~ Ethereal Princess ~

Sometimes the moment you raise your standards, you realize you’ve been asking for the bare minimum. You start to see how much you’ve tolerated, excused, accepted out of fear—fear of being alone, fear of being too much, fear of seeming unreasonable. Your standards are not a punishment. They will only be presented that way by people who see being with themselves as a punitive experience

When you start moving differently, setting boundaries, & requiring more, the pushback is inevitable. People who benefited from your silence will label you difficult. Those who relied on your lack of discernment will suddenly demand “empathy.” But aggressive verbiage is never an indicator of applied knowledge. Most people who throw empathy around only do so when someone stops enabling the very behaviors that show they lack it

This is why you have to know the history of how you move before you allow someone to convince you otherwise. If you’ve been the one who always gives, always forgives & always bends, then understand that the discomfort you feel when you stop is not a sign that you’re being unreasonable but a sign that you’re finally choosing yourself

Standards require discipline, discernment and dependability. Discipline to uphold them when it’s inconvenient. Discernment to recognize when someone is testing them. Dependability to ensure that you don’t just set them for others but that you embody them yourself

"you spoke it into existence"