The Journey of Self-Love
You know, I’ve been asked recently what I did to make the shift towards loving myself a few years ago. The Ego in me wanted to have a perfect answer to help anyone with just a few quick steps and a “See, I did it, so obviously you can too.”
That really isn’t how it works though. For me, there were pivotal moments, but there isn’t a one size fits all solution to this issue. Hopefully a few of the experiences I had can help you get to your own breakthroughs.
Some background for acknowledgement/acceptance purposes:
Growing up was overall rough for my generation. Many people within ten years of me have parents who didn’t have self-esteem instilled in them by their parents due to a number of circumstances — and I’m sure the list goes back generations — but either way, people my age often got the short end of the stick with believing in themselves and self-love.
That being said, I had a lot to work through. For me, the first step was moving out of my parents’ house officially when I was twenty. Not just for college to come back during breaks, but cutting the cord completely. This helped me find and create my own space to be me. I was able to discover what I liked about myself, what my talents were — that I had any talents at all that weren’t forced upon me in high school. I found what inspired me, and with some personal development courses and help from mentors, was able to find what I wanted my purposes to be in life. (Many people become concerned because they can’t “find” their purpose — guess what, it’s actually just a decision you get to make.)
This self-discovery process can vary greatly from person to person of course, maybe yours comes from traveling or finding a partner like yourself, but the point is, give yourself the space you need to discover who you are — whatever feels best for you.
Once I found my space and had ideas for my life, I found it difficult to move forward due to bouts of anxiety and not feeling worthy of the things that made me happiest. I found myself needing to find the root causes of my feelings, or otherwise I’d be stuck.
I began to realize how my thoughts affected me. I looked at the thoughts that occurred when trying to make my business thrive, I realized how counter-productive they were. A main one was the simple, “You’re not good enough for this.”
Well, why?
“Because of [name traumatic event] that happened in your childhood.”
By remembering the event(s), experiencing them, and processing them, I was able to see how my responses benefited me then, and how they did not any longer.
I won’t go into an example about the belief of “not being good enough,” because that one takes a while to hash through due to the wide variety of causes, but a good example of a counter-productive belief people might have is often getting hurt or sick as a kid. I was always coming up with some ailment — and I realized the subconscious belief behind that was me needing my parents’ attention and love. They weren’t great at giving me unconditional love, so subconsciously I had to find a way to get it from them. Now, as an adult, I don’t need to be sick or get hurt every time I want attention or love. I have much healthier ways of meeting those needs — so at that point, I gave myself permission to let that belief pattern go, and with a deep sigh of releasement, it was gone. It’s crazy how when you take the time to experience stifled emotions and uncover subconscious beliefs how quickly you’re able to move on and grow.
I will note that some beliefs you’ll discover are self-destructive patterns you operate through regularly. After you’ve identified them and experienced/accepted the emotional event or trauma that caused you to act that way, you’ll be able to notice the patterns and triggers as you go and choose differently with your new awareness. Obviously this sounds easier said than done, but identifying the belief pattern is half the battle.
And that leads to how I started loving myself.
I realized my ‘problems’ were simply beliefs and experiences, mostly handed to me in my developmental years, that I just hadn’t fully processed and released yet. The destructive patterns were a result of not having released those hindering beliefs and experiences.
Those beliefs didn’t have to stifle me if I dealt with them, especially the ones around how I saw and loved myself as a person mentally and physically.
That lead me to my first big reckoning around self-love — specifically understanding that I am not my body — my body is the vehicle I’m in.
When I’m sick, do I, Alyssa, go into my body and repair my cells? Hell no, I wouldn’t know how to do that. There is so much I don’t do in regards to the functioning of my body. Our bodies are truly operating separately from our minds, and we need to treat them well and with love in order for them to do their best. Would you tell your friend the reason they’re not accomplishing XYZ in life is because they’re ugly or aren’t functioning as well as they should be? Fuck no, so why would you say that to your body?
For a couple years, those thoughts helped me be better to myself and love myself most of the time, but I would still slip up — and I realized it was because I was incredibly hard on myself every time I didn’t achieve ‘perfection’ with my self-love. You ate a couple donuts? Immediate thoughts: obviously you’re a shitty person, and therefore aren’t worthy of making better choices and [self-depreciating cycle continues].
What finally helped me over that last hurtle was realizing that self-love wasn’t about making one bad decision and thinking you ruined everything, it’s about having patience with yourself and making individual choices one at a time over time that show yourself you love yourself — mentally and physically. Think about it — if you’ve been in a relationship, how did you know your partner loved you? The words “I love you” can be empty, but you know someone loves you by the small ways they show you every day. I started doing that for myself with my day-to-day choices, and have been on my path of health, balance, and self-love ever since.
Side Example: my boss bought doughnuts for everyone the other day, and I politely declined. “Oh Alyssa, it’s just a doughnut, you’ll be fine,” he said. I still politely declined. The way I see it is, I could accept that doughnut, but that’s like doing something shitty to a friend I love. I aim to treat my body with love like I would a friend: you can make plans with a good friend and cancel on them once or twice, because ‘it’s not a big deal,’ but after a while if you keep doing it, your friend isn’t going to like you very much. They might actually feel hurt by you. I’m always going to do my best to treat my body well, because it does the same for me each and every day I’m alive. You can use that mindset towards any choices that might be harmful to you or your or mind.
Take care of yourself, and take your self-love one step at a time.
