Mistakes made: 

Believing the Pitch.  Believing that golden future promised 

would be Where effort was aimed.

Believing the excuses, cope outs, sudden disruptions out of nowhere for no reason, seeing the pattern and attempting to resolve.

Ding -ding           Not getting that the fight bell rang in their ego game.  

Look up Karpman Triangle. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karpman_drama_triangle

 It’s an argument approach, once you recognize the pattern  >>> 

Little peck… little cheap…. This sounds like, “You are the bad person.(persecutor)  I am not The bad person( also replace with virtuous signal, I am good, I am superior) I am The injured person here (also replaced with victim-mindset, or similar grievance) …  one up/one down thinking 

Step out of their “fight ring.”  

Watch it.  You don’t even need to participate. Count the rounds they’ll go … rnd 1  rnd 2…  rnd  into each shifting position.    

It’s just a small sample of the chaos engine running in their heads.

This is why we must train our minds.

Mental discipline.

Metaphor:  You can decide you only dance the waltz.  Refuse their tango. You don’t have to fall in step… or step into the role they decided.(in the moment (not based on reality)(sometimes spontaneously invented out of no where.))

It might be more comfortable, or more familiar…  how about “Just the way things are done/ around here/ or how things usually go.”

Recognize your own complacency and be willing to grow out of it.  Step away from your comfort-able (enable) zones and Stretch toward growth. Stretch to strengthen, this is why plants lean toward the light, it’s how they grow.

Robot sez:

“tension” and “attention” share a common Latin root: tendere, which means “to stretch.”

• Tension comes from the Latin tensionem, from tensus, the past participle of tendere — meaning something being stretched tight.
  
• Attention comes from Latin attentionem, from attendere (“to stretch toward”), which combines ad- (“to, toward”) and tendere.
  

So both words involve the idea of stretching, but:

• Tension is more about a state of being stretched or strained.
  
• Attention is about mentally “stretching toward” something — focusing your mind.

Lets go Somatic with it, physically in the REALS..

Give your body a good stretch.  Learn to listen to what your body tells you.  Where are you holding stress…. Let’s Jane tell you, https://youtu.be/lfBpsV1Hwqs?si=EVvg_1DSbfQhCBaZ

It’s a bit of a spoiler, especially when you poke around and find out she has a twin who is just as amazing!!  

Maybe I can leave it there and let you tell me what you found out 

After I point out a little mini-quest you could take and learn from the Senpai’s that showed me.

Mistaken Identity:

Reality check.  

Their words do not define me.  

MY WORK DOES.

My work ethic does.  MY code of honor does. My self determination defines me.

I am building who I want to become.

I will do the work to get there. Will-power. (skill you can grow.)

Keep working at it!! MY mantra…  the hammer its a motif…  kind of my thing… did you miss that talk, cleverly and unambiguously titled The Hammer?

My attention/tension is where I have been focused >>>>  on the skills I am trying to build.

I’m on my way to become an alchemist, cartographer and a shipwright!!