Contrary to popular belief, being a superhero in everyone’s story, isn’t good. It’s actually pretty bad.
A few years ago, I had to learn a harsh lesson that took a while for me to fully process. I met it with resistance, questioning, and lots of self-doubt, but truth be told, those are usually the most integral lessons to learn. The longest lasting. The ones that withstand the test of time. And in this case, the one that allowed me to be at peace with parts of my past.
That lesson is: in some stories, I’m the superhero. In many stories, I’m not even on the cast list. In others, I’m a background character. And in a few, I’m the villain.
Do I set out to be the villain in anyone’s story? Absolutely not. I don’t think to myself, “Let’s add misery to this person’s life just for fun.” I assume most people would agree that they don’t have that mindset, either. But at the same time, I don’t think being a villain in some people’s stories is necessarily a bad thing.
Controversial? No.
Vital.
I can think of a few people off the top of my head who would outwardly proclaim that I am the villain in their story, or at least admit that at one point in time, I was.
For the longest time, the thought of causing anyone emotional pain, physically hurt me. It didn’t matter if it was as trivial as accidentally cutting someone off in traffic or as big as being the reason someone couldn’t easily fall asleep at night. Both scenarios brought me a tremendous deal of guilt and remorse.
Which, yes, if you intentionally cause someone pain and relish in the feelings of inflicting trauma on anyone, you need to do major internal work. I’m not saying you should be feeling holly jolly for making anyone upset when you’re clearly in the wrong— let me set that record straight.
But here’s the thing…
Given the opportunity between protecting the people I love and tarnishing someone’s image of who I am, between allowing someone to walk all over me and standing my ground, between disappointing someone else and disappointing the parts of me that are finding the initial strength that was buried at my roots, I will always, always pick the latter.
I say “always” because it’s backed by a promise that I have only recently made to myself within the last few years of my life. It is a forward-looking “always”, not one that’s been indicative of all my previous choices. Not even close.
Over the years, I’ve learned what it means to grow into myself. I’ve learned why it’s more important to care about what you think of yourself than to care about what other people think of you, and at the end of the day, that means being okay with not being the superhero in everyone’s eyes.
Ultimately, I’ve learned that:
If you never speak your mind,
If you never stand up for yourself or the people who need you,
If you never form your own opinion because you want to appease everyone else,
If you never go for what you want out of fear that it’s going to hurt, disappoint, or rattle someone,
You are still going to wind up being the villain in some people’s stories because you cannot control how everyone feels about you.
So, what does that tell you?
You need to do what’s best for you regardless of how other people are going to see you for it or how it’s going to affect them.
One way I like to look at it is:
Everything that’s ugly and hurtful teaches you something. All the unideal moments of life are disguised as lessons, and when you change your perspective from “why me” to “what am I learning” you literally change your whole life.
So, we need those not so good times, but more than that, we can’t stop them from coming. Even if we didn’t “need” them, they’d come anyway.
I’ll be the first to admit (even if none of us want to admit this out loud) that, I am the unideal moments in someone else’s life every once in a while. It’s just the truth. That’s part of existing in a world with billions of other people. You’re bound to clash with a few of them.
But those people will learn from you. They’ll grow and understand and be better because of you. And even if you were the source of heartache or pain, they will hopefully find the lessons that your character played in their storyline.
So, to wrap this all up, I want to say one last thing.
Focusing on being the villain in a few people’s stories is exhausting and at some point, not conducive to your wellbeing. I most definitely believe in learning from mistakes and reflecting on how you could’ve handled a situation better in the past, but only for so long. Only until you learn what you need to.
And last but certainly not least, the most important piece of this entire puzzle is, if there is one person’s story that you should focus on never becoming the villain of, make sure it’s your own.
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