Why I Finally Stopped Seeking Your Approval
I am so grateful to have finally realized the truth.
KieferPix / Shutterstock By Ashlyn Thomson
Since we broke up, I was always looking for your approval. I would wait to see if you liked my Instagram picture or if you watched my Snapchat story.
For some odd reason, I wanted to outshine you, and prove to you how great I was. It always came down to me waiting for your approval.
It wasn’t because I needed you to approve of what I was doing but I thought maybe, just maybe, you’d want me one last time, even though I knew we both deserve better.
I thought if I made my life look and sound exciting that you’d miss me and want me back, that you’d want to be a part of my happiness.
But once I saw your name pop up from you liking my picture or viewing my Snapchat story, I felt a sense of happiness, a sense of relief — relief that I didn’t have to try so hard anymore.
Lately, I’ve been very focused on the reasons of why we couldn’t make it work, the ifs, the ands, and the buts. I focused on the manipulation, the lies, the secrets, so much that I’ve focused my life back to you.
You’ve been in my head for hours a day and, in my dreams. You’ve been all I think about and it is very sad. My life is just starting to fall into place, and every single time something good comes up I think about you.
It’s like you have your fingers wrapped around me and I can’t get out of your trap.
I recently moved across Canada and you were the one I was thinking about. “I wonder what he is thinking, I wonder how he is feeling, what is he doing right now, would he approve, does he miss me.”
All of those things have been tormenting me, tormenting me so much that I’ve come to terms with my thinking and realized how blind I have been.
You don’t care, you don’t miss me, you don’t like to talk about your feelings, you don’t think about me, nor do you talk about me, you don’t wonder how I am, or what I am doing.
You are not the man I planned you out to be. I felt I had to do something to earn your love, for some reason it was yours I wanted.
All of these things that have happened in the past few months have been because of me — traveling, finishing school, getting my own place — but I turned each and every single one of them down because of you.
The worst part is that I felt it was okay to live like this. I thought it was normal after a breakup, I thought I was just a typical girl in the typical world, reminiscing over her ex. That it was okay to live my life and focus it on you.
I am so grateful to have finally realized the truth.
Yes, you are a great guy, and yes I enjoyed our time together, but we have also learned so much from each other. I now know so much more about who I am, and who I need to be, who I need to be with, and what makes me happy.
For an example, music. I am a music geek, I love music and each different type; I strive for new songs and listen to them so often that I get bored.
So one afternoon I was searching for some new music when I came across this country tune “Think Outside the Boy” by Lauren Alaina. When I first heard the song, I thought it was a typical country song but I liked the beat. So I downloaded it and it came on while I was on my way home from work one day and it just clicked... it hit me very close to home.
“Your diaries filled with get away plans, then he sweeps in and just like that you’re rewriting your story for him.”
I am an adventurous woman, one who loves to travel and get pushed outside of her comfort zone. One who likes to do new things and to try something new.
Although, when I met you I stopped being that girl. I stopped wanting those things. I changed my dreams so they would match yours and that was my first major mistake.
“I believed he was my forever, he was all I’d ever need, but I gave up what I wanted and I gave him control. I lost myself in a deep dark hole.”
I used to be a very strong independent woman, a woman who never cried and would handle whatever obstacles that came in her way with such pride and desire. I used to be okay on my own and I lost each and every single part of me... while being with you.
I would cry after a fight and get upset when things didn’t work out in our favor. I would pass off obstacles to different people and not stand up for what I thought was right.
I was lost. Lost in a world I shouldn’t have been in the first place. I changed as a person, I dropped some of my favorite things and became a weaker woman, a woman who gave things up for people who didn’t do the same for her. This was my second mistake.
“Think outside the boy, look right past his charm, he’s not your definition, he ain’t who you are. If you don’t love yourself, you sure ain’t gonna help, there’s so much more to life than to live like his wind up toy. Think outside the boy.”
Losing yourself is something you truly do not notice at the time it’s happening. Afterwards, yes for sure, but it does take quite a while (it took me 9 months), but it isn’t the end of the world.
Sometimes you go through certain things in life that are represented as a challenge, but then you come to realize it was actually a learning curve.
For me, I learned who I was, who I need to be with to be happy and what I deserve. I now know what I really believe in and just cannot wait for more time to come for me to learn even more life long experiences.
So, as Lauren says, “I’m here to tell you that it’s never too late to cut the strings and to take back your fate. You found yourself again along the way.”
I noticed how I changed and how to become a better person, and how to continue growing from it. But I’m back to the person who I was before, the adventurous woman. The woman who does things outside of her comfort zone, the woman who I love and admire.
So today I stop looking for anyone’s approval about my life but my own. I want to be happy for what my life has become, for who I am, and for my next adventure.
I now see my dreams falling into reality and I approve of the way I am today.
PS: I just want to send a quick thank you to my ex, if you’re reading this, because even though we’ve been through quite the s****y time, we’ve also had fun, we learned a lot from each other, and I truly do wish you the best.
I am sorry for the way things ended and maybe one day things could work out between us, but for now, this is just a thank you letter, because you’ve done so much for me, I’ll never know how to repay you. So thank you, from the bottom of my heart.
To anyone reading this, I suggest you give the song a quick listen, it truly does do wonders and most likely it’ll help you, too.
Ashlyn Thomson is a writer and musician who writes primarily about relationships and self-improvement topics.