Why I turned my Focus to the inside

For a long time, I felt as if life had treated me unfairly. I blamed everyone—Jana, women in general, society, even the world itself. I saw myself as the victim of bad luck: not attractive enough, not confident, and overly emotional. The weight of my suffering felt inescapable, and I searched for responsibility everywhere but within myself.

But facing my own responsibility, as painful as it was, became the first step toward a clearer mind.

"The moment you take full responsibility for your life, is the moment you gain the power to change it." — Hal Elrod

Taking a step back, I realized that my intense emotional reaction to my breakup signaled deeper-rooted issues. Two things became apparent:

My pain felt disproportionately strong compared to the actual duration of the relationship.
My own behaviors had contributed to the breakup, often driven by anxiety and insecurity.

This forced me to question whether my suffering was truly justified or whether my mental state had intensified it.

Recognizing the Root Cause

Challenging My Assumptions

Initially, I excused my pain by telling myself: I loved her deeply, so of course, I’m suffering. But when I compared my reaction to those of others who had endured far greater losses, I began to see things differently.

One morning, I stumbled upon a newspaper headline about a celebrity couple breaking up after eight years. Eight years! I thought. If I felt this devastated after a few months, what would I have done in their shoes? That moment brought up som curcial questions:

Was my reaction proportionate?
Was I really lovng harder than everyone else, or was something else at play?

This self-reflection led me to a pivotal conclusion—my emotional turmoil was not solely caused by external events but by my internal state.

"Your emotions don’t reflect reality; they reflect your perception of reality." — Unknown

The Mismatch Between Emotion and Reality

I began analyzing the disparity between my emotions and the situation itself. I created a mental framework:

Factual cause: The actual event (breakup, loss, failure).
Mental factor: The internal regulator that determines the intensity of the emotional reaction.

By comparing my reaction to what I believed a "healthy" response should be—acknowledging the pain but not being consumed by it—I realized just how far off balance I was. This gap pointed me toward the real issue: my mind was amplifying my suffering.

The Power of Perspective

At the same time, I revisited an old belief I had long ignored: we shape our own realities. Reading You Are the Placebo by Dr. Joe Dispenza reinforced this idea. If my emotions dictated my actions, and my actions influenced my outcomes, then my internal state directly shaped my life.

I pressured Jana because I feared losing her.
I made myself overly available, despite knowing it would push her away.
My anxieties led me to act in ways that created the very outcome I dreaded.

Recognizing this was difficult, but it also ignited a new motivation: If my mind could create my suffering, it could also create my healing.

Reclaiming Responsibility

Owning my role in my own pain wasn’t easy. At first, it fueled more self-hate: I caused this. I am broken. But over time, responsibility became empowering.

If I had created this painful reality, I could create a better one.
If my mind led me here, then reshaping my thoughts could lead me somewhere new.

"You are not a prisoner of your past. You are the architect of your future." — Robin Sharma

The Path Forward: Inner Work

With this new understanding, my focus shifted inward. My priorities became:

Becoming aware of my thoughts and emotions.
Understanding how they influenced my actions.
Learning to regulate and reframe them.

This wasn’t an overnight fix. My subconscious beliefs had been shaping me for years, and reprogramming them would take time. But for the first time, I had a clear direction.

From Victimhood to Acting

The journey wasn’t just about healing from a breakup—it was about transforming my entire approach to life. Instead of asking, Why does this always happen to me? I started asking, How can I change my mindset to create a better future?

For the longest time, I had lived in a victim mentality. But once I fully embraced my power to change, I realized something profound:

I wasn’t powerless. I had always been in control—I just needed to start acting like it.