so we are all rational adults, right? we earned that title. through bills and exercise and taxes and early hours and mortgages

I dunno.
I hear it all the time ..." I have to do what feels right".  "I am gonna follow my gut"

So if your gut has never lead you astray, if you have a history of making sound decisions to lead to personal satisfaction, then believing in your instinct, well, that is just sound logic

But it is a funny thing, these cycles of abuse. they tell you to do what evidence has shown is wrong, time and again, to ensure your past of mistakes

I had this friend, the other day, she told me all about her plan, he plan to do this thing. it was not a very smart thing. we listened and we knew she wanted validation. that it was right. that she was right. that she was a rational adult.  it was a bad bad plan and she wanted validation. and when she did not get it she stated she wanted to do what felt comfortable.
And all I could think was 'what makes you comfortable hurts you"

I had another friend, slowly moving out of an abusive relationship, ask me to trust her, and I had a similar thought. I want to trust you, but right now you are so invested in bad ideas that it is hard to believe you can be trusted to make good ones

it is unfair. punitive. it probably sounds unkind

but part of breaking the cycles of abuse. be it a relationship or an addiction or self-destruction of a less common brand, it is to recognize when you are going out of your way to get comfortable with things that just don't make sense so you can feel comfortable with cognitive dissonance of your fuckery. when you train yourself to see zebras and unicorns in a perfectly fine horse, when you convince yourself that your own logic cannot be proofed by another's you lose the ability to be taken at your word. which is to say, you cannot display to the world that you lie florridly to yourself and then expect open and honest communication. you will not get a vote of confidence from me when you are demonstrating a lack of fitness

there is only one way out, and that is out, away and with a panoromic view that let's you reset your compass