Why We Cannot Change Anyone

I wrote this poem from a memory I had as a child. There really was a dove I found with a broken wing. I picked it up and brought it inside, put a towel in a small box to give it a place to lay, but that was the extent of all I could do for it. Soon after the dove died.

I look back on this moment and think of our innate desire to fix people and help them to change, all coming from a place of wanting them to be happy, safe, and well. We are so limited in our ability to do this. At the end of the day, sometimes someone who is broken is just that... broken. There isn't anything that we can really say or do that will make them any better, any happier.

I don't actually believe that anyone really can change, though some may disagree. I do believe that emotionally stable and well people can grow, but ultimately we are inherently who we are. When it comes to toxic relationships I have a contradictory thought. One I have considered greatly this week, I think I have had an ah-ha moment.

In most toxic relationships, we are dealing with a personality disorder. In my research of borderline personality disorder I once read something that really stuck. That someone with this disorder cannot actually process consequence. Makes sense since one cannot experience consequence if they do not find themselves to blame for anything. If you cannot self reflect and see your own wrongdoings, if you have no regret, then you cannot hold yourself accountable for your actions and cannot see or process the consequence of those actions... therefore, no personal growth, you will not change.

This is the very reason that one cannot change another. I think of the saying "you can lead a horse to water, but cannot make him drink" You can plead your case to your relationship counterpart, express how their actions have affected you, but unless they really want to see it, they won't.

I think back to my teen years, when I would get into disagreements with my mother, who had just taken up therapy, when I would tell her how her actions or words made me feel she would say "I cannot make you feel anything." Basically saying that regardless of how she behaves or what she says to me I am responsible for my own feelings. I realize that her therapist may have been trying to empower her, I don't think he realized that empowerment was not something that she lacked. Empathy on the other hand....

I cannot completely disagree with this statement. It reminds me of the quote "No one can make you feel inferior without your consent" said by Eleanor Roosevelt. So there in lies the contradiction, if someone says or does something that hurts you are you responsible for that pain because it is your own, or are they responsible for their words and actions that hurt you?

I choose to believe both. When someone says or does something that hurts you, you then are responsible for how you respond. Do you endure? in silence or do you express your feelings? Or do you walk away? How you respond is the consequence one has to live with. Whether they take it as such is up to them. Now that, we have no control over.

Perhaps we are the ones who should take flight, before we ourselves are the broken ones.