The lies we tell ourselves

I was watching The Hills most of the weekend (don’t judge me!), or rather I had it on in the background as I worked and couldn’t help but pay attention every once in awhile.  One of the characters (it’s a reality show so I don’t know that character is the right word but I’ll use it anyway) Audrina continued to go back and forth to a guy whom she, and the show, called her ex-boyfriend.  She’s a very pretty girl, yet continued to put herself through torture with a guy who would obviously ( to everyone but her) never love her the way she wants him to love her.

It became physically painful to listen to her make excuses for his behavior, and lie to herself about his intentions every time he came around. I think it was all the more painful because at one time or another I’ve been Audrina.

In wrongly thinking that I would be unhappy without love in my life I settled for what I pretended was love.

It’s easy to believe those lies, but they are just as dangerous as drugs. They give us a temporary high and make us forget all that is wrong, but eventually we come down off that high and need a more potent, stronger lie to take us back up to that world where we can forget the pain of reality.

“He has feelings for me.”

“He just has so many issues he can’t show me right now.”

“My love can fix him.”

Those are just a few of the lies.

I fooled myself into believing that a crumb was almost just as good as the cookie, because if I was given the crumb, the cookie couldn’t be far behind.

But then, lo and behold, Mr. Fixer-Upper would find someone else and somehow manage, despite all of his issues, to love the new girl. The lie was over and the truth that would only hurt a little in the beginning now hitting like a ton of bricks.

It’s a downward spiral we can only avoid by simply accepting the truth, feeling the pain, and moving on knowing that happiness is not to be found in another.