Who are the biggest influences in your life?
I am honestly struggling to answer this prompt. I don’t spend a lot of time thinking these through before I write them. They are typically early morning thought exercises for me. So I guess we are going to see where this goes together dear reader.
The first thought that comes to mind is are weak talking positive or negative influences? I think my parents for better or worse are big influences in my life. But I don’t know that I would say they are positive ones. I’ve written previously about the difficult relationships I have with them. I think as kids we have two paths when it comes to the influence of our parents in our lives. We either follow in their footsteps and do as they did. Or we do the exact opposite. I’m not talking about careers and things like that, though that can be true too. I’m talking about how we are as people. Children are observers and they learn how to treat others from their parents. For me, I decided to not be like my parents. I didn’t want transactional relationships for example.
As for other influences, ones I would consider to be big… I’ve already written about my paternal grandfather, you can read that entry here. There is also my friend Verity who I learned a lot about how to be kind and open and genuine from. She played a huge role in me learning to love myself for who I am and not for who others want me to be. Along those same lines would be my husband and my partner for always encouraging me to pursue whatever dreams I have. For supporting me in my education and my hobbies. For traveling with me and also encouraging me to do things alone so that I can grow and not feel so reliant on others.
These people are far more influential in my life than those that raised me. I don’t think thats a bad thing. Nor do I think it’s a bad thing that I don’t think about the influence of others in my life on a regular basis because my life, is mine in the long run. If I focus to much on the influence, there is the risk of blame if something goes wrong and no one who has influence in my life is to blame for the choices I make.
But perhaps thats my unique way of viewing the world, I never quite know anymore.
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