Stop trying to be less of who you are. Let this time in your life cut you open and drain all of the things that are holding you back.
I can do this… I can start over. I can save my own life and I’m never going to be alone as long as I have stars to wish on and people to still love.
One of the best guides to how to be self-loving is to give ourselves the love we are often dreaming about receiving from others. There was a time when I felt lousy about my over-forty body, saw myself as too fat, too this, or too that. Yet I fantasized about finding a lover who would give me the gift of being loved as I am. It is silly, isn't it, that I would dream of someone else offering to me the acceptance and affirmation I was withholding from myself. This was a moment when the maxim "You can never love anybody if you are unable to love yourself" made clear sense. And I add, "Do not expect to receive the love from someone else you do not give yourself.
Buy or borrow self-improvement books, but don't read them. Stack them around your bedroom and use them as places to rest bowls of cookies.Watch exercise shows on television, but don't do the exercises. Practice believing that the benefit lies in imagining yourself doing the exercises.Don't power walk. Saunter slowly in the sun, eating chocolate, and carry a blanket so you can take a nap.
I could watch him do this until morning — never asking questions and never interrupting his work. I worship quietly — his intense focus and attention to detail and then, out of no where, I realize the inconvenient, inappropriate truth: ‘I love this man… and it has swallowed me.
Your personal truth is your gift to the world.
I feel like, God expects me to be human. I feel like, God likes me just the way I am: broken and empty and bruised. I feel like, God doesn't look at me and wish that I were something else, because He likes me just this way. I feel like, God doesn't want me to close my eyes and pray for Him to make me holy or for Him to make me pure; because He made me human. I feel like, God already knows I'm human...it is I who needs to learn that.
I believe that the best leadership is loud authenticity. That is what the world needs now. We don’t need more plastic, Photoshooped perfection. I don’t want people to look at me and wish they could be me. I want people to look at me and see their own potential. I want people to be more accepting of their own failures, imperfections, and struggles because they watch me accept of my own.
There is a magnificent, beautiful, wonderful painting in front of you! It is intricate, detailed, a painstaking labor of devotion and love! The colors are like no other, they swim and leap, they trickle and embellish! And yet you choose to fixate your eyes on the small fly which has landed on it! Why do you do such a thing?
I see myself as a Scottish sky: there are rain clouds, rainbows and sunrays that run and overtake one another, mingle together and dance with each other! You see all of this within seconds of looking up! It’s a living sky, it breathes and it’s real! And I think that when you look at me, you’ll see my rain clouds first, because only after rainclouds can there come the rainbows. You see, if the rainbows come first, then the rainbows aren’t even real, so I think that if people deserve to see my real rainbows, then they will just know that they need to stick around through the rain! Like a Scottish sky, I want to be real and breathing and running. I don’t want to be a clear blue all the time, or a dark grey all the time or have fake rainbows painted onto me; I want to be Scottish.
An empowered sense of self-love means you truly love and accept yourself as you would a treasured lover or a sweet, wonderful child, and that you do this from a place of strength of character and belief in yourself.
All the external adoration, respect and adulation in the word, can't drown out the internal voices that tell us, we are not good enough and unworthy of; happiness, love and an abundant life. When we need others to tell us were amazing, worthy and lovable, in order to feel good about ourselves, it is never enough. It goes into the bottomless pit where our inherent self-worth should be. It may feel like we are reaching out to receive love, but in actuality, we are seeking external noise to help drown out our negative core beliefs.Love blossoms from the inside out. That is why it is so important to do the work necessary to heal our emotional wounds, to love ourselves and stand strong in who we are. Only then, are we truly free to give and receive love, unconditionally and in abundance.
The single greatest cause of happiness is gratitude.
Gratitude turns disappointment into lessons learned, discoveries made, alternatives explored, and new plans set in motion.
Those who are truly grateful are deeply moved by the privilege of living.
For the grateful, there is no room for disappointment; Each moment offers life.
Don’t worry if people think you’re crazy. You are crazy. You have that kind of intoxicating insanity that lets other people dream outside of the lines and become who they’re destined to be.
I met a boy whose eyes showed me that the past, present and future were all the same thing.
For so many years, I couldn’t understand why every time I thought that someone finally loved me, like… for real, they would eventually turn to vapor. Every person whom I’ve ever loved is trapped inside of my chest. I’ve breathed all of them in so deeply that I’ve nearly choked and died on every soul that I’ve ever given myself to.
I want to be the best version of myself for anyone who is going to someday walk into my life and need someone to love them beyond reason.
Let this time in your life cut you open and drain all of the things that are holding you back. I’m going to help you forgive the things that you won’t let yourself forget.
I look out into the water and up deep into the stars. I beg the sparkling lanterns of light to cure me of myself — my past and the kaleidoscope of mistakes, failures and wrong turns that have stacked unbearable regret upon my shoulders.
Does our purpose on Earth directly link to the people whom we end up meeting? Are our relationships and experiences actually the required dots that connect and then lead us to our ultimate destinies?
I fantasize the night sky to be like a cosmic blue print of my life as I close my eyes and unbutton my heart…. just in case anyone up there is listening.
I’ve grown up defined by this desperate, undeniable, ‘can’t breathe’ kind of space inside of myself and I’m afraid that the diagnosis is fatal.
Something, somewhere, knows what’s best for me and promises to keep sending me people and experiences to light my way as long as I live in gratitude and keep paying attention to the signs.
I’ve always seen this in you, ever since you were a little girl — this hunger to love other people into their highest selves and it’s what has made me irreversibly and just so forever in love with you.
Please… Whoever you are, whatever you are… I believe in you even though I don’t completely understand you. I feel you around me even though I can’t exactly describe what I’m feeling. Sometimes things happen to me and I know that you’re there and I’m humbled by the lack of coincidence that exists in the world. Whatever you want from me, it’s yours — just please help me. You know how I get when I lose control, and I find myself constantly being pulled back there these days.
I feel a resurgence of my 6-year-old self… that little warrior, goddess of a girl reminding me of who I was when I was little, before the world got its hands on me.
I know that this process of ‘me changing my life’ doesn’t just end once I set fire to this list of things I hate about myself. Tonight isn’t as much of a new beginning as it is a violent end and I know the real work hasn’t even started yet.
I’m going to follow this invisible red thread until I find myself again… until I finally figure out… who I’m meant to be.
If ever I was running, it was towards you.
I love him in ways that I can’t explain to other people. They don’t understand… it’s not their fault.
I really believe that there is an invisible red thread tied between him and me, and that it has stretched and tangled for years — across oceans and lifetimes. I know that it won’t break because our souls are tied.
Everything hurts right now and nothing is helping because as the pain is getting worse — so is the love.
I just want your voice aimed at me again. I want to absorb the direction of your eyes…
I want you to trust yourself, baby. Love is all that matters and you’ve always known that. You’ve known, since you were a very little girl, what your life is meant to be about…
I know that your soul is on life support and that you feel lost and like you’re completely spinning out of control, but you’re finding yourself — here, tonight… even in this darkness.
Scent is such a powerful tool of attraction, that if a woman has this tool perfectly tuned, she needs no other. I will forgive her a large nose, a cleft lip, even crossed-eyes; and I’ll bathe in the jouissance of her intoxicating odour.
I’d loved women who were old and who were young; those extra kilos and large rumps, and others so thin there was barely even skin to pinch, and every time I held them, I worried I would snap them in two. But for all of these: where they had merited my love was in their delicious smell. Scent is such a powerful tool of attraction, that if a woman has this tool perfectly tuned, she needs no other. I will forgive her a large nose, a cleft lip, even crossed-eyes; and I’ll bathe in the jouissance of her intoxicating odour.
Before you chase success, status, power, wealth fame or love; first fall in love with yourself - for the person you'll be if and when you get there is still the same. Success will be a painful path and an empty trophy without self acceptance, self worth or if littered with self hate.
Make peace with yourself before you move forward. Accept yourself, love yourself, and keep moving forward.
Insecurity is the lack of trust in your abilities and worth. When you enter into a secured state of consciousness, everything that helped boost your confidence will return.
Yes, it’s okay to be afraid. It’s okay to hesitate before plunging from your comfort zone.It’s okay to have scars, pimples, insecurities, moles, cellulite, tremors, debts, redness, regrets, loneliness and uncertainty.It’s okay to have no idea what you’re doing.It’s okay to struggle with some things, while enjoying others. It’s okay to find joy in the beauty in life, even after a great loss. It’s okay to change. It’s okay to move on. And it’s okay to fear changing and moving on.Wherever you are, and whatever you are experiencing, is okay. You didn’t invent the universe and you didn’t invent the human condition.You don’t need permission to live whatever you’re living, even if it looks and feels different from anyone else’s life around you. And it’s okay to feel like you need that permission anyway.
Be easy with yourself. Be gentle. Remember to be your own friend. We all make mistakes. We all say silly things now and then. It's also OK to change your mind. Don't replay the moments. Don't torture yourself with critique and negative self-talk. The expectation is not perfection, it's to keep moving forward. Keep trying. Keep learning and growing. You'll get a lot further with a positive attitude. Love will open and grow you. Love will encourage you. No one can love you more than you can love yourself. Be your own ally. Learn to help not hinder yourself.
Before label yourself and before you decide that there is something irreparably wrong with your thoughts or emotions, ask yourself: “Do I have a caring, unconditionally loving best friend in myself?” If the answer is “No,” then you will not find the solution to your suffering until you address this serious, life-threatening absence of self-compassion. Self-love is not a dinner mint. Self-love matters. Self-love saves lives.
Some people walk through a hallway with covered mirrors– the hallway is lined with mirrors but there are blankets covering each of them. They go through life believing in an image of themselves that isn't real, and an image of themselves standing in the world and relative to the world, that isn't real. If you happen to be in that hallway and pull the blankets off the mirrors, they're going to think that you're hurting them; but they're actually just seeing their reflection for the first time. Sometimes the most horrendous thing a person can see, is all the hidden things inside them, the things they've covered, the things they choose not look at. And you're not hurting them, you're setting them free.
Leave your hair natural. Let your beard grow out. Leave the makeup in the bag. Wear comfortable clothes. Stop worrying so much about your looks and start looking around you. You have missed so much beauty trying to become beautiful. You have missed your own worth trying to become worthy. Let the mask break open. Let it lie on the floor. Let yourself be seen. Let yourself see.
There is no greater suffering than constantly measuring yourself and coming up short, except perhaps the realization that your suffering is hurting others. But where do we learn these things? Because, really, they are learned. We don't come crying out of the womb because of our birth weight or because we have no money in this brand new world. We learn to measure and we learn to attach our self-worth to those measurements.These patterns we're stuck in aren't just painful for us, they're also distracting us. Every day, the gap between rich and poor grows while the people of developed societies do nothing, because we are too busy worrying about looking good. We're distracted, but not because we've chosen to be. Being distracted by our illusory inadequacy keeps us from changing the world. And believe me, we all have the power to change the world. If we only make the time. If we only free some head space.If you can't learn to love yourself for yourself (and how could you with such a paradoxical motivation?)... then do it for us. Do it for the world. We need you. We need your mind. We need your attention. We need your thoughts. Change your focus, and you will (not can, but will) change the world. You already matter. You just have to realize it for yourself.
You work so hard to fix yourself, but maybe what you need isn't another tactic, another book, another expert, another five-step plan. Maybe, you don't need to be fixed. Maybe, what's really holding you back is the idea that you need to be fixed. Maybe you just need to let yourself play instead of always making yourself do homework.
It's okay to be happy with yourself for all that you are and aren't. It's okay to accept that life will not always be a "win-win". Its okay to fall and pick yourself back up. It's okay to be different and not be accepted by the crowd. Its okay to be on that journey of little beginnings. Your happiness should never be overburdened or compromised by none of your life choices. It's okay to just be happy
POPPY (standing up to Paul): He fits me, and I don’t want to change. Not for you or anyone. I’m deeply in love with myself, and Emmett respects that...“I’m not her (Christine). I don’t have a dream to fix animal boo-boos. Loving Emmett and living close to my family are the only dreams I see as worth having.
POPPY (standing up to Paul): I see family life as invading everyone’s privacy and saying whatever I feel and treating everyone as they’re treasured because they’re my family and thus special as compared to the rest of the world. I see a good family as loud and frantic and intrusive.
POPPY: 25 December 2016 POPPY (standing up to Paul): You see family life as respecting boundaries and saying what makes people happy and treating everyone like they’re treasured but only in a sanitized way. I see family life as invading everyone’s privacy and saying whatever I feel and treating everyone as they’re treasured because they’re my family and thus special as compared to the rest of the world. I see a good family as loud and frantic and intrusive...He fits me, and I don’t want to change. Not for you or anyone. I’m deeply in love with myself, and Emmett respects that...“I’m not her (Christine). I don’t have a dream to fix animal boo-boos. Loving Emmett and living close to my family are the only dreams I see as worth having.
There is beauty all around us, and the light finds us when we realize, we are all part of that beauty and worth the cherishing. If we despise any, we journey to despise ourselves. See all as beautiful, even if they choose to see themselves through you, as being less than so. We have the power to see for each, and be the reflection of what they may yet see.
When enforcing our boundaries, first and foremost, we are caring for ourselves, but we are also helping others to have a clear understanding of what we consider acceptable behavior. We are reflecting back to them what is not acceptable and, therefore, providing them an opportunity to consider that information and make necessary changes.
So much has been done to my body, and still, somehow, not enough.
I tried to push my body through his and completely disappear.
Funny how in a material world full of pundits and economists obsessed with assets and liabilities -personally, economically and globally - few speak about the greatest of all these…YOU.
The way I saw it, I was fully capable of being treated with indifference that bordered on disdain while maintaining a strong sense of self-respect. I obeyed his commands, sure that I could fulfill this role while still protecting the sacred place inside of me that I knew deserved more. Different. Better.But that isn't how it works.
Human history is the ancient story of the umbilical conflict between a lone individual versus a cabalistic society. A love-hate relationship defines our personal history with society, where the suppression of individuality for the sake of the collective good battles the notion that the purpose of society is to enable each person to flourish. A conspicuous feature of cultural development involves societies teaching children the sublimation of unacceptable impulses or idealizations, consciously to transform their inappropriate instinctual impulses into socially acceptable actions or behavior. The paradox rest in the concept that in order for any person to flourish they must preserve the spiritual texture of themselves, a process that requires the individual to resist societal restraint, push off against the community, and reject the walls of traditionalism that seek to pen us in. The climatic defining event in a person’s life represents the liberation of the self from crippling conformism, staunchly rebuffing capitulating to the whimsy of the super ego of society.
n our perfection-obsessed, air-brushed society, it can be tempting to measure our self-worth against its set of impossible standards. However, organic beauty is in the flaws that make us vulnerable, human and fallible. We are here to learn, evolve and grow. We do not need to become perfect to be worthy of love, there is no such thing. We can not love others when we are withholding love and acceptance from ourselves. We can not criticize ourselves and then reach with open arms to give and receive love from others. It has to start from within, radiating outward. We need to learn how to be unconditionally loving, accepting and forgiving of ourselves, first, if we wish to forge healthy and loving relationships with others.
There’s all this pressure in our society to be beautiful, to be strong, to be sexy. So we spend our time and money on trying to become these things. We put on the high heels, the suits, the makeup, the mask. Then, we feel more awkward than confident, so we drink away our anxieties. That doesn’t make us look any sexier – it just makes us stop caring about how we look.Everyone is beautiful. Everyone is sexy. Everyone is strong. It’s lunacy. We’re all running around trying to become something that we already are.You know what’s really sexy? A person who’s 100% comfortable with themselves. And you know what’s really funny? It is just as time consuming and difficult to learn to accept yourself as it is to pretend to be someone else. The only difference is – with self acceptance, one day, it’s not hard anymore. One day, you feel like your sexiest, strongest self just rolling out of bed in the morning.You’re either going to spend the little time you have in your life on trying to know yourself or trying to hide yourself. The choice is yours. You can’t do both.And you know what’s really amazing about choosing self-love? You’ll be setting an example for all the people around you and all the kids of the coming generation. You’ll be part of a revolution to take back the precious moments of our lives out of the hands of shame-inducing advertisers and back into the hands and hearts of real people like you, like me, like all of us.I know you’ve dreamt about changing the world. So this is your chance. Learn to love yourself, accept yourself, and unleash your strongest, sexiest self. It’s in there. You just have to believe it.
All forms of writing are an act of conception; writing must lead to creation. Each time that we write, we begin again. Writing is an act of self-affirmation. Each time that we place our thoughts onto paper, we receive a new opportunity to claim our reality. Writing is also an act of explication and deconstruction. Writing empowers us to shape and modify our fiery constitutions. Writing allows us to explore the essential ingredients that lead to a life of serenity by exhibiting compassion, love, patience, generosity, and forgiveness.
I write letters to you that you’ll never see.
He looked at me, that first day, like he had just found something he’d lost a thousand years ago.
But I love you and I want you and I need you. Can’t you see that? This world has nothing to offer me if it doesn’t include you.
The Fall will always be yours and mine…
Time' is the most threatening four letter word.
I’m tired of justifying why I love someone. I’m done with the explaining.
That last time you kissed me my heart slid past your teeth down into the center of your chest… trapping us both in a stainless cage.
If I had an .MP3 of your heartbeat… I might actually get some sleep.
I kept waiting for the part where I’d finally know who I was — some flashing, neon moment of relief, but it never came.
In the old days, when travelers would get lost, they would follow the stars and I love that idea. I wish that I could rely on something as simple and magnificent as a star for all of my aching questions.
I ruin everything. I think that a bullet must have passed through my heart when I was very young, causing me to bleed out slowly, over things and people and every white surface that I’d ever come across.
I wish that love could be broken down the way it breaks me down.
I don’t ever want to hurt anyone, but I really wish there was something like a reset button on my life.
He could pour himself into my little paper cup heart and my emptiness would finally have a meaning.
It feels like the world is folding up around me, like origami paper, and I’m trapped inside of its breathless center.
I want to understand the strings that are tied between me and certain other people and if they really can stretch through infinite time and space without ever breaking. Are soul mates real, and is my life ever going to make sense?
I feel like a paper cut just waiting to bleed.
I wish on one of the stars for divine orchestration and save the rest of them for all of the other girls in the world who will feel like I do tonight.
Standing naked on the beach with all of my secrets between my legs, I look out into the water and up deep into the stars. I beg the sparkling lanterns of light to cure me of myself…
It is not depression or anxiety that truly hurts us. It is our active resistance against these states of mind and body. If you wake up with low energy, hopeless thoughts, and a lack of motivation - that is a signal from you to you. That is a sure sign that something in your mind or in your life is making you sick, and you must attend to that signal. But what do most people do? They hate their depressed feelings. They think "Why me?" They push them down. They take a pill. And so, the feelings return again and again, knocking at your door with a message while you turn up all the noise in your cave, refusing to hear the knocks. Madness. Open the door. Invite in depression. Invite anxiety. Invite self-hatred. Invite shame. Hear their message. Give them a hug. Accept their tirades as exaggerated mistruths typical of any upset person. Love your darkness and you shall know your light.
You haunt my days and dreams.
Today Lord I am going to do my best with Your help and for Your glory. I realize that there are many different people in the world with a variety of opinions and expectations. I will concentrate on being a God-pleaser and not a self-pleaser or man-pleaser. The rest I leave in Your hands lord. Grant me favor with You and with men and continue transforming me into the image of Your dear Son. Thank You Lord.
You've got to be able to look at the mirror and smile at yourself. If you can't do that, you've got work to do. You have to learn to get along with yourself, to like yourself, to be proud of yourself. You've got to learn to celebrate yourself. You need to be able to love yourself before you can ever appreciate anyone else who does. You're worth it. Put the work in to have the best relationship with yourself that's possible.
As women, we almost never give ourselves enough credit for what we're capable of, for what we endure and how giving we are. Part of loving yourself is about forgiving yourself - which is something I've always struggled with. It's the messy parts that make us human, so we should embrace them too - pat ourselves on the back for getting through them rather than being angry for having gotten into them in the first place. Because loving yourself is ultimately about self-acceptance, about embracing every part of who you are. And that's never just one thing.
While we are all in the process of becoming as ever-changing, ever-evolving beings... it's essential to remember that we are also enough, just as we are, right now, in this moment. When we are able to accept ourselves as we are, we are better able to accept others, as they are. Personal growth thrives in an environment of love, acceptance and forgiveness.
You must remember what you are and what you have chosen to become, and the significance of what you are doing. There are wars and defeats and victories of human race that are not military and that are not recorded in the annals of history. Remember that while you're trying to decide what do. - Archer Sloane from the book Stoner.
Several times in my ministry people have expressed the fear that self-acceptance will abort the ongoing conversion process and lead to a life of spiritual laziness and moral laxity. Nothing could be more untrue. The acceptance of self does not mean to be resigned to the status quo. On the contrary, the more fully we accept ourselves, the more successfully we begin to grow. Love is a far better stimulus than threat or pressure.
In order to grow sometimes we must cease striving to meet other people’s expectations and begin establishing new goals that develop our personal potential. If we live a life to satisfy all the direct or implicit anticipations of other people, we end up living a life full of regret because we failed to develop into a complete manifestation of our being.
I have known friendship love, parental love, romantic love, family love and unrequited love in my life time, but the only love that made a difference was self love. You don't need confirmation from the world or another person that you matter. You simply do matter. When you finally believe that truth and live it then you can do amazing things with your life!
If you want peace, stop labeling yourself. We all label ourselves at some point. We tell ourselves these traits that make us stand out. I am a patient person. I am smart. But what happens when we fail at being what we tell ourselves we are? What if I say something really stupid? Am I now a stupid person?These labels only stand to hurt us in the future. They make us doubt ourselves and they separate us from other people. When you label yourself, you, in turn, begin labeling others. Oh, that Jane, she is so rude. And now, as you have defined her in your mind, she is rude. Regardless of 'Jane's' future actions, she is rude.Labels set parameters on the world. They limit it when the world should be impossible to define and ever-changing.So, pause before you label.
Practise really seeing yourself in the mirror. This is NOT about examining yourself. This is about you looking beyond your external image to connect with your soul. Look upon yourself with complete appreciation and acceptance. You are so beautiful.
You think it's so easy to change yourself. You think it's so easy, but it's not True, things don't stay the same forever: couches are replaced, boys leave, you discover a song, your body becomes forever scarred. And with each of these moments you change again, your true self spinning, shifting positions - but always at last it returns to you, like a dancer on the floor. Because throughout it all you are still always, *you*: beautiful and bruised, known and unknowable. And isn't that - just you - enough?
I’m nothing great. But I’m a rose… I’m a rose whether I’m admired or not, I’m a rose whether anyone’s crazy about me or not… Like I said, nothing great. Just a rose… But, do you know what it means to be a rose, my friend? Being a rose means ‘freedom.’ It means not existing by the praises of Others or not ceasing to exist by their disapproval.
You cannot become good enough for your own approval just like you can't become good enough to have hair. You cannot earn your own self-acceptance just like you can't earn your own ears. You can't become what you are. Stop looking out there. Look in the mirror. You're already everything you've ever wanted to be.
Many people can't sing their praise or feel proud of themselves in front of others because they are scared to be labelled as 'arrogant' or 'big-headed'. Social acceptance is more important than self-esteem in the 21st century - and that’s not good.
There is darkness inside all of us, though mine is more dangerous than most. Still, we all have it—that part of our soul that is irreparably damaged by the very trials and tribulations of life. We are what we are because of it, or perhaps in spite of it. Some useit as a shield to hide behind, others as an excuse to do unconscionable things. But, truly, the darkness is simply a piece of the whole, neither good nor evil unless you make it so. Ittook a witch, a war, and a voodoo queen to teach me that.
The world is so obsessed with defining sexuality for everyone and attaching labels to it. Any time any person openly leaves the sexual norm, their sexuality becomes, more often than not, the absolute defining characteristic of that person. It becomes the first thing people think about and often the first thing they mention. Every other part of that person all but disappears.
The single biggest thing I’ve done to improve my relationship with others, was to improve the relationship I have with myself. I became lovable when I was able to love myself. No one can love you, if you don’t love you. Accept, nurture and love yourself as you are. You’ll be amazed how much it will also change how others perceive you.
What if each time you experienced an emotion, you acknowledged it, accepted it, and became curious about its message for you (instead of trying to make it go away or make it last longer)? Imagine how this could change your life. Imagine how heard, loved, and honoured you would feel if you really listened to yourself.
There is no way to genuinely, powerfully, truly love yourself while crafting a mask of perfection. I know, you know, we all know—it's hard to let your pimples and your flaws be seen. It's hard to stumble and bumble. It's hard to not know the right things to do or say. It's hard to not look like TV.Sometimes, it's really hard for me to be the awkward mess that I am when I'm authentic, instead of having runway authenticity—all natural, but flawless. But every time I allow that to be okay, not just around myself but around others—I affirm something to myself. I affirm, to myself more than anyone else, that I am lovable and acceptable unconditionally. I affirm that it's okay to take on and take in all the flavours and hues of human experience, and not just the ones that are acceptable in this culture, in this time, in this place.And that kind of acceptance, that kind of love—that's the kind of love that creates miracles. That's the kind of love I really need. That's the kind of love that makes approval taste like cardboard.
A person imbued with compassion and self-understanding can readily love oneself and exhibit endless sympathy for all people. A person who is unkind to their self can never transcend their corrupt barriers much less run into the world with open arms enthusiastically embracing humankind and all of nature with uninhibited friendliness and goodwill.
No one's approval is enough to make up for a lack of self-love, which is really a lack of self-awareness.When we feel a desire to be loved, it isn't other people's love we need. It's our own relationship with love that we're longing for, our own awareness of being interconnected with others, our own sense of the magic of our own interwoven existence. To seek the fulfillment of this desire in others' approval is a losing battle. It will never be enough. No one can compliment you enough to supplement for the acceptance that you need from your own self, in each moment. Acceptance for your struggles and your talents. Acceptance for your humanity. Celebration of that humanity.Love is an inside job.
Practicing self-love means learning how to trust ourselves, to treat ourselves with respect, and to be kind and affectionate toward ourselves. This is a tall order give how hard most of us are on ourselves. I know I can talk to myself in ways that I would never consider talking to another person. How many of us are quick to think, "God, I am so stupid" and "Man, I'm such an Idiot."? Just like calling someone we love stupid or an idiot would be incongruent with practicing love, talking like that to ourselves takes a serious toll on our self-love
Because we were treated neglectfully and abusively in our young years—when we most needed self-love to be mirrored—it was difficult to hold onto…We take up the challenge of learning to love ourselves, through our highs & our lows, when we are finding acceptance from others and when we are being closed out and rejected.
My Dear Friend, Don't ever allow yourself to forget how incredibly special you are, even for a single second. Without you, the world would not be as magnificent. Let yourself remember to love again, starting with you loving you.
When you begin to walk your own journey, to have your own unique conversation, you will naturally stop feeling envious of others. Not because you’ll realize your desires are different from theirs, but because they are so similar. You’ll discover the difference between doing well and pretending to do well, between being happy and pretending to be happy, between healthy relationships and staged ones. You’ll see just how many obstacles lie on any path. You’ll realize that it takes the same amount of effort to work on building up the quality of the conversations in your life as it does to broadcast to the public, constantly, that those conversations are already perfect. You can either build up the mask or build up the authentic self. And you, brave and beautiful you, will make the right choice eventually. Be it now or on your deathbed. We all realize soon enough.
Self-love is not the process of ignoring things, paying attention to fewer flaws or forcing yourself to look away from the parts of you that you perceive as ugly or unwanted. Self-love is the process of expanding your awareness, of seeing those flaws and imperfections alongside the incredible potential of the universe flowing within you, alongside the eternal truth of life flowing within your veins in each second, alongside the flickers of creativity and opportunity present within each moment of your existence. Like this, the imperfections persist, but only as lovable quirks, like a bad doorknob on the front door of a cottage in paradise, like a few thorns on a beautiful rose, like a cloud in a sunset. Like this, what was once unwanted becomes essential, memorable, humbling.
Your skin is your skin. Your legs are your legs. Your hair is your hair. Your smile is your smile. Your past is your past. You can waste your life hating these things, but you may as well learn to accept them. Both routes are difficult and full of pain, but with acceptance, you will be happy one day, while with hatred, you never will.
Who will you love if not yourself? Other people? How can you love someone for anything but their raw, naked humanity? How can you say you love someone if it is not for their flaws and quirks, snorts and hurts, triggers and tears? Anything else is not love. It is idealization. And, as long as you do it to yourself, you will do it to everyone. You will not love anyone or anything until those eyes in the mirror soften up and embrace the beauty that is already within.
The search for the soul mate, the perfect partner to complete you, is a bit like searching for the perfect food when you’ve got a giant ulcer in your stomach. No matter what you find, it will never be good enough.
Make life easier for those around you, not harder.Every person you know is fighting their own great battle. Few of us ever know what those battles entail, and so often we say and do things that push others deeper and harder into the front lines of those battles. I know such has been the relentless lifelong reality for me.Love a person for the person that they are.Or dislike them for the person that they are.But don’t love or dislike them for the sole reason that they see people differently than you do. Don’t love or dislike them because they experience the world differently than you do.And please don’t eternally and wholly define them with sexual labels just because they were among those who finally found the courage to acknowledge their truth.
For twenty-one years, I have been paralyzed by the fear of what this society will do with me if they ever were to know of the thoughts that I continually push away. For more than two decades, I have made a choice to be straight. After all, it’s as easy as making a choice, isn’t it? This culture has made sure that I know that. Anyone who is anything other than straight was just someone deceived by the devil. He is unnatural. He is confused. He is mistaken. He is weak. He can control it if he desires to control it. Such a compelling and ongoing argument has been made that I have always trusted it.I believed that if I hid it long enough, and ran from it long enough, and refused to acknowledge it for long enough, I could indeed succeed at living up to their decrees. I believed that I could force myself to never be anything else.
Even if our survival skills have become impediments we would like to let go of because they have ceased to serve us, we can still love ourselves with them. In appreciation of our survival, we can be awed at how our resources brought us through, even when these resources were things like indifference, a wall of rage, a cold heart…We learn to embrace ourselves as humans with faults and problems.
When you find yourself drowning in self-hate, you have to remind yourself that you weren’t born feeling this way. That at some point in your journey, some person or experience sent you the message that there was something wrong with who you are, and you internalized those messages and took them on as your truth. But that hate isn’t yours to carry, and those judgments aren’t about you. And in the same way that you learned to think badly of yourself, you can learn to think new, self-loving and accepting thoughts. You can learn to challenge those beliefs, take away their power, and reclaim your own. It won’t be easy, and it won’t happen over night. But it is possible. And it starts when you decide that there has to be more to life than this pain you feel. It starts when you decide that you deserve to discover it.
The healing that comes with self-acceptance rippled through my life. As I embraced my carefree nature, I began living from my truth, and watched as the pure expression of who I am and the love I bring to the world illuminated my life.
Life is short. Things can change very suddenly. Make the best of every situation. Look for the silver lining. Maintain a positive mindset. Remain optimistic. Never give up hope. Savor every day you are given. Live with gratitude. Appreciate even the smallest things. Genuinely do the best you can, and once you do, don't dimish this by undermining your efforts by whatever limitations you face. Acceptance can be hard at times, but it is necessary to keep moving forward. In order to deal with situations as they come in the best manner possible, we must let go of things we have no control over. Energy must go towards the here and now. Be cognizant of your blessings, of how precious life is. Live with gratitude and appreciate every moment.
But if you wish, you can imagine that the Shadow does wait for your return and that it does remember everything that has gone before and that it doesn’t let you accept yourself as perfect until you let it. There is truth in that. That is why a child usually cries as soon as it’s born. With its first breath, the Shadow returns.
The difference between my darkness and your darkness is that I can look at my own badness in the face and accept its existence while you are busy covering your mirror with a white linen sheet. The difference between my sins and your sins is that when I sin I know I'm sinning while you have actually fallen prey to your own fabricated illusions. I am a siren, a mermaid; I know that I am beautiful while basking on the ocean's waves and I know that I can eat flesh and bones at the bottom of the sea. You are a white witch, a wizard; your spells are manipulations and your cauldron from hell yet you wrap yourself in white and wear a silver wig.
A fine line exists between quitting on ourselves and letting go of a restrictive position in life and moving forward to reach our ultimate destination based upon our natal predisposition honed by a lifetime of experimentation. Who has not been forced to stop and ask ourselves, ‘who are we,’ ‘what are we doing,’ and ‘where are we going?’ Who has not been forced to pause by life’s dynamic forces and ask ourselves, ‘what mystical chords bind us as a species; what is the meaning of life; and how do we give birth to our genetic blueprint while shaping a sense of purposefulness out of our own existence and striving to bring joy to other people’s hearth?’ To answer these life affirming questions that gnaw most voraciously at our consciousness at the time when tension and unsettling trauma besieges us, we must appreciate our heritage, be mindful our epoch, accept responsibility for our adult decisions, and strive to accumulate wisdom that segues our entrance into the future. Each of us must arrive at a unifying philosophy that guides our living quest, and the sooner we come to terms with our eccentric self the quicker we will perceive and appreciate the ineffable beauty of nature.
Recognize that there's something AMAZING about you. Everyone has something that comes very natural for them - natural gifts and talents. That gift/talent is that thing or things that comes easy for you, but hard for most. The greatness that is stored within was given to you, because it was meant to be used. Whether you've been running from it or haven't discovered it yet, it's there. It's your job to discover and master it. It wasn't given to you in vain, it's part of your purpose.
Self-acceptance should not be confused with an over-vaulting aggrandisement of self over others. That individual's exaggerated positive view of self relies upon a comparison with others - they sustain their own positive self-view, relatively, by maintaining a negative view of others.
What is freedom? It consists in two things: to know each his own limitations and accept them – that is the same thing as to know oneself, and accept oneself as one is, without fear, or envy, or distaste; and to recognise and accept the conditions under which one lives, also without fear or envy, or distaste. When you do this, you shall be free.
It is the lies he's telling her - as he has been, Nassun understands suddenly, her whole life - that really break her heart. He's said that he loves her, after all, but that obviously isn't true. He cannot love an orogene, and that is what she is. He cannot be an orogene's father, and that is why he constantly demands she be something other than what she is.
When we accept ourselves for what we are, we decrease our hunger for power or the acceptance of others because our self-intimacy reinforces our inner sense of security. We are no longer preoccupied with being powerful or popular. We no longer fear criticism because we accept the reality of our human limitations. Once integrated, we are less often plagued with the desire to please others because simply being true to ourselves brings lasting peace. We are grateful for life and we deeply appreciate and love ourselves.
I am here. I am in the present tense. I'm not always here, and sometimes here is a very difficult place. Sometimes it is a labyrinth, or a Minotaur, or a rope I can neither let go of nor follow. It's hard to find the right words, but I guess I would say that it's something like feeling the floor. And that it is my privilege to feel it.
Identifying as a writer is a matter of self-acceptance. It's not a thing that can be given to you, or bestowed upon you. You are a writer if you write. That's it. If what you are seeking is to be acknowledged as a writer by other people, many of them strangers, you're in for a demoralizing journey. It is a silly club where those who have been 'accepted' are loathe to permit others into. It's sort of like how we Americans love denying our own immigrant origins while railing against immigration.
We fitted together like the two halves of an oyster-shell. I was Narcissus, embracing the pond in which I was about to drown. However much we had to hide our love, however guarded we had to be about our pleasure, I could not long be miserable about a thing so very sweet. Nor, in my gladness, could I quite believe that anybody would be anything but happy for me if only they knew.
There are, literally, thousands of people all around the world who need nothing more than to meet someone just like you. To spend your time pretending to be someone else is just as senseless and fear-driven as spending your time speaking to people who don’t understand you. Find your tribe. Let yourself be seen. You are already someone’s hero.