Dear Elie:

Combining your two short original posts in your two threads, this is my understanding at this point. I may be accurate, or not:

You are busy working and studying, and the pandemic situation is difficult for you. But the most difficult thing for you by far, has always been to witness a family member, a “dear one”,  perhaps your mother, being in pain for not having something she desperately needs,  then watching her try so hard, and work so hard to get what she needs, only to see her get disappointed again and again.

Your intense empathy for her is causing you a lot of pain, and it is exhausting. You tried to give her a part of what she needs, tried to make her life better in the small ways that were available to you, but you failed every time. Maybe you dream and fantasize about being able to help her in big ways that are not available to you yet.

You want so badly to take her pain away, while your own pain is weighing you down. As a witness of her pain, in pain yourself, and exhausted, you often feel lonely and disassociated from people and from your surroundings. Sometimes maybe you feel angry at this person you care so much about, and it may be confusing to you: how is it possible love a person so much and yet, be angry at her, at the same time. It makes you feel complicated inside.

If you would like to reply, you are welcome to do so.

anita

Dear Elie,

However I’m still pushing through and still believing my efforts won’t go into waste and that maybe someday the table will turn around with me getting to know things better and becoming smarter and happier overtime.

The table will less likely to turn around by a pure strike of luck, but rather as you say, by you “getting to know things better and becoming smarter” – meaning by you better understanding yourself and how perhaps you’re suffering where you needn’t be suffering that much.

If you’d like some help in unpacking and better understanding your family dynamic, as well as your internal dynamic, please share some more about your situation, e.g who in your family is struggling with their career – is it your parents, your siblings, your adult children? What are the disappointments and heartbreak you’ve faced? What are you doing to advance your own career but you feel helpless?

Dear Elie:

You are welcome. You shared in your few posts, as I understand it,  that you grew up “so emotionally aware and sensitive towards life, challenges”, that you can take on the personal challenges you are facing, but you end up worrying about family members you care about, failing to successfully face their challenges. You helplessly watch them work and make efforts to make progress in their careers, but they fail to achieve their goals, “it’s always just disappointment after disappointment”.

You are busy and working, making efforts to make progress in your life, to achieve what you want to achieve personally and professionally, but there are not enough career opportunities, and your efforts end in “failure, disappointment, heartbreak and just a point where life isn’t working out at all”.

There are people who hurt you without intending to, and other people intend to hurt you. You feel lonely, and always felt lonely, a part of you disassociates from people and surroundings, and you may be too complicated inside to be understood.

You are grateful for what you have, but you “want to achieve things, be emotionally successful and reach a point where my efforts will matter in dealing with my problems”, to advance your career “but nothing’s working out”. You keep trying and you hope that “maybe someday the table will turn around”.

I am wondering if you are working hard for your family members, wanting be able to give them the material things/ the material life they want but failed to get on their own?

anita

Dear Elie,

I’ve always wanted to feel understood but I never got that, due to my parents being more goal driven and emotionally unaware.

My parents aswell as my brother is trying to accomplish more with their careers, however even though all of us are safe and stable, my brother’s constantly trying for a job and he’s breaking apart.

It appears your parents worried mostly about material security while you were growing up. They focused on providing that for you and your brother, and didn’t pay too much attention to how you and your brother feel. Were they working a lot and didn’t have time to tend to your emotional needs? Or they disregarded your emotional needs, sending the message that emotions aren’t important, that material and professional success is what’s important in life, and that’s what defines a person? Perhaps their philosophy was to choose a profession that is the most lucrative, and to disregard the calling of the heart and what one loves doing?

If so (and this is just an assumption, I don’t know if it’s true), then what you wrote about your brother: my brother’s constantly trying for a job and he’s breaking apart” could mean that your brother is very much trying to follow your parents’ philosophy (follow the money, disregard your heart), but it seems he’s breaking, he can’t really do it. And you have compassion for him because you feel the same – not understood by your parents, who have those materialistic expectations on both of you.

Am I assuming this right?

Dear Elie:

I ended my most recent post to you with a question in regard to the 7 points I listed: “Is my understanding above (1-7) accurate?”.

Your answer: “Yes it is but also not entirely”. You added that I was accurate regarding your parents never understanding you (my #1 point), but you did not answer whether I was accurate regarding 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 & 7. If you would like to complete your answer to me, please do.

It seems to me that you prefer to keep your writing vague and complex, lacking detail. I pursue and aim at clarity, simplicity and detail.

anita