They told me to be nicer. Fortunately, my parents had brought me up differently

I’m not going to write a dramatic article today about childhood trauma, about the hardships that shaped me, or about how I became the person I am because I once had to survive something. Of course, there’s some truth in that. Just as there is, to a greater or lesser extent, for all of us.

Today, however, I want to talk about something different.

I am truly grateful to my parents.

I was lucky enough to be brought up by people who, even before I was born, had hoped to have a child who was very energetic and very headstrong.

And in the end, that is exactly what they got.

Like all parents, they made mistakes. I am not writing this article to portray a perfect family, nor to romanticise my past.

There is, however, something very important that I can now recognise, after all these years and having met so many people:

It didn’t stifle my personality.

They allowed me to be myself.

They allowed me to be stubborn.

They allowed me to be creative.

They allowed me to have an opinion, to stand my ground, to persevere, and not to give up easily.

And the older I get, the more I realise just how important that was.

Because if that part of my character had been suppressed from a very young age, I think I would have completely lost myself.

Whatever my birth chart might say – and really, if you take a look at it, you realise quite quickly that we’re talking about someone who finds it hard to stop once they’ve made up their mind—no character develops in a vacuum.

If this side of my nature were constantly coming up against obstacles within my own home, if I’d learnt as a child that I had to suppress my intensity, my determination or my creativity in order to be accepted, all of that would most likely have come out in a much more extreme way at some point.

And I realise this even more when I think back to how many times, later on as an adult, I heard people around me say:

«You ought to be a bit nicer.»

Or:

«You ought to be more accommodating.»

To be honest, this demand has always filled me with revulsion.

What does «sweeter» mean?;

I speak to people politely, because my philosophy is that we must respect others first and foremost for their humanity.

I don’t have to agree with you to speak to you with respect.

You don’t have to be on my good side for me to treat you with respect.

But politeness is one thing, and backing down is quite another.

And above all, what does «being more accommodating» mean?;

Why do I have to be the one to compromise for a relationship or a partnership to work?;

Why don’t you try to be a bit more accommodating, so that we can meet somewhere in the middle?;

A story that came back to my mind

Some of you may be following me today having come across my work through other websites or organisations. I have been fortunate enough to have worked with quite a few people both in Greece and abroad.

And, of course, many of these collaborations have helped me to develop.

However, there is also a side to it that we don’t talk about very often.

When you are at the start of your career and working with a much larger or better-known organisation, there is objectively an imbalance of power.

You know that the other person’s name can help you on your own journey.

You know that a collaboration can open the next door.

And when you don’t come from a wealthy family, you don’t have any connections, you don’t have any «connections» and there’s no one who’ll make a phone call to get you on the telly or secure your next job, then everything takes much longer to build up.

In my case, whatever happened, it was down to a lot of hard work.

So a few years ago, when I’d started working professionally as a writer and content creator, I was approached by a sex shop with a proposal to collaborate.

I was asked to write articles about the zodiac signs and sex.

I don’t have any particular fixation on this particular subject, and I’m not going to pretend to be a prude or a conservative just to project a certain image.

My views are what they are.

And I don’t think there’s anything wrong with someone talking about sex.

My problem at the time was much more practical.

I didn’t yet know how to price my articles properly.

So I turned to someone in the industry with whom we were working and who had at least twenty years’ more professional experience than me.

I trusted it.

And my question was very specific: based on my experience at the time and the number of words each article would require, what would be a reasonable price range?;

What happened next took me by surprise.

Not only did I never receive a proper answer to my question, but that particular person contacted another organisation with which I was also working at the time and expressed the view that, if I accepted that particular job, I might damage my public image and, by extension, perhaps the image of that other organisation as well.

At the same time, I was also told that such a collaboration would make me look «very cheap».

And to this day, I still find myself wondering:

Why?;

Why does a person seem «cheap» just because they talk about sex?;

Are sexologists cheap?;

Are psychologists who write about sexuality trivial?;

Are journalists who cover such topics cheap?;

Or is it because I’m an astrologer that I’m also expected to conform to a certain image of how a woman in this profession «should» behave?;

What bothered me most, however, was not his personal opinion.

He could have told me his opinion.

I would listen to her and make up my own mind.

What bothered me was that, as I saw it, he tried to involve a third party and cause problems in another of my professional collaborations over something that was none of his business.

And when I realised it, I didn’t make a big deal of it.

I have terminated our working relationship.

I didn’t have a row.

I did not make a public complaint.

I didn’t start explaining why I thought what had happened was unacceptable.

I simply stopped working with him and never spoke to him again.

At one point, he sent me a message asking why I wasn’t talking to him.

I didn’t reply to that message either.

And we never spoke again.

Because I thought of something very simple.

A man who, at the time, had almost as many years’ professional experience as I was old could, in my opinion, understand perfectly well what he was doing and what the consequences might be.

I didn’t think it was something that happened by mistake.

And so I didn’t feel I had anything to explain.

There was, however, one detail that made things much worse

At that time, I’d just got divorced.

I had moved to a different city.

And I felt a tremendous sense of financial insecurity.

I didn’t see a new collaboration as something that would simply make my CV a bit better.

Every job brought me a little closer to being able to pay the rent.

The bills.

My basic expenses.

To feel that I can stand on my own two feet.

And that particular person was aware of my situation.

That was actually what annoyed me the most.

Because when you know that someone is going through such a financially precarious period and yet you still interfere in their professional relationship, knowing that you may be depriving them of an income, for me the issue is no longer simply that ’we disagree professionally«.

The fact that you’re going out of your way to potentially ruin a working relationship with me, whilst knowing that at this moment in time every job I take on is absolutely vital to my survival, means that you don’t really care what happens to me afterwards.

And I just couldn’t get past that.

And at this point, I’m going back to my parents’ house

This story has come back to mind recently, and it’s got me wondering about something.

What would have happened if I’d grown up being told that I always had to be a «good girl»?;

What if I’d been taught that I should be sweeter, more accommodating, more easy-going?;

What if I had learnt to be afraid of upsetting someone older, an employer, a colleague or someone with more power than me?;

What if I’d learnt that I should keep people in my life because «you never know when you might need them»?;

Perhaps I should have kept that collaboration going.

Perhaps I had started to explain myself.

Perhaps I might have wondered whether, after all, I was being overly dramatic. But what if, in the future, I forgot all about it and asked for help again, only to find that, instead of help, I was met with yet another obstacle?

Perhaps I had apologised for something I didn’t feel I should have apologised for. But that’s the least of it. The highest price to pay would be to stop being myself, because it’s only when you’re your authentic self that you can be truly creative and make an impact on your audience. I’ve realised over the last few years that people are perfectly capable of telling who is putting on an act and who is genuinely who they appear to be – though, of course, there will always be exceptions…

Perhaps I had started to become exactly what they were asking me to be:

sweeter.

More accommodating.

And perhaps, little by little, I had started to make myself smaller so that I would fit in better with other people’s expectations. But even if I managed that, who can guarantee that these people would treat me just as kindly and with the same empathy? Could it be that these people make demands of you because they are incapable of making any concessions themselves? Could it be that they don’t like it when you try and achieve things? And if that’s the case, sooner or later there will certainly be a risk that they’ll undermine your success and every opportunity that comes your way.

That is why I feel truly grateful today.

I’d like to thank my parents for not teaching me to make myself seem smaller just to be more accepted.

Which did not dampen my determination.

Who didn’t try to take away my energy because it might have become a nuisance at some point.

Which allowed me to be creative.

Where they let me be myself.

And now, so many years on, I find myself wondering something else as well.

Did my colleague and I do the right thing back then?;

On the one hand, I’m almost absolutely certain that he has. In fact, of those I know who are still working with him, none of them have made much progress at all. In contrast to the colleagues I worked with back then, only those who left have really spread their wings professionally. … could he have actually been an energy vampire? 😂

On the other hand, for some reason this story has recently come back to mind, and I’d really like to hear other people’s views on it.

What would you do?;

Would you ask for an explanation?;

Would you reply to the message?;

Would you give the collaboration a second chance?;

Or would you also agree that a man with so much experience knew exactly what he was doing, and that there was nothing else that needed to be said?;

I’m not sure if you can all leave comments under this particular article at the moment. If you can, I’d really like to read your thoughts. You can also create an account so that you can leave comments under the articles whenever you like.

It was just something I wanted to say and share with you today.

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