Buck Up. Move On.

Failure is reality.  It's a part of life.  I'll be the first to say--if there's anything I'm really good at, it's failure.  Right now you're thinking "Cool. Now why are you telling me this?"
Because--I'm currently struggling with one of my bigger failures of my personality.

I call this the "Suck It Up Initiative."  It's one of those things that was outvoted by humanity and can never be publicly accepted.

Truth be told, I'm an overly empathetic person 99% of the time.  It's obnoxious, really.  You cry, I cry.  You laugh, I laugh.  You mad, I mad.  No, that isn't proper grammar, but I don't really care.

While my empathy can be an occasional burden or bumbler(sobbing for no reason when someone else is upset), it more or less puts me in touch with those around me and keeps me caring about mankind.  My heart goes out to those who are happy, hurting, angry, sad, in love, allergic, and crazy.  It doesn't really matter; I can be like you and feel what you do if I need to, and both of us will feel good about it.

Sadly, my empathy crashes and burns when it is supposed to give way to my sympathy.  Sympathy should show up when empathy isn't possible.  After all, if I can't put myself in your shoes and feel what you feel, then I should be able to understand and acknowledge a hardship (or a joy) and comfort or advise.  Generally, this should work.

But some sort of failure (there's that word again!  I brought it back around!) in my system has my arms folding across my chest, my eyes narrowing, and my jaw clenching.
This is generally a localized subject, and even in that subject there's an even smaller sub-type to which I lose all traces of kindness.

Hence being such a defect.
What is it, you ask?  Oh, I'll tell you--or else why do I ramble so!

Subject: Self-Pity.
Sub-type: Public self-pity.

Funny thing is, I'm human!  There are bound to be times in EVERY human's life where they experience self-pity.  I am by no means an excpetion to this rule.  Yet, even when I myself face this wallowing chasm of despair (whoa is me)  I have the same, apathetic reaction.

Buck up and get over it.

I am the one person in this world I cannot offend beyond repair.  You can't offend yourself, really.  So I don't find it offensive to realize I'm sitting feeling sorry for myself and to tell myself to get over it--life goes on!  People have faced worse!  Grow up!

However, through much trial (and even more error) I learned this wasn't an acceptable practice to use on other people.  The dominant logic portion of my brain simply didn't understand.  The golden rule is "Treat others as you would like to be treated".
Well, I treat myself all right, and I tell myself the hard truth!  Doesn't everyone want to hear it? Bluntness be damned?

Nope.
Human beings don't appreciate an outside voice saying something as harsh as this--regardless of when it is "truth".  I myself don't want to hear someone else say these things most of the time (though sometimes it's just what I need.)

I ponder this because of situations which faced me today.  The first was a friend seeking advice.  Her situation made her wonder if she was a "horrible person" for not being someone's right hand (hard to do when you live in different states).
That's when I started thinking about this failure.  The person she felt she was being less than awesome to was getting far better treatment than I would give.  I would tell my friend's friend to "Buck up. Move on! Get going with life! Don't revolve around this or that and expect different results!"

The second was a much more public form of self pity.  Praise the Lord in Heaven for people kinder than I.
If left to me, I would have said something I'd have to apologize for later.
Which is why I'm here, writing obscurely, instead of saying exactly what I think should be said.  Especially after someone who is wallowing in self-pity attacks another who is just trying to be loving and nice.  Watch me turn into a monster then.  I'll take them out.

We all have our flaws.  I have several--thousands, quite possibly!  I should never be allowed to judge.  Yet this flaw is present in my mind.  This flaw is fighting against my restraints holding it back.

But the truth is:

Sometimes we just need to buck up.  You can't be coddled forever.  Take responsibility and make your choices as best you can.  I have failed NUMEROUS times this week--but did I feel sorry for myself?  Yes, for about one minute.  Then my brain said "Wallowing won't fix this mistake.  Get up and take care of it."
 Don't sit and feel sorry for yourself when things go poorly--what, and I mean WHAT will that accomplish?
Is it helping anyone?
Is it making things better?

No! Never! Nuh uh!
Self Pity is a one way ticket to Whinersville Poutakota.   I don't have the right (most of the time) to tell you to stop feeling sorry for yourself.  But someone in your life does--and I hope they tell you.
All you're doing is hurting yourself and the others who try to show their love for you.

Sometimes we have to grow up.  Face the facts.  We can't be children forever.  Put your big boy pants on and get on with life.

Don't make me tell you to cry me a river, build a bridge, and get over it.
We all fail.  We all fail.  We all fail.

It's part of life.  We're human.
Buck up, apologize if you need to, and keep moving forward.