And another. (It takes ten nice things to erase every mean word spoken.)

I don't like conflict. I avoid it at all costs. I hide my own feelings of hurt or dissapointment or anger most of the time, when they occur, just so no dissagreement happens. So no unpleasant words are exchanged. I would much rather be unhappy all by myself, then tell someone else that they are making me unhappy somehow and then we get unhappy together. That sucks. I hate conflict.

It makes me feel all wrong inside when my relationships aren't all going well. It crawls under my skin and makes my heartbeat seem off balance. Something is missing. What is it? Harmony? That seems to high a word but what I mean is that I don't like discord. It grates on me all day long. Yesterday and the day before it made me sick to my stomach. It made me cry. My fingers wouldn't hold steady and food sounded awful and I couldn't concentrate on my reading. I hate conflict.

Even when its over, its like the reverberations of it are still moving across the surface of my mind in little ripples. I replay all the events and every word and try to figure out what I might have done to make it not happen. I could have said this, I could have agreed here, I could have apologized here. But that meek, apologetic person is dying in me. I'm not going to agree and acquiesce if it means lying to myself and other people. I'm not going ot pretend that everying is okay when everything is most certainly not okay. And for the first time in my WHOLE life, I'm not going to assume that everyone else is worth more than me. I deserve to be heard. I deserve to be seen (accurately). And I deserved to be loved for who I really am.

I know that anger is a secondary emotion. It comes from things like hurt and dissapointment. It is a defense mechanism meant to drive away the person or events responsible for the hurt and dissapointment. Meant to stop it from happening again. But anger is rarely the healthy response and forgiveness nearly always is. I can rationally choose to forgive, but I can't make the hurt stop with a decision and so the anger is still there, lying in wait.

I must be extra kind. I must be extra friendly. I must be extra agreeable and a better listener and smile as much as I can so it doesnt show. I must learn to lie. I can't show that it hurt more than it ever should have. Can't let it show that now I doubt every good thing about myself. I doubt other people that seem to like me. Cant let it show that I'm not okay. That it will take me years before I could ever let someone get that close again.

Because, I don't want anyone else to hurt because I'm hurting. I don't ever want that.