“Once I discovered that people are creating and living their own story, how could I take anything they think of me personally? I know that when they talk to me, they are only talking to the secondary character in their story. … I don’t waste my time taking anything personally. I focus my attention on creating my own story.”
People are complicated.
We can never fully know what is going on in the mind and spirit of another. Sure, we can know some people better than others. But we always know them based on the filter with which we view them…which is not necessarily reality. We assign roles to people, we write lines for them in our heads, we make assumptions, and when they don’t act the way we expect we are offended. (Of course I have been guilty of this as well.)
I have always struggled with others who want to write my story-line I resist the notion that someone can watch me, size me up, claim to know me, tie a neat little bow around the box they put me into, and then actually expect me to behave in accordance with their boxed version of me.
I repeat…people are complicated.
Recently I’ve struggled with being frustrated and flustered by the story-lines that other people have tried to write for me. I’ve taken it personally. I’ve lost sight of the truth of what don Miguel says above… I’ve taken my role as a secondary character in their story far too seriously. Meanwhile I’ve let the plot of my own story get muddy, boring, and undefined.
Not anymore! I’ve got my fancy story writing pen out and the Author and I are going to leave behind other people’s story-lines and take up some far more intriguing plot developments of our own design.
People are complicated…but complicated it interesting.