Guard up

No one is born with their guard up, right? I wasn’t, but I think with a lot of things in life and different experiences, something causes us to put up a wall and not let a lot of people into what is happening or what we’re thinking – at least that’s how it was and is for me.

As humans, I think it’s a very natural thing to put your guard up.

When I think of having my guard up, I think of being alert and staying alert. It’s sort of like ‘am I going to get my feelings hurt, am I going to be disappointed?’. I don’t necessarily want to ask myself those questions but if you know me, I like to be prepared. 

My guard goes up when I’m vulnerable or when I start getting vulnerable. I have no problem being vulnerable, especially when I’m by myself. Like I can go into my room and cry my heart out, it’s just when it comes to crying in front of other people. Yeah, I don’t like doing that. I’ll cover my face and just hope everything goes away, but it never does. I get a bit uncomfortable and just want to get up and leave, but in certain situations I can’t do that. This happened recently at work. I wanted to leave, but my nature is very much like just stick it out and see how you go, so I stayed and kept going as if everything was fine, as if I was fine, but I wasn’t. My emotions took over and I started crying. Even if I tell myself “no, don’t cry, you’re good”, it’s too late and tears will already be rolling down my face, and it’s annoying, it annoys me because I think I’m being silly for feeling - how silly is that?. ugh —— (that made sense, right?. let me know in the comments)

Keeping my guard up I feel is just a way of protecting myself. People can be really mean with what they say and how they say things, sometimes it’s all in the tone. Life beautiful but it’s crazy and with the way things go, sometimes I feel like I’m not given much choice to put up a wall. I want to protect my mind and heart as much as possible because I don’t want to get hurt. As I’ve mentioned in a previous blog post, I was bullied in school and been judged before, so that’s when I’m like I’d rather just keep to myself. And also, It feels a lot safer to keep things that really hurt you to yourself, and I’m sure a lot of therapists will disagree with me, but that’s just me. Clearly I’ve got a lot to work through. 

So how do I bring that wall down? Ah, the truth is - I’m not too sure, but I’m just going to keep being myself and communicating what I need. I feel it’s the only way, and also not being afraid to wear my heart on my sleeve. It all comes down to being vulnerable as well. It’s incredibly brave to be so open and show people how you’re feeling, it’s scary but so freeing when you’re just able to let it out. 

I’m still learning.

It’ll take time for that wall to drop and it will take someone super special for me to open up completely, but I know putting up a wall is only going to hold me back, and I deserve a chance to let my wall come down… one brick at a time.