Loving Yourself is a Continual Process
When I started a self love journey it was because I just wanted to be happy. I realized I didn’t really even know what being happy was. I had no idea that loving yourself is a continual journey.
When I decided that happiness was something I really wanted, I started with the book The Art of Happiness by the Dalai Lama.
Why not? It has the word happiness in it. And seeing the Dalai Lama as a happy person made me feel that there is an end goal for happiness. I felt like you learn to love yourself and be happy, then you move on to the next thing.
What I found was that this process is a life-long process. But not all of us realize that for many reasons.
It Starts With Self Abandonment
At some point we abandon ourselves.
I have worked with people and children of all ages and see how young people walk into a space with confidence and excitement. Then slowly they lose their faith in themselves through many different social pressures and experiences.
As this continues, we begin to question ourselves and stop trusting ourselves. A new, critical, voice shows up in our minds.
If you are lucky, you stay in contact with the part of yourself that makes decisions that are best for you. For most of us though, we are trained that are needs are secondary to fitting in and compliance. So we begin to make choices that are not what WE want fully.
Due to this, we start to feel like we do not deserve to love ourselves. Sometimes, we don’t even consider self love as a possibility at all, it never even comes up.
Moving Towards Ourselves
Hopefully, you realize that you are worthy of love. You are worthy of love outside and inside of yourself.
Once you realize this, you have to start making real moves in this direction. By the time we realize that self love is missing in our lives, our brains are wired in a pattern of negativity and low self-esteem. You might even be addicted to anger or other negative emotions. We doubt ourselves and have to relearn how.
As with the Dalai Lama book mentioned above, I had to work through many different resources to find the right fit for my journey. This is how it all starts.
BUT!! It never ends. This is the best discovery of all, you are constantly changing and must continually invest time in the relationship with yourself.
Your Self Love Improves Your Whole Life
This path is a healing path. To love yourself you must heal the self abandonment from the past. You will have to forgive yourself and learn to trust yourself.
These things take time. You can get to an end place with some of it, but our lives are complex and never still. Because of this, we will always need to reflect and grow.
While on this path, you will begin to see your worthiness. And, although you probably see the worthiness of others, that feeling for others will grow stronger. You will see that your self love, your boundaries, your increased self-esteem will inspire other, but also make you more empathetic and compassionate.
Enjoy This Ongoing Experience
In conclusion, you will need to prepare yourself to do this work over your lifetime.
At the same time, you can chill and enjoy this work. While you heal, there will be so many ups and downs, but all of it is beautiful and unique to you. Your self love journey is something special and so is your entire life.
Dr. Autumn Thomas
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