Have you ever stopped to hear how you speak about yourself? Are you aware of the “names” you call yourself, daily? When you look at yourself in the mirror, is it with approval or criticism? Do you ever get up in the morning and tell yourself: Darn, I just love you?
We are our own worst critics.
We are ready to put ourselves down, even before anyone has said anything. When we can’t do something from the get-go, we label ourselves as silly, dumb, etc. The other morning during our yoga practice, I heard one of the ladies calling her foot, the “dumb foot”. She has had a serious injury on that leg and since the nervous system has not healed properly, with the result that the foot does not always respond to intricate demands. Therefore, she calls it the “dumb foot” and lives with the “dumb” foot. What would happen if she today decides to just love that foot, tell that foot it is no problem, she can still walk and run? She still has a foot and can wear a shoe? How about if she tells that foot that she loves it? I want to put money on it, that foot will start healing – her body will start to feel loved and accepted and miracles happen like that.
She is not the only one. We all have had injuries like that, that has caused our body to work differently. Nobody is perfect. In fact, have you seen the photo manipulations where they have made people’s faces 100% symmetrical? They are no longer the beautiful people they are. My human eyes do not identify well with that kind of perfection.
There is perfection in everything and everyone.
It is a known fact that your subconscious does not differentiate between you, your foot or any other person or thing for that matter. What you speak, it takes as personal. And it becomes part of your “make up”. The way you view yourself through your words is the way you portray yourself to the world. Subconsciously, you become the “dumb” person. Sounds crazy, if only it was. Now tell yourself you are beautiful, and you love yourself, and then see what you portray to the world.
Because of this way of speaking, we start putting ourselves under immense pressure to be better, to do better, to be perfect. Have you ever taken the time to look at flower? Really close up? The flower is not always perfect, it might have sun spots on, or a bug might have taken a bite. The wind might have torn one of its petals. But does the flower stand there and tells itself it is not perfect? Does it stop flowering because it feels inferior? No, it pushes out blossom after blossom and we walk past and praise this flower for its beauty. Imagine that was you? We are all a little “wind-blown”, had a “bite” taken out of our soul.
If we felt loved, how much more love would we share with the world?
The difference between us and the flower? We never stop criticizing ourselves for that one “flaw” that we have. We constantly do negative self-talk. The moment we swing it over to positive self-talk and love, the whole world changes. Literally.
Self-love does not mean you are conceited. Have you ever loved anyone with your whole heart? You just accept that person for who and what they are? You know their weak points and their strengths. They do some things that you do not like, but does that make you love them less? NO. Now, why can you not love yourself the same way?
When you love yourself, you want the best for yourself. You do not settle for less. You work hard to provide the best for yourself – be it education, the job you desire, and most and biggest of it all? Answering to the true self of who you are. Not judging yourself by the standards of other people. Not trying to be like the other people. For heaven’s sake please do not, we need you.
So how do you stop?
1. Listen to yourself. Become aware every day of what you do and say to yourself that is positive and negative. If needs be, keep score. Do this for a week and tally the totals at the end of every day and then for the week. You might even discover, the days you were less critical of yourself were good days. When you are less critical of yourself, you are less likely to allow other people to “discredit” you.
2. Mirror, Mirror on the wall. Go and stand in front of the mirror. Look at yourself. Do you have eyes to see? Look deep into them – are they sad or are they happy? What are you going to do to make them happy? Do you have arms that can hold your loved ones? Can you stretch them wider to include a few other? Have you thanked your arms? Do you have legs and feet? Can you walk and get to move around? Have you thanked your legs? Take every part of your body, thank it, love it and be in gratitude. Your body is perfect just as it is.
3. Delete any negative talk. The moment you say anything negative, DELETE / CANCEL it. Say to yourself, Delete. There is an old saying, if you cannot say anything nice, then don’t say anything at all. But, include in this your thoughts please. Your thoughts are incredibly powerful. The moment you want to have a negative thought about something, look for something positive in that person or thing. Being positive takes time and practice, please be kind and patient with yourself.
4. Be kind, be kind, be kind. Please be kind to yourself and other. Think about how those words would make you feel, spoken about you or someone else. Imagine, someone else said those words about you, to you, that you are playing with in your head. Think how you would feel. Now realize, you are telling yourself these negative things and your subconscious is taking it in all the time to play back to you later. Be kind in your words and thoughts, to yourself and other. We are only here to learn and to love.
5. Results. You have now taken a week to monitor your negative words and thoughts. Now it is time, after 3 or four weeks, to start monitoring your positive words. It is time to see how your life has changed. I have seen time and again, how people who work at switching from negative to positive, have changed their lives. It is hard work, because you are breaking a habit. Change does not come with the flip of a switch, it comes through daily awareness of your thoughts and words. It means you need to become conscious and start living in the moment.
For the same money and time that you criticize yourself and others, you can love yourself and others through your thoughts and words. Telling yourself you love yourself is not crazy, you tell yourself you don’t like yourself every day and that is okay?
You are beautiful and perfect, just as you are. You are one of a kind and I think you need to acknowledge that every day in the mirror and in your self-talk.
Sue Leppan
Transformation Life Coach
NLP Practitioner
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