If you’ve suffered from low self-esteem like I have for most of your life, loving yourself doesn’t come easy. But, it’s the most important thing you can do in life. The way I think of it now is that the Love you have within you is Divinity and it’s how that Divinity in you connects with the Divinity in everyone and everything else. Nurturing the love in yourself increases your experience of love in the world.
We all have an inner judge that is very good at pointing out everything wrong with us and everyone else. This judge who is determined to find fault with everything is the opposite of love which is appreciation and gratitude . The judge is a trick the ego uses to separate us from each other. As long as you are finding fault with someone, it’s hard to feel good about them and share good energy.
The same is true of you. As long as you are allowing the judge to reject you, you feel separated from your own Self. You are disconnected from Love. The first step to loving yourself is to become aware of that judgmental voice in your head. Is it really telling you the truth? It can be so cruel! Would you ever treat someone else the way your inner judge treats you? Is it really making you a better person? Or is it keeping you from living your life to the fullest? We all have this inner judge…and we can all start to dismantle its power.
The way to do this is to become very aware of it and catch it in the act. Just like housebreaking a puppy! When you find yourself criticizing yourself….stop! Say, “Oh! That’s just my inner judge and I don’t have to listen to it anymore!” Then say three nice things about what you were judging. It doesn’t take long before you start to feel good. That goodness you feel is your natural state. The way you feel when nothing is blocking you or trying to change you!
The secret to loving yourself is appreciation and gratitude . You can always find something to be grateful for about yourself. Soon you will see that feeling bad about yourself was blocking you from seeing the truth. As you stop rejecting yourself, you start seeing yourself and everyone else in a new light. You see more and more lovable things about yourself that you weren’t allowing yourself to see before. Don’t take my word for it! Try it for yourself!
Pamela A. Turner, M.Ed., C.Ht. has a Master's degree in counseling psychology, is a Master Practitioner of Neurolinguistic Programming and a certified clinical hypnotherapist. She is the founder of Begin Within ( http://www.beginwithin.org ) and brings you tools, techniques and products to help you master your inner world, heal and grow.