What really happened, and what happened in me?

Does this happen to you too?

Someone hasn’t replied to your message. An hour goes by, then another, and you start wondering what went wrong.

Maybe you said something wrong?

Maybe he’s angry?

Or maybe he simply doesn’t care anymore?

The same thing happens when someone doesn’t ask how your day was, glances at their phone a few times during a conversation, or says they need some time alone. The event itself is often quite simple, but our mind quickly starts writing the rest of the story.

He didn’t reply because he doesn’t care. She didn’t ask because my life doesn’t matter to her. He looked at his phone because he’s bored with me. He needs time alone because he doesn’t love me anymore.

And before we even notice what we’ve just done, the story becomes a fact.

We no longer think: “I’m afraid he’s stopped caring.” We are convinced that this is exactly how it is. We don’t notice that our fear of rejection has just been triggered. We simply “know” that the other person is pulling away, is about to leave, or has already made a decision and only forgot to tell us.

For a long time I couldn’t see the difference between what I feel and what I take to be true on the basis of that feeling. If I experienced something so intensely, it seemed obvious that I was reading the situation correctly.

Only later did I understand that a feeling can be real, while the story built around it - not necessarily.

I can truly feel unimportant, even though the other person doesn’t see me as unimportant at all. I can truly be afraid of being abandoned, even though no one is abandoning me right now. I can feel anger, sadness or tension, but none of these feelings gives me access to someone else’s thoughts and intentions.

A pity, because mind reading would make relationships so much easier;)

On the other hand, it’s mind reading that complicates them far more often than we’re ready to admit.

All of this seems fairly simple until it concerns a person and a relationship we truly care about. Then the distance we need to separate facts from our own interpretation can vanish within seconds.

After all, we don’t enter a close encounter only as who we are today. We also bring with us the memory of earlier disappointments and of every situation in which we weren’t heard, seen or chosen.

Sometimes a single late “I’ll call you back” is enough to awaken the whole history of waiting for someone who, again and again, didn’t come. The other person takes one step back, and we feel every earlier leaving at once.

At that point we are no longer reacting only to what is happening now. We are also responding to everything the present situation has stirred in us.

I know this mechanism very well. When I sensed distance in a relationship that mattered to me, I couldn’t simply notice it and wait for more information. Almost immediately I tried to work out what I had done wrong, whether the other person still wanted to be with me, and what I could do to win back the closeness we’d had.

I didn’t tell myself then: “My fear has just been triggered.” I was rather absolutely certain that I was reading the situation correctly.

And sometimes I probably was. At other times, though, I was responding not only to the behaviour of the person in front of me, but also to every earlier moment when someone had moved away from me.

The less certainty I received, the more I needed it, so I asked more questions, sought contact and tried to find out what was actually going on. For me it was an attempt to save closeness. The other person, however, could experience it as pressure and withdraw even further.

Their withdrawal confirmed my fear that something really was wrong. My attempts to come closer confirmed their belief that I wasn’t giving them space.

So we both had proof that our version of events was true.

I could think: “I knew he would pull away,” while the other person was probably concluding: “I knew she wouldn’t leave me alone.”

After a while it’s hard to tell where it all began. Each of us was reacting not only to the other person’s behaviour, but also to the meaning we had given it, and every new reaction supplied more arguments in support of the story we already believed.

When we are absolutely sure we know what the other person meant, facts become practically unnecessary. Our story is, after all, so logical and convincing that we can easily find more evidence for it.

But I don’t mean that we should stop trusting our feelings or suspect ourselves of projection every single time. That would be just another extreme, and extremes rarely help us see anything more clearly.

If I feel anxiety, anger or sadness, I really am experiencing them. They’re worth taking seriously, because they may show that I’m afraid of something, that some need of mine has gone unanswered, or that the present situation reminds me of something that once hurt.

Yet I don’t have to automatically accept the first explanation that appeared in my head as the only one possible.

My anxiety is real. The reason I have attached to it may be real, but it doesn’t have to be.

That’s exactly when I need to check what I actually know. What the other person said or did, what I am only guessing, and what I have added myself, drawing on a story I have known far longer than the person standing in front of me.

This pause isn’t meant to invalidate my own experience or to excuse, at any cost, behaviour that hurts us. Sometimes the first recognition is accurate. Someone really is pulling away, not listening, crossing our boundaries, or doesn’t want to build the relationship we care about.

Not every difficulty is a projection, and not everything can be explained by childhood, fear or differences in communication styles. Sometimes the other person’s behaviour is simply painful, dishonest or irresponsible. Understanding our own reactions doesn’t mean we have to take responsibility for their choices as well.

It’s rather about being able, before I make a decision, to see both: the behaviour of the person in front of me and everything it has set in motion within me.

After all, I can know a great deal about myself. I can understand my childhood, know my attachment style and recognise without much difficulty the patterns that appear in my relationships. And yet, when I truly start to care about someone, I can still analyse messages, search for hidden meanings and adjust my behaviour to prevent what I fear most.

Knowledge alone doesn’t always stop an old reflex.

The hardest moment comes when I have to stay with the space between the event and the story, without immediately escaping into certainty and without making a decision just to quiet the anxiety as fast as possible.

Sometimes this means that instead of saying:

“You never cared about me,”

I’ll try to say:

“When you didn’t reply, I felt anxious and started thinking you don’t care. I want to check whether that’s what’s happening.”

That second sentence isn’t any easier, because it asks me to show that I don’t know, and to allow an answer I may not want to hear. But I’m not passing a verdict before the other person has had a chance to say what is happening on their side.

I have no control over how they respond. They may hear me, dismiss my feelings, withdraw even further, or say something I’d rather not know.

Being in contact with myself doesn’t guarantee pleasant answers or happy endings. But it helps me make decisions based on what is really happening between us, rather than on a story that has already started playing in my head.

I still sometimes mistake my own story for reality, especially when fear shows up and everything suddenly seems obvious. More and more often, though, I’m able not to act on the first impulse and to pause before deciding that I know what the other person thinks, feels and intends to do.

That’s when I return to two questions:

What really happened?

And what happened in me?