Quotes About Insecurity

When they felt secure with their lover, they could reach out and connect easily; when they felt insecure, they either became anxious, angry, and controlling, or they avoided contact altogether and stayed distant

He'd taught her something tonight. Taught her almost painlessly. Almost. She'd thought she was memorable. How clear it was that she was not. It wasn't a quality you possessed, she thought now. It was a quality other people endowed you with. She felt small, and foolish, exposed.

too, though she felt less sure

I worried so much about how I looked and whether I was doing things right, I felt half the time I was impersonating a girl instead of really being one.

There was nothing I hated worse than clumps of whispering girls who got quiet when I passed. I started picking scabs off my body and, when I didn't have any, gnawing the flesh around my fingernails until I was a bleeding wreck. I worried so much about how I looked and whether I was doing things right, I felt half the time I was impersonating a girl instead of really being me.

I felt half the time I was impersonating a girl instead of really being one.

At that moment she seemed everything I was not, and this came as a small revelation. I had hated in her what I lacked in myself.

Whenever I opened one, T. Ray said, "Who do you think you are, Julius Shakespeare?" The man sincerely thought that was Shakespeare's first name, and if you think I should have corrected him, you are ignorant about the art of survival.

I worried so much about how i looked and whether i was doing things right, i felt half the time i was impersonating a girl instead of really being one. - Lily

The terror here was palpable.

She was afraid to want things for herself. She didn't think she deserved them.

The child I was is the only child I really know.' That's it. I can still feel what it was like to be that child of the 1940s from inside; I am still the same mixture of insecurity and determination, shyness and arrogance, curiosity and fear. I have the same talent she had; the same imagination. I write for her, for that child, and so it is true when I say I write for myself.

Fear of having done the wrong thing—fear that having done this one great thing, he would never again be able to accomplish anything of great worth—fear of age, of insufficiency, of unmet promise. All such endless fears, that are the doom of people given the gift of making, and lie always somewhere in their minds.

Women who were unprotected as children don't believe they are worthy of love—on an unconscious level, they believe that if they were, their mothers wouldn't have allowed them to be hurt. "I don't trust that anything good will happen for me," a woman who was an unprotected child tells herself.

When you are reactive, you are dependent on the approval of others. You feel good about yourself only when no one disagrees with you, criticizes you, or disapproves of you. Your feelings are often far out of proportion to the events that evoked them. You'll perceive a small suggestion as a personal attack; a minor constructive criticism as a personal failure. Without the approval of others, you have a hard time maintaining even minimal emotional stability.

Children growing up in alcoholic homes are buffeted by unpredictable and volatile circumstances and personalities. In reaction, they often grow up with an overpowering need to control everything and everyone in their lives.

The misogynist's control over his partner is like the roots of a plant: it spreads into many areas of her life. Her work, her interests, her friends, her children, and even her thoughts and feelings can be affected by his control. Her self-confidence and self-esteem can be so damaged as to bring about significant changes in the way she feels about herself and how she relates to the rest of the world.

I have a horrible time trying to figure out who I am, what I want, or what I need. I'm just beginning to figure it out. The hardest part is for me to like myself. Every time I try, I hear Daddy telling me what an awful kid I was.

A little girl wo was criticized or ignored or abused or stifled by an unloving mother becomes an adult who tells herself she'll never be good enough or lovable enough, never smart or pretty or acceptable enough to deserve success and happiness. Because if you really were worthy of respect and affection, a voice whispers inside, your mother would've given them to you.

The misogynist must control how his partner thinks, feels, behaves, and with whom and what she involves herself. It is amazing how quickly even successful, competent women will disavow their own talents and power in order to gain their partners' love and approval.

Criticism of this sort works in much the same way as water on a rock: the first few drops are not damaging, but the cumulative effect over time makes deep and lasting crevices. Similarly, the misogynist's constant criticism and picking eats away at his partner's self-confidence and sense of self-worth.

There is an insatiable, demanding quality to the misogynist's love; no matter how much you give, or give up, it is never enough. He is never convinced that you care about him as much as he cares about you. He will constantly invent new tests of your devotion. It's very much like having a final exam every week for a course you can never pass.

It is a fear that must be defended against at all costs. In an effort to quell his anxiety, he tries to gain control over his partner by destroying her self-confidence, so that she can never leave him and he will be safe.

The experience generated powerful, lifelong fears of being hurt and betrayed. Two marriages ended in divorce because he couldn't learn to trust.