How much are you willing to bend your boundaries to avoid conflict?
How often do you speak "Yes" only to swallow down regret, resentment, and anger?
What's the price tag on your self respect?
That's the issue of today's post:
R-E-S-P-E-C-T... namely, your own.
In life, no one's respect is more critical to your self esteem than yours is. Far too often, our choices rise and fall on the approval of other people. We think that love requires sacrifice and, yet, we act as if self-sacrifice is the condition upon which another person's love is based. If love comes at the high cost of your self-respect, then there are three things you need to be clear about when it comes to that love:
1) Any love you sacrifice self-respect for is CONDITIONAL. When the price of your self-respect is no longer adequate, that person will find something else in your soul to ransom.
2) Any person who cares more for their personal needs than your self-respect is a giver and not a taker. You are not in relationship with them. You are in servitude to them.
3) The kind of love you are bartering your self-respect for is a selfish kind of love and since love is not selfish, what you're sacrificing your self-respect for is not the love that you want or need. It's the love you're willing to settle for.
FINAL POINT: People who cut your self-respect by violating your boundaries will continue to do so until you teach them how to treat you in a healthy way. Words will not be enough. Consequences must follow a violation of your self-respect boundary. In life, you do not simply tell people your boundaries; you SHOW them...
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