Have you ever had someone share a secret with you? Possibly something happened in your community and you happened to be friends with the person(s) involved, or had inside connections to the “event” that happened. You were informed of the details by the source or victim of the event. Then a neighbor mentions the event to you based on the rumors going around. When you hear the rumors, you realize how much it differs from the truth.
Have you ever noticed in the absence of information that people will often make up their own story or assumptions? We see this a lot with celebrities and the tabloids. You just can’t believe everything you hear.
Have you ever had someone make untrue accusations about you? If it was someone you did not know very well or may not place much value on their opinion, you may have been able to easily brush it off. But what if it was someone who knows you fairly well, a close friend, or worse yet your spouse? It might not be so easy to brush it off.
In fact, their accusation may cause you to re-evaluate the statement and ask yourself, could this be true? After all when someone close to us, who we tend to share our hearts and allow to know us more intimately makes a negative comment about us, we take it personally. A negative comment can cut us to our core and cause us to doubt our value and self worth.
If you are going through a divorce or recently divorced, did this happen to you in your marriage? When a marriage begins to break down, the initiator of the divorce can develop a negative perspective of their partner and marriage. The initiator’s focus can be only on the negative. Before long the initiating partner can begin making negative statements to their partner. This can take place over a period of months or years.
Over time the initiating spouse can convince themselves their negative perceptions are true about their spouse. The more negative attributes they can find in their spouse helps them to justify their desire to leave the marriage. In the process of convincing themselves, the initiating spouse may also convince their partner the negative comments or perceived imperfections are true.
If your former spouse made negative comments about you, your character, your personality, take time for a reality check. Don’t believe everything you heard. Understand that many of the negative or derogatory comments directed towards you are not true. Consider the source, the mindset of your former spouse at the time. It is quite possible the statements have no validity or truth.
If you are interested in reading more about this topic, read my recent Ezine article Post Divorce: Recognizing and Dealing with Untrue Accusations
Divorce brings enough pain and rejection. At a time when your self worth and value are at an all time low it is easy to believe such negative statements. Take the time during your Divorce Recovery to discover the truth. Ask yourself and others close to you, if there is any truth to the negative statements? Is there something you need to address? Are there behaviors, thoughts or actions you may want to change in the future? Or were the statements not valid, stemming from your former spouse’s guilt, hurt, anger and/or insecurity? Don’t automatically believe everything you hear!
Copyright 2009 Shelley Grieser All Rights Reserved.
