Denial.

Never underestimate the power of denial.

Strategy for Survival #1: Always be right.
All too often we fail to appreciate the power of the human mind. So powerful is the human mind that we are able to subconsciously repeat things to ourselves that we end up believing the lies of all lies without even realizing it.....

Beautiful women convince themselves they're not good enough to deserve respect.
Talented people scare themselves from aiming for their dreams.
Children teach themselves that they don't deserve love from their parents (or anyone else).

More often than not we make our goals fit our inhibitions rather than altering our relationship with fear and stretch our inhibitions so we can reach our goals.

How has this applied to me most recently?
For years and years I've built, brick by brick, with bloody hands, sweaty brows and tear stained cheeks a wall around my heart to protect myself from adversity and shield it from the torrential storms of "love".
What we often fail to realize is that, it doesn't matter how thick or high our superficial walls are -- one day, on any random day, a stupid person, no different than any other person will walk into our stupid lives to whom we carelessly HAND OVER the pieces of our heart we worked for so hard and so long to protect.... just like that!
We can lie to ourselves and say "no, not this time... I'm safe behind this iron wall I've built." But then one day, something happens that will reveal just how far beneath your skin this stupid person got.

I shake my head as I look over at the side of the wall, now in shambles, that I've denied for so long... take a deep breath, and begin to rebuild.....