Years ago I was at a party at a friend’s home and I became triggered by the interaction I witnessed between two close friends. One woman was heterosexual and the other was gay. I was uncomfortable with how flirty the straight woman was and how attentive her gay friend was to her. We all know flirty behavior, right? It can be as innocuous as an innocent smile or as intentional as engaging touching, laughing and giving ‘bedroom eyes.’ Now don’t get me wrong, all those things might not be flirting either (because there is no flirty intention behind them.) It could just be a representation of living in the moment and experiencing connection. What I was triggered by was the unconscious intention behind the behavior of the straight woman . Let me share with you why it bothered me at all and why on earth I spent precious life energy on what other people were doing? If you are guilty of this ever, read on.
You see, I grew up with an absolutely beautiful, sexy mom who lived fully in her body and expressed her sensuality openly. I idealized her and wanted to be like her although I felt it could never happen. I remember being in the glory of my youth at 15 and not receiving any attention from men when my mother was also present. In addition to being 15, overweight and having super low self-esteem, my mother thrived on attention from the opposite sex so she flirted unconsciously. She wasn’t technically inappropriate. She wasn’t intentionally flirty with the young men I was interested in but she lit up around them. Looking back I can see clearly that her unconscious intention was to gather their attention like fuel to feed her own low self-esteem. I wished I could talk to her about this now to see if she was in agreement, but she died a long time ago so that’s not possible. Once I got conscious of why I was triggered I decided to talk to the straight woman at the party (who was an acquaintance) to see if what I was observing could be helpful.
Okay, I know…it wasn’t necessarily any of my business. But I have found that at various times in my life when a friend got really honest with me about an unconscious pattern I had displayed I experienced huge breakthroughs. I was guided from a place of no judgment to speak with this woman privately. I felt if she understood what she was doing (I thought she was leading the gay woman on because she didn’t have a chance with her) she might feel better about herself and not have to keep feeding this inner part of herself that needed to be filled up. We sat down and I asked if she was open to feedback about something I noticed about her relationship with this other woman. She was. It turned out to be an incredibly healing conversation for both of us. She had been totally unconscious of what she was doing and was grateful for the new awareness. She loved her friend dearly. She recalled numerous times in her past when she repeated this pattern with less than desirable results.
Of course there is more to this. The gay woman had her own lessons. She happened to have deep intimacy issues so being ‘in love’ with someone totally unavailable suited her for the time being. Not really, but you know what I mean. I looked at where I too had been unconsciously using energy from the opposite sex to fill myself up in the past. It was modeled to me so I’m sure it showed up in some way. For me it showed up as a feeling of unworthiness when I wasn’t getting attention and jealousy and even unresolved anger and resentment for my mother who I judged as ‘stealing my thunder’.
The truth is that whenever you bring unconscious thoughts and behavior to conscious awareness (while at the same time being nonjudgmental and holding a neutral observer space) you have begun your healing process. The next step is to apply loving to those part inside that have been hurt.
