Dear enlightenedmisi70

I’m really sorry to hear about your father. I’m also sorry to hear about what you’ve faced with your family and ex-boyfriend’s mother. It’s sad that we have to go through experiences like this but we learn a lot from them, and it sounds that you’ve taken a lot from it and you’ve become a stronger person from this. Also you mentioned you have children, I hope they give you all the happiness and love you deserve 🙂 It’s okay to still feel upset about your break-up with your ex-boyfriend. These emotions are a part of you so it’s important to listen to them and let them have their time to speak.

I definitely agree with you in that holding a grudge does more harm to us than it does to the person we’re holding a grudge against. That’s why I don’t hold a grudge against other people even if they have hurt me because we’re just harbouring all this negative energy that is really draining for our soul. But for some reason, and for a reason I can’t understand, I find it so hard to let go of the negative feelings I have towards my sister? And it’s driving me crazy because I don’t want to be like this. I definitely feel like having this anger is doing more harm to me because I can feel myself becoming negative and bitter towards my sister becoming spiritual and that makes me feel angry with myself because I had made such a progress from when I started counselling and it’s like I’m going backwards and forgetting everything I learnt.

I don’t think I could ever proclaim a loss of love for her or cut her out of my life forever (even though when she’s mean to me I feel my life would be better if I did) because I do like talking to her and we can have such a laugh. When she goes away for a weekend, I miss her but then at the same time I feel free and that I can do things without being judged and I know I don’t have to deal with the way she can be towards me. I do admit that recently she’s developed a more positive outlook on life which is good and I start to think wow she’s changed and I really like this change. But then suddenly she’ll be mean to me and it upsets me. When someone is mean to me for a one-off, it hurts but I’m able to let go of it. When someone repeatedly does it to me, I become more sensitive so the next time that person does it to me I will get really upset. I know a month ago when I felt really depressed, I got really hysterical and was crying loads because of something my sister had said, I can’t even remember what it was anymore because it’s such a blur. But because it’s something I’ve been getting constantly from her all my life, I’ve reached that point where I can’t handle another mean or sarcastic comment so I will get really upset. I was feeling really down and depressed the past couple of months. I wouldn’t wake up until 1 or 2 o clock in the afternoon and sometimes when I woke up, I would have missed calls and text messages from my managers at work asking if I could come in at 11 or 12 and when I told my sister she would say it’s my fault and that I’m irresponsible. That probably doesn’t sound that bad and it might sound like I’m being too sensitive and need to man-up but what she says to me really knocks my confidence, it always has done. My sister knows very well I get anxiety and there are times when I feel very low and depressed. But she’s never empathised with it.

I feel that this difficulty in letting go these negative feelings stems from the fact that all my life my sister has been mean to me and because it was what I was getting from her all the time, I’ve made up my mind on the type of person she was which was selfish, cruel, judgemental of other people. So it’s now what I see of her and it’s all I expect from her? And it could be this that’s preventing me from letting go of the feelings I have and being genuinely happy for her becoming more spiritual. It’s so confusing I don’t even know what I’m saying anymore! But I also feel that as loving as I can be towards my sister, she will not be completely loving towards me, I feel that she has these barriers up that stop me from getting close to her.

But I do acknowledge what you say about her spirituality. I don’t see anything wrong with people wanting to attract love or wealth into their life so I’m not meaning to mock it. I’ve just had to reread my original post because I honestly can’t remember how I felt! Hopefully a sign of letting go as I honestly I feel a lot better in myself today 🙂 I think what I was angry about was something that was so personal to me becoming a big part of her personality and because of the type of person she was yet getting what she wanted from the law of attraction, I just couldn’t understand it. I was also annoyed at the fact that I felt like yet again she was trying to copy me. The weird thing is I don’t 100% connect with the law of attraction as much as my sister does. And after realising that last night, I realised people are spiritual in different ways and that’s completely okay. Not one thing works for everyone. Just do what feels right to you and stay focused on your own journey and finding inner peace. To be honest, I felt like I wasn’t spiritual or a fake spiritual because I found it hard to fully understand the law of attraction and when I saw how easy my sister found it and how much success she was getting from it, I couldn’t understand it because of how she makes me feel. It was like she doesn’t deserve it or how can these good things be happening to her when I know I’m more kind-hearted than her. I felt like I lost a huge part of myself and my faith.

It’s weird to hear that my sister wants to be like me because I’ve always seen my sister as the prettier one and the more social one. We’re kind of opposite. My sister is the popular pretty one with loads of friends and I’m the less social ugly one. I’m not bothered about the amount of friends I have because I know that the ones I have in my life are good genuine friends that I’m so grateful for and love so much and I wish to surround myself with people like this who bring good energy and I can vibe with well. But I do feel like people like my sister more than me, more specifically my cousins.

(Ooo I just wanted to add that I don’t feel jealous or angry of the fact that my sister is prettier and more social. It’s actually what I admire about her. We had a party last week to celebrate my auntie’s birthday and my sister was so good with all our little cousins. She’s a teacher so she’s really good with children and I thought it was really sweet how she got them to tidy up. I just compare myself to her. When I see how good she is with kids, I think wow I could never do that and then I think about how bad of a mother I will be and when I see how pretty she is, I feel like that’s beauty and I’m so much uglier).

My mum and dad have been divorced (this is delving into deeper topics now, I’m so sorry!) for 12 years and when they got divorced, we didn’t see any of my cousins from my dad’s side until 5 years later. Well for me I hadn’t been in contact with them for years but my sister had been in contact with them by Facebook (I don’t have Facebook) and had met up with them. So when we saw them again, I felt like I wasn’t a part of their group because they had a lot to talk about. I could have joined in and I do try but they talk about things my sister almost keeps a secret about? For example, the last time we met up with my cousins was last summer and we went to a restaurant. We all had a laugh and had fun but they would bring up times when they went clubbing with my sister and she got drunk and they brought up her ex-boyfriends which I never even knew she had and they brought up times when they went out which I never even knew about. My sister just goes all quiet and tells me not to listen to them. It makes me feel so excluded and I feel sad that my sister can’t confide in me and that we can’t be close enough to talk about these things and to ask me if I want to meet up with them too. Whenever I’ve spoken to my cousins (and my next door neighbour who is close friends with my sister but is also a close family friend) when my sister is not around, they say to me that I should come when they meet up and they always ask my sister to bring me along. But the thing is my sister never asks me? When I was speaking to my next door neighbour, she told me she always asks my sister to bring me along when they meet and I was so shocked to hear that and I said to her my sister has never asked me. It really made me question why my sister does this to me. We’re sisters, I thought we were supposed to be close, almost like best friends? I felt like my cousins and next door neighbour didn’t like me as much as my sister because of how excluded I am.

I was going to talk about my younger cousin’s on my mum’s side but this post is long enough! I’ll just keep it short and say that I think the reason for why I feel they like my sister more is because my mum always says how much they like my sister and how she’s their favourite and it makes me feel that they don’t like me.

It almost annoys me that they can’t see how horrible my sister can be because to everyone else she’s really nice but towards me and towards my mum as well she can really upset us.

Thank you so much for taking time out to write down your thoughts, you’ve been really helpful. I’m so sorry for how long this post is…

Hi Anita, thank you so much for replying.

I’m 20 and my sister is going to be 25 soon. She’s become spiritual in the fact that she has crystals and uses feng shui and the law of attraction to attract certain things into her life. I do believe in feng shui but I don’t use it and I only have one crystal that is on a bracelet which helps me to feel more positive and at comfort within myself when I wear it. She’s very outspoken and talks a lot about her spirituality such as what she’s going to attract (i.e. wealth, love) and how she’s going to do it, whereas I’m quite hushed and just practice thinking good thoughts and letting the results show up in my life which is fine because people practice spirituality in different ways. However, not wanting to be spiteful, it’s like she tells me about what she’s going to do to show how good her life is going to be compared to mine by attracting these things just because I don’t speak out loud about what I’m doing? The way she talks is almost like she’s boasting? For anyone else I feel so happy when something is going good for them and I love advising friends and family when they feel troubled to help them feel more positive so I don’t keep this way of living just to myself, I love to help others. But for my sister, I want to be happy and try to be happy but I can sense it in her tone of voice that she’s quite boastful. But maybe I’m just being insecure? If I am, perhaps that could be explained by the fact that I feel like her life is going to be better than mine and I don’t understand how she can have this when she’s so horrible to me? I really hope this paragraph makes sense, it was difficult to word and I don’t mean any malice whatsoever.It’s just the way I feel and if I am being insecure and silly I would really appreciate some guidance on how I can think differently about this situation.

You’re right when you say she doesn’t acknowledge her behaviour or make effort to repair the damage because she’s never said sorry to me even when she knows she’s upset me, even when I start crying in front of her. She just carries on as normal as though what she’s said hasn’t affected me and then she never understands how what she says is hurtful.

It’s quite difficult to be completely loving towards her. I’m not sure how to explain it. We do get along at times and have a laugh. She went to work abroad for 6 months during the same time I started counselling for the first time and we Skyped each other everyday and it was fun so there are parts of me that can and do love her as a sister. But when she came back, I soon became unhappy even though I had missed her because she started being mean to me again. I still do miss the time she was away. I felt more independent because I could listen to music and do things without being judged.Living with her is an added stress for me because of the way she treats me and whilst she was away I didn’t have to worry about that. It’s strange because over text messages we get along okay but then in person she acts horrible towards me, and like you mentioned I don’t know the next time she will be horrible to me because one minute we get along and then the next she upsets me, and not knowing causes me a lot of stress. It’s like my attitude towards her is always changing and it’s exhausting because I can’t make my mind up about her? When we get along I start to feel bad about myself for thinking bad things about her but then when she’s mean to me I think no I was right, she’s not a nice person. I’ve mentioned to my mum that I don’t see myself staying in contact with her when we’re older and living our own lives but I basically get told I can’t do that because we’re sisters.

I like what you mentioned in your second to last paragraph. It took me a while to understand it and I had to take some time to think it through in my head but you’ve pieced together things I found hard to understand, which was that she feels anger at me and acts in a way that intends to hurt me. However, I don’t understand why she feels anger towards me. She has said to other family members that I’m the “favourite” but I don’t get why she thinks that because I know my mum loves us both and my mum is loving towards her too. I don’t want her to think I’m the favourite because it’s not true and I don’t want her to let this thought cause her negative behaviour because it makes me feel bad, like my existence is causing her sadness. I think waiting for the next time she’s going to be hurtful towards me is also a reason for why I can’t feel completely loving towards her and why I’m finding it hard to be happy for her because I’m just expecting to be hurt by her again.

In terms of what can be done, I feel like I need some help or guidance to change the way I think about the situation. I feel like my attitude towards her becoming spiritual is negative and I feel drained and quite low by it. I feel like I need to see things in a different way. Maybe I need to learn to forgive her? Maybe I need to see this change in her as a good thing as it then means we have something in common where we can help each other? I just really feel the need to hear another person’s thoughts on this, so I know if I’m being silly or if my feelings are actually understandable.