I am a huge fan of elephants. Especially babies. So that’s why I’m using that image. No other reason, haha. Baby elephants make me happy!

So Mila has been learning while she studies the Queen and King of the Awakened. Not even asking a lot of questions, she is finding that as she watches the way they interact with one another, the things they say, and even how they don’t at times speak, but do speak.

It’s telling her a huge story about the type of people they are. Which is really how we know, isn’t it? We don’t have to ask someone what their favorite color is to see as time goes on that they wear a certain color over and over. Or they have a certain color in their house. We study by not asking questions. We learn by watching the way they interact.

Being far too self-aware, I’ve been very cognizant of the past year about how I’ve been growing away from people and ending friendships that no longer feel right. Or they never really felt right but now it’s amplified. Like a huge spotlight. Once I may have just grown away, but if they are close, or if I really wanna make sure that door is closed, I tell them straight out.

From an outsiders perspective, because my life has been changing so much this past year or so, it could appear that I don’t value friendships or am not extremely loyal. But that’s what I think Mila is noticing. For so long she’s been assuming she knew what vampires are like, she’s been seeing them in these brief windows, or hearing things about them, but never really saw beneath the surface.

Now, like anyone who really steps back and sees who I am, they would see that I am beyond extreme when it comes to loyalty. I am beyond extreme when it comes to overextending friendships beyond the expiration date. I stand by people when others wouldn’t. It takes a lot for me to finally close that door. Granted, there are exceptions.

A recent example that comes to mind is a woman who was left for a younger woman. Being a younger woman you can imagine that though she didn’t see it, she treated me as lesser. She judged me as her, but had that underlying cutting tone and negativity all the time. When I told her I fell in love, her literal first sentence to me was not to lose myself. Automatically assuming that since she had obviously gone through that, she was projecting herself onto me. She’d assumed she knew me after only a short while, telling me she loved me, but then made cutting remarks about my age as though being 37, I couldn’t be wise. As though being 37, it automatically meant because she was older that she had lived more, and was downright emotionally abusive in the way she spoke to me.

I’ve dealt with that from many people. Many I can excuse. I have no ill will toward her, but being an Empath, when someone approaches me without authenticity and instead is living in their dark shadowed side, their pain, their hurt, and projecting it onto me, it sickens me. It brings me down. We all know those negative folks who pretend they are happy, but being around them drains us. They praise while underlying it comes a negative critique. As in, I’m so much better than you, know more, and this is why you’re wrong.

If you think about what emotional abuse or psychological abuse is? That is it. That is why trolls get away with things they do. We are not coming out and confronting it. We allow it. We ignore it. And I did. I am not calling her a troll. In her way, she was being what she believed was a good person. But the truth was, every time she came to a great quote I shared about love, she cut it down. Many times when I talked about happiness, she cut it down. Many times  I said that people cared, she would cut it down saying nobody cares about anything but themselves. On the outside, me finally having enough and telling her the reasons, then ending that presence in my life, it can seem to an outsider that I don’t really have loyalty. Or they can see me ending friendships right and left and going, damn.

It’s something that pops up in my head. Which is what Mila is dealing with. She has been looking from the outside to the inside of Kat and Julian and thinking they just threw their daughter away. But now she’s getting to see two people who have the most incredible passionate, once in a lifetime love for one another, and they wanted that child of theirs.

Now to finish my trail of thought for me. I am loyal to a fault, yes. I do not give up on people that easy. I’ll easily take hits (not literal) again and again if it means showing them I don’t let go so easy. I don’t give up. Because sometimes life does get hard and we need those folks who are not necessarily punching bags, but people who stay there. Who remain loyal. Who we would give that same reciprocal loyalty too. But there are also those people who I’ve learned to suss out. I feel them out by energy mostly. By instincts as I wrote about in a previous post – Following their gut – that guide me. And in this past year I have been finding that I don’t have to be the nice girl to that extreme maybe.

Honestly I don’t know how to explain it. Bottom line is that I’ve lost everything before. Friends, money, job, you name it. And when I needed the people who I’d been loyal to and believed they had my back? The only thing they said to me was that I didn’t want to hang out with them anymore. Not, how can I help you. Not, I am here for you. Not, I will help you get through this. No. I was there in times when I sacrificed time and energy to be there for them when they needed me. When they needed a friend. And then when I needed it in return, they were criticizing of my need for help, wanted to shove me off, then abandoned me.

So I learned long ago that only those who truly show up for me, deserve to be there. And those who I feel that underlying criticality? No. I am not as forgiving anymore. I want people in my life who have my back and I will have theirs. I am beyond generous.  I love to give. Love to take care of people. It makes me happy to make others happy. I am forever a people pleaser, but people don’t realize you can be without it being a detriment.

But what I will not do? Is allow one person to remain in my life if they only want to remain in their negative critical spaces as those people had been. Not if they are energy drainers. I can forgive. I can have patience. But if someone stands between me and a happy love-filled life?

Fuck them.

I will limit people and then I will remove people if necessary. Either they appreciate me and show it through their actions, or I will have zero tolerance for them no matter how long I have known them. The instant I feel someone doesn’t deserve a spot in my future is the moment I cut them loose. We have to be that discerning. Not everyone deserves a place in our lives. I never wish them anything but the best and I tell them goodbye.

So in this past year I have been cutting ties. But I also still have people in my life that I have known since I was a little girl. I have family members I’ve never met, but through Facebook we’ve connected. I have people I’ve only ever known online that I am very close to and we’ve known one another for over ten years. I’ve stood by the side of a person who ended up in prison. Nothing will keep me from being friends with the right people. And my loyalty remains true until I realize our paths don’t continue on together. So I’m loyal all right.

To the right people.

I will go to war for people I love. I will rage battles against beasts five times my size for the people I love. I will stand alone against an army and tell the entire world they will have to get through me to get to that person to protect them from harm. But having lost everything has taught me to value those friendships and relationships who offer me the same in return. Not to have one-sided takers anymore.

And like Mila has discovered, she’s been wrong. Looking and judging Kat and Julian from the outside has shown her she didn’t know what she thought was true. Today she even asked them why? Why did they give Kylarra up?

Then she truly saw what it did to them. She finally realized exactly who the King and Queen of the Awakened are.

And realized all this time?

She’d been wrong about them.

Which is why we should never assume we know who people are until we know them. And it takes getting to know them personally. Talking to them. Communicating with them.

Today’s word count for Discovery of an Enchantress

Started today at – 24,308

Ended today at – 26,562

Total word count for today – 2,254