It is hard to adjust to a new life, and I’m going to have many hard parts of this journey to discuss later, but, if you are still with me, the following is going to be about my AMAZING new school where I will have the pleasure of teaching (and eating) for the next two years. Summer Break is officially over!

 

Chapel School

Chapel School

START HERE IF YOU JUST WANT TO READ ABOUT MY NEW LIFE IN SAO PAULOJ So, today I got to explore Chapel School. It is a beautiful campus filled with life. The people I will be working with are kind and compassionate and intentional about the culture they create (as was my last school, which was an amazing place to work for the last five years and difficult to leave). The space is truly inspiring and peaceful. It is a K-12 school, which is the kind of school I grew up in, with around 800 students from around the world, which is nothing like the school I grew up in. It is surrounded by a tropical/jungle-like environment. I have heard that monkeys will run across the window-sills outside, just like squirrels would in Brighton—and I CAN’T WAIT to experience that!! Tomorrow I will explore the grounds some more, but today was more about touring the buildings, and eating. Really, I ate six times today: we were served coffee four times throughout the day, each time accompanied by a variety of baked goods like pão de queijo, powdered donut holes filled with chocolate, some other tasty pastry, and lots of fresh fruit (strawberries, passion fruit, watermelon, honeydew) then later by some mini-chicken pot pie-like-bites- of-heaven. Lunch was (and will continue to be) a buffet of so much deliciousness…salad, roasted and seasoned veggies, a carrot-au gratin that just melted in my mouth, and steak…always steak here. Honestly, with just about every meal—AT LEAST once a day, I have had some tasty steak, sometimes picanha and sometimes other cuts, but always so good. Oh, and there was some tasty caramel cake for dessert at lunch also. I am going to have to work really hard not to put on too much excess weight while I’m here, because everything is SOOOOOO tasty.

IMG_1877

Ok, back to the school…..the buildings are beautiful and really well-maintained. There are two libraries (elementary and high school), two gyms, a fabulous computer lab, a chapel, an auditorium, and lovely classrooms with verandas in the elementary wings. I’m sure I’m forgetting some other important details about the beautiful building, but one thing I have to mention (but failed to get pictures of) is the vast amount of art decorating the hallways. Some student work, and much professional work bedecks the hallways and office spaces, as Chapel hosts a biannual art show and clearly has a focus on fine arts as part of their well-rounded education.

 

Something that I really enjoyed about today’s Professional Development was all of the “Brain Breaks” the admin team worked into the lessons/discussions. I learned that a person’s age multiplied by three is the average amount of time a person is able to sit and focus on something. I learned that I am able to throw a paper ball over my head and catch it behind my back about three times out of ten. I re-learned (because I have experienced this stuff before) that little breaks like this are majorly important and effective ways to re-energize a group of people, and can be used intentionally to create focus and culture in a group of people. Despite the slight dizziness I still feel from the bus-ride home, which I am going to have to learn how to deal with since it will be my mode of transportation to and from work every day, I feel completely motivated, inspired, and energized to go into this year and make a positive impact on my students.IMG_1880

My intention here at Chapel is to continue building positive relationships as a role-model for teenagers, to continue inspiring a love for writing and reading, and to grow as much as I can as an educator. And I know I’m going to need my strength for that, emotionally and physically, so I’m going to keep doing yoga, and I hope you’ll join me, if not on the mat, then in setting an intention for yourself.

 

Filed Under: News, Travel Tagged With: challenges, intention, starting over, teaching, toxic relationships, travel, yoga

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Jillian. Jill. Jilly. Jilly Bean. Bean. It helped that I was all legs and full of energy. String Bean, Bouncing Bean. I liked keeping secrets but I loved to spill the beans. Bean Carries On is my garden. A place to cultivate thoughts about the things I care about. I’m a daughter, a sister, an aunt, a teacher, a gardener, a reader, an artist, a cook, and an empath.

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Jillian. Jill. Jilly. Jilly Bean. Bean. And like a seed in soil, "Bean" stuck. Bean Carries On is my garden. A place to cultivate thoughts about the things I care about. I’m a daughter, a sister, an aunt, a teacher, a gardener, a reader, an artist, a cook, and an empath. I want this to be a place where we can learn together, so please leave comments and if there's anything you want to know, please ask!

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