Sometimes I think I have Obsessive Compulsive Disorder.  I have the need to walk around with a magic eraser to wipe away any marks that I see on the walls in my home.  The jars in the kitchen cabinets all have to be labeled and facing one way.  If anything gets broken I have to fix right away. There is an anxiety that comes over me if things are not in perfect order.

I have found that I have a great need to fix things.  But it goes beyond the items in my house.  When I reflect on my life, I find that my need to tinker and repair things carries over to my relationships as well.  When I was a child, I always sought out a troubled friend that I would want to nurse and restore in whatever way they needed.  Even as a kid, I functioned as an enabler.  I remember my pediatrician once asked me, “who have you been hanging out at school with?”  After I responded, she raised her eyebrows and said, “my little Sonia is always looking for the birds with broken wings so she can help them fly again.”  I didn’t know what it meant then, but that conversation always remained ingrained in my mind.

Recently my best friend was looking for a new home to buy.  There was one particular home that was fabulous; there was nothing was wrong with it.  But she did not like it, and her brother who was accompanying her on the open house visits said, “you don’t like it because there is nothing to fix in it.  When my friend had told me of her brother’s comment, something clicked for me.  His words, though not directed toward me, served as a metaphor that reminded me of my own inclinations to be attracted to relational “projects.” Underneath what I thought may have been interpersonal OCD was an unhealthy pattern of needing to “fix” the people around me. If I could not somehow help or counsel a friend, I felt a dip in my own sense of usefulness and self worth.  If I could not help them make changes, then I felt that I was a failure.

When I stepped back to think about this, I was reminded that although objects can be bandaged up from the outside, people were different.  People can change, but real change only occurs if one wants to change.  I realized that I did not truly possess the power to “fix” anyone.  Only they had this power, so obviously there were greater chances that I would fail in my never-ending quest to save people.  

If this discovery wasn’t enlightening enough, what lay just a little further beyond this realization was another important insight.  Only when I started to look inward did I truly realize that my need to focus on the flaws of others was just a way to distract myself from addressing the things that I needed to work on within myself.  Subconsciously, I somehow had become good at burying the past hurts I had experienced, dodging the obstacles I had to overcome, and avoiding huge life-altering decisions.

It’s lovely to be empathetic and truly caring for others.  The world needs more of that.  But if there is a neglect of oneself in order to focus on someone else’s change, then it’s time to do a little inner inventory to figure out why we are running away and not dealing with what’s really going on inside of us.

If we really want to be agents of change, we have to remember that real change always starts from within – with ourselves.  When we work on ourselves, we unlock our own important breakthroughs, and we become helpful examples for others.

Occasionally, I do feel myself slipping back into the “fixer energizer bunny.”  When I catch myself, there is a checklist I always remember to take note of.