Wednesday, April 6, 2016

For Petty People Who Do Not Know How To Let Things Go

This one is for us.

I’m one of those people who considers herself to be pretty self-aware.  I know my strengths and I know my weaknesses in equal amounts.  I try not to live in denial about who I am and will gladly tout both my strengths and weaknesses if asked.
In that token, I have to acknowledge/confess that one of my biggest weaknesses is my petty, unforgiving, I will hold a grudge and remember your matter nature.  Back in the day it was called “keeping malice”, haha.

For some reason, when I was younger I lived in self-deception thinking that I was quick to forgive. All lies. I think that as I grew older, I started to realize that although I was cool or had supposedly moved past old hurts from my “enemies” (as I secretly think of them as), I still was not over whatever it was that they did. For instance, for the longest time,  I held a slight grudge against an ex for breaking up with me 2 days before my  birthday AND not buying me the red Blackberry that I was supposed to get for my birthday gift. Hellooooo, Blackberrys were the rage then and I was supposed to be part of the cool kids club but it wasn’t even about the gift, it was more about the principle.
Who breaks up with someone right before their birthday??? Needless to say, It’s been well over many years and we “moved past it” but I haven’t completely forgotten his matter. I’m going to remember to point him out to my kids in 15 years and say “You see that uncle over there? He pissed me off in 19 gbogboro and I haven’t forgotten so don’t greet him and don’t play with his kids!” *chuckles*...I keed, I keed.

In the same token, I think I hold grudges against 90% of the men in my past. Ironically, we never even had crazy bitter endings and if I currently relate with any (which is rare ‘cos I generally believe that exes = Ex-communication), then we are at least cordial. But none of them should expect me to save them if we were combating world hunger and I had an extra piece of bread *evil laugh*
If I have to be honest, I will admit that I secretly or not so secretly hold these grudges because for the most part they were the ones to do the rejecting in one form or the other, and another major weakness that I have is my pride/ego. Like ehnnn, you want to reject a whole ME??? Do you know who I am?? But that's another post for another day...

Speaking of ex-communication, this totally works for petty people like me. I remember one of my coworkers crying about some dude who had wronged her and I was like wellll I hope you’ve blocked him off every form of social media, deleted his number, and if possible deleted his existence from his life…and she said nope. I was confused, as for me this would so be the default thing to do. Delete, delete, delete.  I used to date this other guy who was every thoughtful and did nice things like make a CD of “our songs” (how cute), and some other kain nice gifts. When things abruptly ended, I broke the CD and tossed all his gifts in the trash. I want absolutely no reminders of you sir. Now be gone while I try to move on. And best believe he will definitely not get a piece of bread if he was dying and I had the last
Disclaimer: If na expensive gift i.e. phone, bag, shoes….honey, you can remind me anytime!

Men and their matters aside, my “I remember your matter” attitude is generally equal opportunity to the sexes.  A friend of a friend pissed me off in 2004, we got into a screaming match, and now it’s 2016 and I still don’t like her ass based on that incident. I doubt I ever will.

I’m sure most of us have experienced those friends who have coded certain things that happened in their lives – new job, engagement, baby on the way etc. I’ve definitely made a mental note of all those types of people and have oh so pettily planned that when my own celebration comes in any shape or form, I will treat their misbehavior. Oh, you waited 6 months to tell me that you were having a baby? Best believe that when it’s my turn, you won’t even hear PIM from me until a friend of a friend tells you about the baby’s christening (you won’t even hear about that from me sef).  My general mantra is = treat people as they treat you, and if you have to, go above and beyond in showing them pepper.

In this journey of pettiness, I’ve had a lot of well-meaning people advise me to “be the bigger person” and “just let it go. And I just want to say that I don’t think people realize the true and legit struggle that it is for a petty person like me to be the bigger person and let things go. Whaat? Impossicant! I want to plan how to deal with my offender’s f-up. I want to fantasize about their downfall. When I'm truly in that zone, I have absolutely no desire to embrace maturity and let things go.
In my opinion sef, maturity and calm is so overrated and doesn’t get people very far anyway. Why do you think crazy, bitchy people stay winning in life? Hmm hmm.

Aniwoos, I can’t say that I’m working on this character flaw of mine, cos the truth is that I’m not. I think I was born petty and will die petty and it is what it is. To people who can truly live life without bearing grudges and remembering people’s matter, I doff my hat to una o. That’s definitely an admirable trait in this world that we live in.

And that is all she said.