Make your life better by learning how to read people. Who doesn’t want to better his or her life? Isn’t that our primary purpose in life? Don’t we all want to make enough self improvements in our lives so that we live our lives better? Of course we do.
There’s an old saying that states “Nobody promised you a rose garden.” Rose gardens are beautiful. It’s up to you, however, to make your garden — your life — as beautiful as you can. No one, other than yourself, owes you a life filled with beauty. No one promised you that you’re life was going to be filled with roses. Sometimes we forget this. It’s better if we remembered this. Why?
Then we are in control. When we expect others to better our lives, we wait and wait until these others do something. Do anything! But, that’s not a good way to live your life. The best way to live your life is to know that you are in charge of it. It’s not what people do to you that makes your life. It’s what you do with what people do to you that makes your life.
Learning how to read people is one way. Human beings are imperfect creatures. We are made up of many different feelings and thoughts. Some feelings are good; others are bad. Some thoughts are good; others can be very bad. Feelings and thoughts are just that feelings and thoughts. You can’t stop them. You can’t change them. When you feel something, when you think something, it’s just there.
Oh, with time and maturity, you can learn how to control your feelings and thoughts so that they don’t play havoc with your life. However, those feelings and thoughts will always be there. It’s just now you have learned how to handle the feelings and thoughts that don’t improve your living your life as happy as it can be lived. How can you do that?
Accept the fact that people will hurt and disappoint you. Life itself can be hurtful and disappointing. Intentionally, or unintentionally, no matter what the reason, you will be hurt and you will be disappointed. You must accept these undeniable facts.
The question then is how hurt will you be? You can be very hurt or you can deal with your pain in such a way that it doesn’t hurt as much as you think it will. For example, your boyfriend breaks up with you. Are you hurt? Yes. How hurt are you? That depends on how you feel about your boyfriend. If you have been happy with him and wanted the relationship to continue, you will be very hurt. If, on the other hand, you had been thinking of breaking up with him, you will be more relieved than hurt.
So you see it’s not your boyfriend breaking up with you that hurts. What hurts is how you feel about your boyfriend breaking up with you. You are in control of how you react, or act, on your feelings and thoughts. You can control how hurt you feel or think by changing how you feel or think about the person hurting you. Don’t give him or her so much power over you!
Let’s say your boyfriend breaks dates with you a lot and sometimes even disappears on a few weekends during the month. Where does he go? Who is he with? If you know how to read people — if you’re not in denial — then you shouldn’t be surprised when he breaks up with you. Surely if he loved you, he would want to spend more time with you, not less.
The hardest job we have is learning to let go of our fantasies of people. We think so-in-so should act a certain way, should treat us a certain way. We refuse to give up on the fantasy that this so-in-so will one day act and treat us in the way we want him or her to. Forget about it! This person won’t; not on his or her own. He or she will treat you better; will act towards you better, when you expect that person to do so. Frankly, when you demand that he or she does so.
You may think that the word “demand” is too harsh. The definition of “demand” is “to ask for firmly; command” and “to claim or assert as due or just.” Aren’t you worth it? You are. You are a wonderful human being. Yes, you have faults. Who doesn’t? But you are a good person, one deserving of respect. Your self improvement depends upon your taking care of yourself.
This is not possible when we are very young. We can’t dress ourselves or even feed ourselves. We certainly can’t earn enough money to provide a roof, clothing and food, the basic necessities in life. We do, however, grow up. We learn to dress ourselves; we learn to feed ourselves; we learn to earn a living and provide for ourselves. Sometimes, though, we don’t grow up inside. We still think and feel like a child. We still think and feel that we have to depend upon someone else to take care of us.
Stop that thinking and feeling right now! It may seem that your world is coming to an end when you give up your fantasy about how you want life or people to be or act. It won’t come to an end. Honest. In fact, your world will begin to get better and better once you face this honest truth. Once you get used to feeling in control of your life, you’ll find that you like this way of living far better than you did the other way of living.
Yes, make your life better by learning how to read people, learning that it’s not what a person says or does that hurts you, but instead it’s what you feel or think about that person saying or doing something that hurts you. If you want that person to be different, if you want that person to act different, you cannot make him or her do so. All you can do is to act, or react, differently to what that person says or does. There lies your power! Once you realize that it is all up to you, you will go through life better. Try this; it really works.