EMOTIONAL TRADING INC. 

What an enterprise! If I give you a little blame (for whatever you are supposed to have done), then you can give me a pinch of aggression in exchange. If I can take some control and domination . . . then you get to have a bucket of self pity and victimhood.

If I make you feel guilty . . . you owe me! And I will collect upon that debt and demand of you that you give me love so that I feel better about myself for a while. Don’t you point your finger at me and accuse me of being righteous and projecting, for I have a secret savings tucked away of all of your faults and weaknesses and by God, I will use them! I know you . . .

And because I know you, I own you . . .

I can pull your strings and demand that you dance to the tune of the piper and if you don’t, I will have such a tantrum that the heavens will shake! For you see, I too have stored up my own weak defenses and reasons for my behavior. My inner child is pampered and my adolescent is obnoxious and they will have their way. For if I do not bend to their needs and I begin to clear out my private emotional bank accounts, what will I have left? What will I fall back on when I am not filling my own cup . . . when I am not creating my own reality . . . when I am pretending to be anything other than dignified?

I have nothing.

I have not spent my livelihood on building self esteem and self love. I have not filled my coffers with dignity and patience and I have over looked the interest on my debts too. For the trades I have made, come with a heavy price and the guilt alone could cost me five lifetimes, let alone one. My apathy and arrogance don’t even allow me to have a key to the vault of treasures that I am assured awaits me . . . I must struggle with a joint savings plan and whilst I plow my goodness into it, you withdraw from it to feather your nest of doubt.

If only I had traded with a different currency . . . if only I had learnt to save in what was to be a long term deposit – an eternal one to be clear. If only I had turned a blind eye and a deaf ear and allowed you to gnaw away at your own bank account while I secretly saved in my own. I would have had gems of the rarest kind – emeralds of dignity, rubies of grace, sapphires of trust, diamonds of love, pearls of wisdom and opals of patience.

But alas! I live as an emotional pauper – stealing energy when I am empty and giving when I want to invest in a future expectation.