Earlier this year someone very close and dear to me decided to cut ties with me without articulating what I had done. Have you ever had someone you love who writes you off? It can be particularly difficult when this person doesn’t give you a clear reason. For me, this person simply summed up their decision with the following accusations regarding my character (which they claimed spanned my lifetime):

• Selfishness
• An uncaring attitude
• Lack of ability to accept fault or responsibility
• Manipulative actions

Their rejection of me seemed to come out of the blue without any prior complaint. Obviously, I was hurt, perplexed and confused. But, as is my nature, I immediately asked myself, “Am I like this? Am I doing this?” I have spent decades self-examining in an effort to find and eliminate the “black blobs on my glowing ball of light.” That’s an expression I coined several years ago when I began actively teaching that we are all divine beings. There are things, black blobs, that get in the way of us showing our divine nature. Releasing what isn’t the light allows God’s love and light to shine through us freely.

Selfish

I could see where this person might think I’m selfish. I am an introvert, and I frequently go inside my own little world or separate myself from others to recharge. This is self-serving, self-preservation. I am also very goal driven and focused, which brings me great satisfaction and a sense of accomplishment. Again, this is acting in my own self-interest – even if what I’m doing is serving others in the process. It pleases me to please others, so I’ll claim selfish.

In one of the greatest breakthroughs of my life, I finally owned the fact that everything I do is self-serving… even if it’s just the feel-good response I get from helping someone else. Personally, I believe we’re all self-serving. Any time we help someone else, we are immediately “paid back.” It may pump our ego, give us feel-good endorphins, or even help us claim martyr status for doing something we didn’t really “want” to do for someone else.

An Uncaring Attitude

Again, my introversion, being in my own world, and my focused, goal-driven nature can come across as uncaring. Internally, I do care very deeply about other people and want to please them and facilitate their happiness, health, goals, enlightenment, hopes and dreams. Nothing brings me more joy than lightening someone else’s emotional load. Obviously, this individual isn’t detecting my internal thoughts, motivations or feelings. 

In addition, I try to  step back and let people plot their own path and make their own choices. I am a big believer in personal freedom and personal liberty. That may also be perceived as uncaring. 

Inability to Accept Responsibility

Given that this person has not been a daily part of my life in nearly six years, when most of my major life upheavals took place, this person was not someone I confided to about my wrestles with difficult decisions. This person doesn’t know how many sleepless nights I spent praying about which direction to take my marriage or my divorce.

This person wasn’t inside my mind when I scoured and analyzed every decision and misstep I’ve taken, every flaw in my character, every weakness. This person was not there when I obsessed over every little thing I could have done that caused the demise of my marriages. This person wasn’t on the phone with my best friend and me as we discussed every character trait that contributed to the difficulties I’d experienced and how they have impacted my former spouses and children.

So, yes, to this person I may seem like I don’t take responsibility, even though my closest friends would say I’m the queen of owning everything. In fact, I sometimes get scolded for owning too much and forgetting that other people have their freedom to choose as well. Which am I? I guess it depends on perspective.

Manipulative Actions

Being accused of being manipulative stumped me for a few days. I could not see how this person would see me as manipulative. I am very much live-and-let-live. Back in the late 90’s, I learned the hard way not to push or pressure people – even for “their own good.”

Because of my belief in personal liberty, I don’t believe in micromanaging others. I have never been a helicopter parent by any stretch. I hoped to teach my children independence. I equate independence with freedom and there is nothing I prize more highly than freedom. So, I wondered, how was I “manipulative?”

Shark Symbolism

It took me a couple months before the full answer to “manipulative” came. I was meditating in prayer one morning when God gave me the symbolism of a shark. A picture came to mind of me in shallow water. There were dozens of small sharks swimming all about my feet. They weren’t bothering me and didn’t appear to intend harm. I seemed to hear God say, “You are surrounded by sharks, and you are a shark.”

Many times God gives me insights into myself and my life through animal symbolism. Normally, I look up the animal totem online for the meaning. Instantly, I could guess the symbolism of the shark.

The shark is adept at navigating oceans of emotion. The shark is goal-driven, focused. It knows what it wants and goes for it. The shark doesn’t wait for life to happen; it’s in charge. It represents sleek authority and is a master of survival in the waters of life. Sharks demand respect. While they are efficient and effective, they also terrify people.

I have never seen myself as scary or terrifying, but I do have a lot of those shark qualities when it comes to focus and achieving goals. I’ve often referred to myself as a “heat-seeking missile” when I have the vision of something and know what needs to be done to achieve it.

I like what one article I found said,

“People with the shark totem navigate through life with a specialized ‘gut-rudder’ … A gut rudder is a primal instinct. It’s a visceral, hard-wired knowing that guides certain humans. It’s infallible, reliable, and geared for one thing only: To protect the sacred. And what is sacred? Life.” (What’s Your Sign, Shark Totem Symbolism)

Life and Freedom are sacred to me. I have an instinctive gut rudder that is reliably geared to protecting both of these sacred principles… for myself and for others.

Hedgehog Symbolism

A couple days later, while meditating, I saw God handing me a hedgehog. I knew very little about the hedgehog, so I looked it up. The hedgehog is a calm, lovable creature that is incredibly popular around the world. The hedgehog is perceived as intelligent, grounded and practical; unique, innovative, resourceful, protective, nurturing, fertile, and centered. The hedgehog knows how to protect and care for itself.

Because the hedgehog is nocturnal, it also is perceived as possessing intuition, psychic ability and in having prophetic dreams and visions. The hedgehog is also immune to snake bite poison. Thus it is equated with victory over evil. (See What’s Your Sign, Hedgehog Symbolism)

The hedgehog can seem intimidating to predators (with its spiky exterior). It can also curl up in a ball and isolate itself for self preservation.

Like the hedgehog I’ve been known to have prophetic visions and dreams. These visions inspired me to make adjustments in my own personal life, in my character, and my health. With shark-like focus, I began navigating toward those visions. From the outside and to the people affected by my choices, I’m sure my actions seemed uncaring, selfish and manipulative. On the inside, I felt like God showed me a path, and I moved toward it the best way I knew how.

Opening My Eyes to Another Perspective

By God showing me how I am like both the shark and the hedgehog, I could see why this person who I care for so deeply labeled me with all the negative characteristics they’d outlined.

Nature teaches us so much about ourselves. God created the shark and the hedgehog and every other animal. Each animal has its upsides and downsides. No one would say the shark is a “bad fish.” It’s just a fish. While it can be scary or intimidating, and while the hedgehog can seem prickly, both of them have admirable qualities.

Equally, you and I have qualities that seem good to some people and problematic or even scary to others. That doesn’t mean you’re a bad person or that I’m a bad person. It just means that from some vantage points we may seem intimidating or challenging.

Loving Ourselves – Lights, Shadows and All

I think it’s important for each of us to come to love ourselves for the lights and the shadows. Everything serves. Sure, there’s room for self-improvement. Definitely, we must learn from our mistakes and strive to improve. And often the attributes we despise in others are the ones we are too afraid to admit that we see in ourselves. Perhaps this was why God showed me that I’m a shark in a sea of sharks. We’re all working the plans we have in our own minds and hearts. We all can be scary or intimidating to some people. Our choices and agendas are always bumping up against other people’s choices and agendas.

Seeing Myself from Another Vantage Point

The shark and the hedgehog have helped me see myself through the perspective of the offended loved one. I can respect this person’s viewpoint. From their perspective, I’m the scary shark or the prickly hedgehog.

I’m okay with that, because I have come to accept and love all aspects of myself. God made me as an introvert, a visionary, a goal-driven person who tends to hyper-focus on the task at hand. God is also patient with me and enabling me to grow. He’s teaching me to communicate better and to confront life head-on instead of curling up in a ball and hoping problems go away. He’s giving me opportunities to chill a bit and not be so goal driven … to relax and enjoy life. He’s teaching me to be more in the moment and to spend time enjoying those I love.

Being True to You

If there is anything I have learned, it is that we are each responsible for our own choices, creating our own lives. Sometimes that makes things difficult for other people. But if there is any message I would share it is that you’ve got to follow your own path.

When I told my father I was getting divorced from my first husband, he said something that stuck with me: “Marriage is important, Marnie. But you’re more important.”

Each of us goes through difficult things in life. Other people often play a role in those difficulties. But in the end, we are each responsible for our own choices, our own lives, our own happiness. We each must follow our own hearts and be true to what we know we are being led to do. That doesn’t mean that everyone around us is going to be unaffected or thrilled about our choices. In the end, our choices give others an opportunity to grow. And their choices give us an opportunity to grow.

I think it’s important to understand that we’re all doing the best we can. My former spouses were doing the best they could. They aren’t bad men. They aren’t the enemy. They didn’t set out to cause harm. And neither did I. Relationships are like chemical reactions. Just because it’s cool to put baking soda and vinegar together to watch the explosion, doesn’t mean you keep putting them together. Some combinations are inherently messy and unhealthy. As my friend Donna Blevins, The Big Girl of Poker and author of MindShift on Demand says, “There is a time to fold. You don’t keep throwing money after a bad hand.”

Each of us have times where we’ll have to fold a hand and start over – either by choice or by necessity. But starting over isn’t a horrible thing if we own our role, learn from our mistakes, and make better choices in the future as a result. Fresh starts are just that … fresh. They can be exciting adventures or tragic endings depending upon what we choose to make of them.

Featured Image Copyright: Aaron Amat / BigStockPhoto.com
Shark Copyright: Fiona Ayerst / BigStockPhoto.com
Hedgehog Image Copyright: Ihor Ivakhno