Embarrassing is a good way to describe it. I have been the toxic one in relationships and it's sad to realize that years later. In a weird way, recognizing other people's inappropriate behavior helped me recognize my own. I have been a debbie downer in the past, negative, complaining. I try to limit that now. I want friends, not vent partners. Negative people attract other negative people, not in some sort of mystical way but just in a practical way - if I complain, then someone else will feel free to complain.


I took some notes from a DBT workbook that seemed to have a very good list of prompts for recognizing how our own actions contribute to distressing situations:

what happened in the distressing situation?
what past events led up to it?
what role did you play?
what roles did other people play in creating it?
what do you have control of?
what don't you have control of?
what was your response to the situation?
how did your response affect your own thoughts and feelings?
how did your response affect the feelings of other people?
how could you have changed your response to the situation so that it led to less suffering?
how could the situation have occurred differently if you had decided to radically accept the situation?