This jovial romp that uses time-travel to misplace a 12th century knight into the 21st century was a blast. It did, however, trigger one of our longest discussions on just one or two questions: Questions 3 and 4.We started talking about the way that we not only draw people into our lives who reflect who we want to be, but that we seem to more frequently draw people into our lives who show us our current feelings about ourselves--especially our insecurity and low self-esteem. And when we do that, it's not a pretty sight; we end up being surrounded by put-downs and insults, and then we internalize those negative thoughts and end up feeling even worse.
On the other hand, one participant said that she has looked at those negative comments from others as a mirror of what she already felt about herself, and now she could fight back because those thoughts were external and thus more visible. So it actually helped her see herself more clearly.
Someone said that it's not just a matter of drawing negative people into our lives, it's also a matter of learning how to eject negative people OUT OF our lives. We decided that some of us need to learn to "throw the bums out!" sooner than we have in the past, while others need to stick it out in our relationships longer and "fight the good fight" by truly becoming ourselves. In other words, we need to learn to stand up for ourselves (Question 4).
Here are the questions: