To return to the original topic:

In my own experience, this is what I have frequently mistakenly done and have believed to be true:



That if someone is mistreating me or disrespecting me, that I must somehow earn their respect, fight for their respect, and turn the person's abusive/toxic behavior around by explaining what respectful treatment entails. I spent YEARS doing just that, in many different toxic relationships!

Boy, what a waste of energy ALL of those efforts turned out to be!!!!!

Someone who frequently disrespects and disregards another will NEVER change their TRUE CHARACTER. The spots of a leapard do not change! Once a disrespectful, dishonorable person, always a disrespectful, dishonorable person.

I did not realize at the time the mere truth of the quote above - that frequent disrespect and disregard are a sign of that person's CHARACTER, not of my own SELF WORTH.

When I finally realized that my self worth is NOT DEFINED by how someone treats me, but rather by how I TREAT MYSELF and by HOW I ALLOWED others to treat me, everything turned around for me in my own mind.

I think many many people make this SAME MISTAKE. And that we frequently can place FAR TOO MUCH OF OUR OWN SELF WORTH AND VALUE in someone else's hands.

That's the same thing as placing our HAPPINESS in someone else's hands - another big mistake.

Our happiness depends solely on US. We are responsible for making our own happiness in life... no one else is responsible for that.

And we are responsible for our own sense of self-worth and value in this world. Giving someone else that power is like handing over the reigns of your life to someone else.