Retrospection is stripping every single layer of defense of yourself.
Coming to terms with your very ego and telling it to stop fighting back - it's easier said than done. All of your life's experience is letting your brain know otherwise, and at some points it's can be confusing why it feels the need to fend itself, but when it gets to that stage, you're pretty much better off letting it go.
Switch off.
It's another thing to learn from, to manage, to add to your ever-growing repertoire of experience and do your damn best to make sure it doesn't repeat again.
Sure. I have my fair share of being blinded by my ego, holding out for way too long, way too hard, yet for basically causing nothing but devastation.
Yet, why do we care about this ego thing so much?
Being together with someone else exposes you or all your inner demons that you don't want to ever face. Escaping and run away, sounds familiar doesn't it? (Hint: Parkour)
And in order to continue being together with that someone means you need to constantly software update yourself to address all the bugs in MY system.
That's a lot of coding. Or effort. Which we are all capable of doing.
Question is, how much is too much?
The politically correct answer is 'You can (and should) always improve'.
What if I feel (very strongly <- even by pointing this out, it sounds snobbish) that I've already improved so much, and want to just 'hang around'? The app still functions very well, if you can just see the rest of the progress I've made so far and not just this one error.
But it is still an error! Sticks out like a sore thumb.
Construction cap on, off I go to fix MY problem again.
That's the thing that people don't see. The constant holding up, tanking, stress-solving – isn't that part of the job? The stereotypical 'good man', the breadwinner, the loving husband, capable AF to handle everything with A* empathy skills. If you're anything less, you don't deserve anything more.
MENtal Health. Funny. But it's not. It's heavy. It's not uncommon for people to think that the guy in the relationship is the problem. Seems like they're right, though.
Yes, I am human. I have my faults. I am not perfect. And hey, I do care enough to be better, yet I find comfort in just being myself. I keep feeling like no one sees the struggle when you know the kind of work you've done to improve yourself, yet what echoes the loudest in your head is the fact that you are still very much lacking.
And that's a very lonely feeling.