When Someone Cheats or Mistreats You, It’s About Them, Not You

“Pain makes you stronger. Tears make you braver. Heartbreak makes you wiser. So thank the past for a better future.” ~Unknown

I used to think when someone cheated on me that I was flawed.

You see, I had a core belief that there was something wrong with me. I never felt enough. I’m not even sure I can fully articulate this feeling, but whatever it was, I just didn’t feel enough. Slim enough, pretty enough, clever enough, worthy enough, or just, well, anything enough.

I’ve now come to see that when someone mistreats you it has almost nothing to do with you. Other people’s behavior is about them.

I’ve come to realize that my ex flirting and engaging in a sexual manner with other women had to do with his insecurities, and nothing to do with me not being good enough.

It was his issue, not mine. It was his ego that needed a boost, and he used other women for that because he wasn’t emotionally or intellectually developed enough to boost himself.

I believe we must be responsible enough to look after our own feelings and not make someone else responsible for how we feel. He was still trapped in a cycle of thinking he needed someone to make him feel happy. He needed to use other women to boost his self-esteem.

Previously, I’ve felt that my world was falling apart when a man cheated on me or left me. I felt my value decreased the moment he didn’t want me.

I can now see my value just is, it’s innate. We are all born worthy—worthy of love and good enough. Even if no one in the world can see it, it’s the truth. I am enough exactly as I am. I don’t need to be anything other than who I am. I have nothing to prove to anyone anymore.

I’ve realized that I am more than lovable. When someone doesn’t or can’t treat me the way I want and deserve to be treated, it’s not a reflection of me.

I’ve learned that it’s my job to put my best interests at heart and love myself enough to walk away from anything that doesn’t serve me or build me up.

This time I discovered an inner strength much sooner than I previously have. I walked away when I discovered the lies; previously I would stayed trying to fix myself when I wasn’t the one that was at fault.

I now recognize that I am a complete person all alone. I don’t need someone else to complete me.

I function and enjoy my life on my own. That’s not to say I don’t enjoy being in relationships—I really do, and I think it’s so magical when two happy, complete people come together and share their lives.

However, I’ve discovered that if the other person is looking for someone to complete them or to make their life more exciting than it is, it’s more than likely never going to last.

Relationships are places of spiritual growth, and they can enhance an already happy life. Their purpose is not to make a miserable one better; that’s too much power to hand to any one person.

Love is a place of pure positive energy. If someone has to put you down in order to try to keep you then that’s not love; it’s control. Control is based on a scarcity model of love, and that’s not positive energy; it’s fear-based.

I have never understood it when people said that love isn’t enough. Love is always enough, but love is about loving actions, loving behavior. You can’t claim to love someone yet lie to them; the two things don’t match.

So here are the five things I’ve learned from my past failed relationship.

1. When someone cheats or mistreats you, it almost never has anything to do with you.

You are good enough even when their actions may have you believe otherwise.

2. Someone else’s bad behavior doesn’t reflect badly on you.

Someone cheating on you doesn’t make you look silly. It highlights that they have issues they need to work on.

3. Your value and worth aren’t tied to anyone or anything.

Not your weight, relationship, or job.

4. Love is never bad; love is amazing, pure and simple. Cheating hurts, lies hurt, being heartbroken hurts, but these things are not love.

These cause pain, but cheating, lying, and hurting others are done out of fear, not out of love. Love is, in fact, the only thing that ever makes the pain better again, and you can start to love yourself today. Self-love depends on you alone.

Set the standard for how people should love you by loving yourself wholeheartedly.

5. Just because one relationship doesn’t work, that doesn’t mean the next one won’t.

Don’t give up on love; give up on the people who made you think love wasn’t good.

And always remember what Steve Marabolie wrote, “The most powerful relationship you will ever have is the relationship with yourself.”

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