When you’re sensitive and love hard, it’s essential to protect your heart. At times it feels like having a big heart is more of a curse than a blessing. Especially when you’ve been disrespected and let down when all you’ve been is genuine with good intentions.
It fucking sucks, but don’t let other people make you just like them… cold, disenguine, and emotionally unavailable. It’s actually amazing to remain open after multiple people have done you wrong.
Here are some pieces of advice that I would’ve found useful when encountering one sided relationships.
This post is all about how you can protect your heart.
Stop giving people the benefit of the doubt.
I find myself still doing this because I’ll be “sure” they’re a good person but that was just me seeing the good in them. Unfortunately, many people will put on a facade to get what they want. It might not be in your nature to lie so easily, but thats not the case for a lot of people. Give it time to really see who they are, eventually they will tell on themselves. Take it slow. Let actions speak for their character.
Trust is earned, not automatically given.
I recently learned this. I used to think that unless someone gave me a reason not to trust them, there was no reason to be untrusting. But unfortunately, thats going to keep getting me hurt if I continue to think that way. I know I’m truthful and trustworthy so I assume many people are but no. Let actions and time convince you that they are trustworthy.
Listen to your intuition.
It can be hard to know what your intuition looks/feels like if you struggle with trusting yourself. Those times you felt something was off. Those minor red flags you brushed off. Those moments you peeped that they said/did something iffy. That was your intuition telling you something wasn’t right. Trust yourself enough to listen to those messages no matter how small you think they are. Trust yourself to act on those intuitive messages and either leave the person, or emotionally distance yourself.
Be firm with your boundaries.
Unfortunately, there’s shitty people out there that will take advantage of you if you have no boundaries (I learned the hard way). We think people would have common decency and humanity to treat people with respect and have good intentions, but unfortunately that’s not the case. I know it can be hard to stick with boundaries because we don’t want to cause conflict. But if it causes conflict, then that person does not deserve you. They should have no problem with your boundaries. Protect yourself and don’t let people take advantage of you. Boundaries are key to protect your heart. They will prevent you from unfortunate situations and lead you to people who are worthy of your energy.
Be more cautious with your heart because not everyone loves like you.
Not everyone is like you. You gotta protect your heart and peace. Don’t let just anyone have access to you. Many people will want to be with you because they see your genuineness and big heart, but some just want to leech off your good energy. Be particular with who you spend your time with. You don’t have to be friends with everyone.
Hurt people hurt people.
Just know it has nothing to do with you. They acted from a place of hurt and projected it onto you. They wouldn’t even know how to treat you right. “People will only know you as deep as they know themselves”. They probably don’t even know themselves that much to have the deep connection you desire.
You did what you could with the knowledge you had.
I know it hurts and it’s such a let down. But you can leave the situation with a good conscience, knowing you didn’t inflict hurt on someone. Don’t beat yourself up over the thought of “I should’ve known better” or “I was so naive”. Now you know more than you did back then.
Work on your discernment.
This will save you from ending up played or let down by a phony. If it’s not something that you were taught, you will have to get help from other resources. It wasn’t by choice, but I learned more about discernment from the crappy situations I’ve been in. I’ve also been getting insight and help from relationship content creators (My Favorite Content Creators for Self Improvement). Books will help out too.
Don’t exaggerate your place in other people’s lives.
I know it can be easy for you to care deeply about a person and prioritize them, but it doesn’t mean they feel the same way. I’m always realizing at the end that they didn’t care as much as I thought they did. Not taking people’s words too seriously and strictly looking at actions will help you see things for what they are. Sometimes we hurt our own feelings thinking someone really cared when they weren’t really showing it.
Learn from it.
If someone takes advantage of your big heart, know that they took a huge ass L (that they will realize in time) and that you are taking a big ass W by dodging a bullet and learning from the situation. The times I’ve been let down and disrespected sucked ass but I wouldn’t have grown as much without those lessons. Take the time to self reflect. Take accountability for the things you did that led you to ignore obvious red flags and also do some inner work to see why you ignored those red flags.
This post was all about how you can protect your heart from unecessary disappointment.
Thank you so much for taking the time to read this and be on my blog. I truly appreciate it. Have a great day/night <3