Unfortunately, you grew up in a judgmental and critical culture is by definition creates anxiety. How could you not be anxious if every time you make a mistake or you overreact you anticipate being criticized or diminished. As a result you are probably self-critical and critical of others even if you don’t voice your criticism out loud you have been conditioned to see other people’s imperfections in a diminishing way.
In our culture we are conditioned to believe that if we didn’t get the unconditional love we deserved as children we can have a “do over” and get it in a romantic relationship. No one was trying to trick you. Every behavior has a positive intent in a matter what the outcome is. The positive intent in this hypnotic message was to give you the hope that you could feel lovable and worthy even if your parents didn’t create these feelings and you. Your parents didn’t have the ability to give you unconditional love because they didn’t have it either as is the case with the vast majority of the people you know.
