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Sometimes the way people treat you changes so gradually that you hardly notice when your patience begins to cost you your self-respect. You make excuses for their behavior, forgive what keeps hurting you, convince yourself that things will get better if you just understand them a little more. But every time you silence your own discomfort to keep someone else happy, you risk teaching them that your feelings can be overlooked without consequence. Eventually what once hurt you becomes something you have learned to live with, what you once knew you deserved starts to feel like too much to ask for. This is how people lose their standards without realizing it, but through countless small compromises they make to avoid losing someone. Understanding someone's struggles does not mean you have to accept their mistreatment and loving someone does not require you to abandon your boundaries. You can be patient without tolerating disrespect and compassionate without making yourself responsible for someone else's behavior. Be careful what you normalize in your life, because you can become so accustomed to surviving what hurts you that you forget you were always allowed to choose something better.

~ Dorothea

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