Pride.

I am one who does not like conflict, whether it involves me or people that I love. I always thought of myself as someone who didn't have a lot of pride and was a very non-judgmental person.

The past couple of weeks have proven me wrong on both accounts and it's been rough, because my mind would not let me stop thinking/obsessing.

I have been recently in a situation where I said some things that hurt a married couple that I love. The things I said were said out of love and concern, but they hurt them all the same and they both confronted me about it.

Because in my mind they were said out of love, I was offended that they were offended and couldn't see past my offense. I responded in a rather snotty way and they called me out on that too.

I could not sleep and my stomach was in knots for days. I kept replaying the situation and the "how wrong they were" scenario in my head over and over and over and was just about on the point of obsessing over it and being willing to totally call off our friendship as a result. "I'm nice! I would never intentionally hurt anyone! Can't they understand that? Why do they keep picking on ME? Where is their love for ME? Don't they know what this is doing to ME?"

Common denominator? All the MEs in those sentences. I didn't truly consider what I had done to THEM. I let my pride get in the way. And then I realized how incredibly judgmental I was being as well. Something I took pride (hmm, there is that word again) in declaring to everyone that I am a very non-judgmental person was the exact reason why I offended these lovely people.

This didn't come to me in a vision or explosion. Just in a very subtle way did I realize that I needed to knock my pride to the curb and that I still owed them a sincere apology. I woke up with that thought in mind a few days ago and immediately acted upon it. It's amazing to me what happened. The moment I did this, the obsession stopped and I felt peace. I also feel like the matter is closed and my married friends have accepted my apology and we are all moving on.

PRIDE dadgumit! I don't remember ever allowing pride to rule my world. It was ugly and had snuck upon me and had almost ruined a good friendship.

I am sharing this story because during all this yucky-ness, I kept thinking in my mind, "Don't they know how a depressed person would deal with this conflict? Don't they know WHY this is killing me more than probably them?" I was using my depression status as a crutch/an excuse. Like I'm entitled to do things or not do things because of the emotional crap I deal with on a daily basis. This is a new realization for me.

Glad I have you to set me straight.