NO,REALLY,Who Are You?

It is more shameful to distrust our friends than to be deceived by them.
--Confucius--

But what about the pain factor? I mean, when one realizes they have been deceived it can be so life shattering and jolting that it is hard to trust and believe in anyone or anything but most importantly, Your Self and Your ability to prevent being deceived again.

How about the reality shifter when you must get honest with yourself about your parents, and who they are, or who they aren't? We tend to placate ourselves about the truth of our parents because, let's face it It's a big bad world out there and we Need our parents to protect us, teach us, feed us,provide for us, you know the basics of surviving as children knowing we can't do it alone, we have to have an adult! However, when the adult in charge of this for us is, well, not up to the task (for whatever reason) or not reliable (for whatever reason) and we get an inkling of this lack of safety,we may learn to cope with this with denial,or modifying reality to create the safety we need. Then, somehow by the grace of divine we make it to adulthood, chronologically speaking, and we have some unhealthy coping mechanisms in place, things we learned to do to make us feel safe. Only, these things don't work anymore and we start to have to deal with it, or not. We need to take down the coping mechanisms and create new healthy strategies for life. In doing so, we have to let go of the false "realities" we created. Maybe my dad is Not the hero I believed he was, maybe my mom can not fix everything,maybe she isn't my friend, maybe I am not the best writer,  maybe my husband doesn't Love Me....... Whatever our false realities have been that served us need to be let go of and the lessons integrated and the learning moves us on to new experiences and new ways of going through life. How does one cope with  this shattering? How does one bounce back and TRUST again, trust life, trust people, trust Yourself?
Take a look at our Notre Dame fella and his On-Line Love, or so he thought. His comments about well, what I went through was real, the pain, the feelings,It was real even if "She" wasn't . Or was it? What a nasty prank to play on someone! How does one not allow such things to happen to them? Can we really prevent things like this from happening? Why does life have to include This type of experience? Is this what it is all about? If finding one self is a life long journey of morphing,continually dying and being reborn again and again, it would seem reflective of the process of life itself. So then What IS REAL? Who are YOU, Who IS this person, this relationship,this situation,this.......? How does one navigate the ever changing tides of Life and find the flexibility and Courage to continue to  bob back up for more after being in the undertow? Were you ever in an undertow anyway?

What is Reality?
Where Is it found.......