A person reflects on their habit of shutting down emotionally in relationships, explaining it's a long-standing pattern, not the partner's fault. Admitting withdrawal is hard because it can sound like blame. The speaker emphasizes awareness, self-kindness, and asking friends or a counselor for help.
We've been talking about my relationship, about my withdrawal, and I'm. I'm often provoked. On occasion, I can get my act together and I can say, I'm withdrawn. I've vacated the premises a bit. I'm trying to re. Enter. I'm not very happy with the way I'm responding. And what I'm met with is, you mean Susan will say to me, you mean I'm the cause of your withdrawal. You're blaming me because you're withdrawn. Instead of putting out the fire, I put fuel on the fire. And it's difficult to break through to a place where my response isn't even. My response to saying I have a problem isn't further cause for her feeling wronged. Not only did I do what I did, but now I'm blaming her for my reaction, which I shouldn't have had in the first place. What do I do with that one? Well, the first thing is staying aware of what you just said. It's a heightened state of awareness to realize that your reaction to her at that moment when she's asking, am I the cause? Your defense structure, you're starting to tighten up your muscles, is a lifelong defense, and it precedes her. And so the answer really is no, you're not the cause. That's the real answer. You might be a contributing factor, but you're certainly not the cause. My heart is used to shutting down. That is a stable condition that exists inside all of our egos. I hope that even you see that you shut down. If you think this conversation is about Dave and I, we have a problem. So that's the first thing, is that, yes, I have a tendency to make the other responsible for my lifelong shutting down. Now, the awareness of shutting down is inside ourselves, is a very big step. Then the next step is, can we have any kind of kindness? Can we have any kind of warmth that goes towards us, or are we just simply either critical towards ourselves for shutting down or just kind of in a desert and just empty sort of a dry awareness? And if that's all we can do, that's still a lot better than nothing. And that's where we need the most help from people that are honest enough and aware enough to say, here's where I'm stuck. I can be aware of myself, but I can't find any kindness towards myself. I'm just kind of uptight. I think I'm failing. I'm just contracting against myself. Now, I might not be doing it towards Susan, but now towards myself. So can I have some help, and we need to ask our friends for help or a counselor for help.
