Why does the same shit happen to me over and over again?! I started to honestly ask this myself a few years ago. I kind of regret that I have not met a person as wise as me now, who would have given me the answer and explanation that I now think that has a high potential to be the right answer to this question.
These things happen so that I finally learn something that I lack in order to live a happy life.
And yes, again, sounds cliche. Yes, maybe I have even heard this sentence but without the in depth explanation that actually makes it possible to understand what is behind those words. What speaks to me very strongly is the explanation based on trauma and emotion resolving. That my subconsciousness will keep on putting me in situations where the traumatic feelings are reactivated so that I can deal with them and finally resolve the emotions that are hidden behind.
It was very hard to see it, but now when I look at all this pain I carry, all my craziness, weirdness, suffering, constant bad luck, all this luggage that I feel I am so unfairly forced to carry with me everywhere, this very thing that I have long time ago intellectualised as "my problem"..
..it is a pattern.
Literally, all the well known bad feelings, since the earliest childhood years when I was contemplating about the idea of suicide, all the "off" feelings that I thought are an internal part of me - it is merely a pattern (and it makes me hopeful now, as I heard somewhere that once you see a pattern it is not possible to un-see it). It is a pattern that is constantly trying to precisely point me exactly to where my problem is. Those bad feelings are not the problem, the problem lies in what I understood I am in my earliest years. I simply got it all wrong back then. I felt rejected, now I am actively seeking rejection. I felt unloved, now I am looking for people who won't give me love.
And what is important to remember, is that I shall not feel guilty for it. To remember that it is a natural and healthy reaction of a human brain, almost a physiological reaction to the circumstances I found myself in as a child. I should also not blame other people. It is a process, it's a law of nature. What has been happening was just bound to happen.
The answer is not reacting on the discovery I just made, but to ask myself "so how does it feel?". How does it feel now to be rejected? How does it feel now to be not loved by the person you want to be loved by? How would I define myself in these circumstances - yes, because they are circumstances. They are not part of me. They are just external circumstances. That's what I got wrong back then. And it is understandable as as a little child I had no concept of "external".
I need to find the answer to who I am by relating myself to these circumstances, not by internalising them.
It amazes me how researching simultaneously on multiple fronts: psychology, spirituality, common wisdom and being attentive to my own experience brings me to the very same conclusions. Acceptance of the reality and allowing myself to feel emotions are the keys. Easier said than done, but I am learning every day now. What helps a great deal in not shifting to the old reactive habits is the calmness, about which I write in another post.