YOUR TOOLBOX: BE YOUR OWN BEST FRIEND
Take a current relationship or situation you are struggling with and write down what advice you would give your best friend in the same circumstances.
Now read it back and ask yourself, “Am I willing to take that advice for myself?” I bet you just gave yourself the best advice ever!
If you answered no to taking the advice, why was that?
What will happen if you take the advice?
What will happen if you don’t?
This really is the essence of self-love. Taking the time to care for yourself, and be kind and forgiving to yourself, in the way you would with your own best friend.
Withholding love
If someone withheld love from you as a child, you may withhold love yourself or have become a needy adult – perhaps you have become fixated on wanting love from a particular person and, as a result, you’ve been willing to accept crumbs. Let’s just unravel this for a moment. Let’s say your parent didn’t show you that love because they didn’t love themselves, that because of their own conditioning they didn’t know how to give that love to someone. Have you ever considered that? Often when we understand that person’s full conditioning, how they were raised, their limitations, we start to understand the reason why that person wasn’t able to give us what we needed emotionally, why they only gave us “crumbs”. I like the analogy of accepting crumbs because really I’m sure you deserve the whole cake, and as you fall more and more in love with yourself, you will come to know that too.
And, by the way, what’s that person’s story, in your life now, who is giving you crumbs? Do they love themselves enough to know how to give love? Are they ready to be in a relationship? Or are you perhaps subconsciously the one who is withholding love because that way you won’t get hurt? Are you receiving crumbs because that’s all you believe you deserve or because you are only really giving crumbs yourself?
We’ve all been in situations where we fall out with someone we care about, but both parties are too proud or stubborn to say sorry. Instead we both withhold love from one another, until one of the parties suddenly reaches out and then all is forgotten. The same goes for a situation that is frustrating you beyond belief – you are actually better off sending that situation and the people love rather than anger and hate, even just in your mind, because clearly love is what is needed for it to be resolved, healed or for you to let it go, and sending love rather than negative thoughts will serve you better. It may be that the relationship is beyond repair and that it has caused a lot of hurt and upset, but you will feel a greater peace within when you wish that person well in some way, whether that’s by wishing for them to find love within, healing or happiness – in essence, by doing so, you are letting yourself off the hook from needing to hold a grudge against that person. When we hold a grudge, it is only ourselves that we hurt.
“Withholding love is a form of self-sabotage, as what we withheld from others, we are withholding from ourselves.”
Marianne Williamson
YOUR TOOLBOX: IGNITE THE LOVE
Take a moment to ask yourself if you are withholding love from yourself or in the relationship that is challenging you? Use your journal to explore these feelings if you need to.
Ask yourself:
• Am I withholding love?
• Why am I withholding love?
• How is withholding love serving me?
• Where do I need to redirect my love to?
• What can I focus on that will make me feel more love?
• How would letting go and letting love flow serve me?
Become your own thought detective
To truly know your own worth you have to be willing to start celebrating yourself, stop putting yourself down and stop comparing yourself to others. I want you to learn to be your own thought detective. Start to notice how you are feeling in different situations during the day, especially the moments that challenge your self-worth. It can also help to write your feelings down on your phone or in your journal. What were you doing in that moment? Who were you speaking to and so on? When you notice your sense of self-worth switching, notice what it is triggering in you and try to change your actions and switch to focusing on having a more compassionate mindset in that moment.
If you know hanging out with certain people is going to make you feel crap, why are you doing it? Is that what loving yourself looks like? No! If you are following certain people online and they make you feel awful about yourself, unfollow! At the dreaded annual company or family party when that one person corners you and you can feel they are dumping on you and making you feel bad, have an excuse up your sleeve and politely finish the conversation and move along. You do not have to stay and listen and be dumped on emotionally and verbally if you don’t want to, just to avoid upsetting someone and at the expense of your wellbeing.
Knowing your worth is also about having the courage to choose relationships that are going to lift you up. Be confident that if you pass on a relationship or move on from someone another one that is better aligned with you will appear. When you know your worth you stop comparing yourself to others and putting yourself down and you start choosing relationships and the company of people that lift you and light you up. See pages 89–90 for a great exercise that helps you cut the cord with negative people in your life.
Reframing with positive affirmations will support your self-love and self-worth journey and it’s a tool you can use all day long. By the end of the chapter I’m hoping you will be a reframe champion!
YOUR TOOLBOX: REFRAME – WHAT IS AND ISN’T TRUE ABOUT WHAT YOU THINK OF YOURSELF?
As I touched on in Self-Awareness, the way you speak to yourself can either build you up or tear you down. It’s time to get in the driving seat of your self-talk and start taking the route that will not just lift you up but lead you to your ideal relationship and support you in finding inner peace. After all, how can we learn to love ourselves if we constantly talk to ourselves in such a negative way?
Jack Canfield, author of Chicken Soup for the Soul, says that out of the 60,000–80,000 thoughts we have a day, 80 per cent of them are negative. That’s a whole lot of negative self-talk and it’s crazy to think that we would do that to ourselves. He also says, “When we think something is possible, we’re more likely to make the effort to achieve it. If we think it’s impossible, we won’t bother trying.” And Jack also confirms what I mentioned on page 100 – that the thoughts we think have an effect on our body. Doesn’t that convince you right now to be super selective about how you speak and think about yourself when it comes to yourself and your relationships?
To become an expert at reframing you have to commit consciously to stop yourself in your tracks when you are speaking negatively to yourself and literally reframe there and then. In the beginning you will catch negative thoughts creeping in many times a day, but after a while they will become less frequent and you will be able to reframe more quickly.
Let’s start with any false beliefs (see page 43) or negative statements you have created about yourself or the relationships you want to heal. False statements or beliefs are things you have repeated to yourself so often you have come to believe them to be true. But deep down you know that they are not true.
What are they? Write them down. Examples might be:
• I suck at relationships
• I don’t feel as if I’m ever enough
• They always leave
• I’ll end up alone
• No one ever really sees me
• No one understands me
• Relationships bring out the worst in me
Now rewrite those sentences in ways that are positive and support you.
So “I suck at relationships” would become “I’m great at relationships” and “I don’t feel as if I’m ever enough” would become “I know I am enough”, and so on.
Reframe as many beliefs as come to mind and make them into empowering statements about yourself.
Repeat them every time you catch yourself sliding down the slippery slope of self-loathing and get on with the self-loving instead!
It can help to get support with this, so consider making your empowering statement known to others, maybe your closest friends or by writing it on your mirror, or on a post-it note. I would love to hear and support you in this too, so share it online tagging #INYIM It’s Not You, It’s Me.
Meeting your needs
Time after time my clients tell me they are scared to be honest with their partners about what they need from the relationship. It is really important to have this conversation at the beginning, and that includes for work relationships too. If we fail to communicate what we want, for fear of losing the relationship, our needs won’t be met and we risk losing ourselves – we shrink to fit and that will cause its own pain and frustration, leading to both physical and emotional problems.
Self-love leads to higher self-esteem and as a result your needs are more likely to be met in a relationship. When your love for yourself and your self-esteem is high it becomes logical and totally okay for you to communicate your needs in any relationship. You will ask for what you want in an authentic, assertive and confident way rather than being needy and fearful of the outcome and you will be able to move on more easily if the needs you have communicated are not accepted.
“If you communicate one thing but want another, it’s incongruent. No one is going to read your mind. If you want something you are going to have to ask for it.”
YOUR TOOLBOX: WORKING OUT YOUR NEEDS
Try answering the following questions to gain some clarity about your needs:
In this relationship what do I
• Need? ……………….
• Give? ……………….
• Want to give? ……………….
• Receive? ……………….
• Want to receive? ……………….
You might find that there is a discrepancy between what you are receiving and what you want to receive, and what you are giving and what you want to give. Answering these questions should help you to clarify where you need to put the work in to make sure it is all aligned with what you deserve when you look at it from a perspective of loving yourself.
Do remember, though, that it is okay to compromise and negotiate at times as long as the relationship is balanced and it feels good to you. It’s also important to be open to receiving love in different ways as we all have different communication styles. Let me give you an example: you may have been raised to believe that love and affection are shown in material ways. However, your partner may believe “it’s the thought that counts” and show love by giving you something of a sentimental rather than a monetary value, or perhaps he or she believes actions speak louder than words and they like cooking for you, driving you around or even doing the housework. It’s important to understand how your partner perceives these things too, so they can feel that what they do is also a valid way of showing love.
YOUR TOOLBOX: A LOVE LETTER TO YOURSELF
Writing a love letter to someone we really love is pretty easy, so how come it can be so hard and almost silly to write one to ourselves? As easy as it can be to say nice things to others and compliment them, it can be difficult to say them to yourself. Yet it is so important because your opinion of yourself matters, it matters more than anyone else’s.
In this letter you are going to tell yourself all the nice things you would like someone else to tell you, but it’s going to mean even more because this is a true act of self-love and because we both know it doesn’t matter what other people tell us unless we believe it ourselves. No matter how cute or charming someone else thinks you are, you are not really going to acknowledge and accept the compliment unless you believe it to be true yourself. This is why relying on outside validation is not sustainable.
Keep the letter simple. You can either make it specific to a current situation in your life or more generally about loving yourself. As an example, below are some of the words I like to use in love letters to myself. OMG I can’t believe I actually just wrote those words – it has been a journey getting there but I can tell you it feels good to say “the words I like to use in love letters to myself”. Get creative below and write the most loving letter to yourself you have ever written. This experience is for you so make it an act of self-love. Sit somewhere relaxing, make your favourite drink (mine is a matcha tea or coffee) and play your favourite tune. (I’m obsessed with “Weightless” by Marconi Union – backed by neuroscience, it’s written specifically to calm the mind. I feel it helps me relax and let the words flow. I wrote this whole book listening to it!)
Dear Me or write your name (whichever feels best to you)
I’m so proud of you for how you are being disciplined with your self-compassion practice and making time for it every day. I want you to know that you are always loved and supported even in the moments when you feel alone. Always know you are infinite love and light. You are always enough!
And so on…
Another example might be to write how proud you are of yourself for handling a situation the way you did or to tell yourself that even though you are feeling hurt and sad at the moment, know that you are loved and that it will pass, that you are a really amazing human being and that the world needs you.
You can be as creative as you like – after all, this is your love letter. Mention as many nice things you can think of about yourself and really notice how you feel as you are writing the letter – really allow yourself to feel each word. You can read it back to yourself if you want to – it’s really powerful to read it aloud and I have had clients who have read it to themselves in the mirror, to me or even to their partner. Do whatever works best for you.
“If I love myself I love you, If I love you, I love myself.”
Rumi
YOUR TOOLBOX: IN THE MIRROR
In Louise Hay’s book Mirror Work she says “Doing mirror work is one of the most loving gifts you can give yourself” and I totally agree. Something magical happens once we let the awkwardness of it fall away, when it’s just you staring back at you, completely authentically, ready to have the courage to speak lovingly to yourself. It can be a little uncomfortable, yes, for most of us, but it’s also so intimate and can be a great way to send yourself a loving message, and accept and love yourself as you are. And hopefully you are getting more and more used to it.
I have watched many clients stand in front of the mirror in my office looking as nervous as if they were going on a first date. Then over a few sessions I’ve witnessed them becoming more comfortable as they stand taller and move through the different stages from saying statements such as “I hate myself”, “I don’t like my body” to “I think I can like myself”, “I want to like myself” to “I like myself” and then “I love myself and my body.” To watch them literally switch on their lights within, and the joy on their faces as they become more and more comfortable in their own body, is amazing.
On page 40, in Self-Awareness, I asked you to look in the mirror and write down the words that were coming to mind. Perhaps back then there were a few not so supportive words you wrote down. The purpose of this exercise is so that ultimately, after a while, you’ll be able to look yourself straight in the eye and say, “I love you”, and really feel that love you have for yourself.
I’m not expecting it to happen overnight, although if it does that’s awesome, but I can tell you I’m pretty confident you will feel really proud of yourself when it happens and that it feels good. It’s okay to start saying it too before you believe it, as with time you will come to believe it. Once you have been able to do that, you will be able to catch yourself quicker and redirect your mind whenever it drifts to old behaviour and the negative thoughts creep in, and you will start to feel strong and comfortable in situations where you didn’t before.
This exercise can be done very easily in the mornings as you are brushing your teeth or drying your hair. Stand in front of th
e mirror and try out some of the positive affirmations below to find the right starting point for you, knowing that you will be gradually moving towards loving yourself.
• I like myself
• I like myself more and more every day
• I love myself
• I like xyz about myself
• I love xyz about myself
• I love my body
• I appreciate my body
• I speak positively about and to myself
Whether you practise one sentence a day, or simply look at yourself in the morning in the mirror and say “morning gorgeous” to yourself, it will help you to build your self-love. Remember I told you already, you deserve this love.
Body image
I’ve had many clients who struggle with body image issues. By the time I see them they have often tried all sorts of diets, abused their bodies and each time ended up back in the same place because the root cause is still there lingering in their subconscious. And that is not going to be conquered by any diet – only with LOVE.
Falling in love with our bodies can be hard. Many of us have a skewed idea of what we look like and are constantly striving to perfect our bodies and looks. However, no amount of looking good is going to make you feel good if you don’t love what’s inside of you. You will be striving for perfection, the unreachable, and there will always be something that will catch your attention that you are not going to like. That’s why Simone’s story struck a chord with me…
“I stopped waiting for you to see it, I stopped waiting for you to say it, And I just looked myself in the mirror and said, I LOVE YOU.”
In New Zealand earlier this year, I went to the launch of Simone Anderson’s book Journey to Health. It was an inspiring and heartfelt evening. I read in an article she had described “her health to be at stake” before she started her weight-loss journey and that her relationship with food was one where “food brought her happiness”. Simone became an Instagram sensation for documenting her very honest weight-loss story, inspired many and built a strong following. She lost 194lb in a year, but no matter how amazing that is, it was something else about her story that really touched me that evening.
It's Not You, It's Me Page 10