When did you last enjoy who you are?
When did you really get pleasure from who you are?
Still chewing over Claire Anstey’s challenge as shared at StoryHouse.Rocks Live that I told you about yesterday, I keep coming back to this question: when did you last enjoy who you are?
It is difficult to enjoy who you are if you:
1. do not like yourself (or you actually hate yourself)
2. do not accept yourself (or you actually reject yourself)
3. do not know yourself (and really do not want to know yourself)
4. and you really really want to be somebody else, anybody else, except yourself (because you are ashamed of yourself and think and believe you need to be fixed)
Being in any one or more of the above scenarios, it usually doesn’t really matter how much somebody else tells you that you matter, that you are awesome and that you are complete and enough in yourself, just the way you are. Without you receiving and accepting those words as true, or that at least they contain an element of truth… a seed of truth in them, nothing much will change.
So, how could you begin to accept yourself exactly as you are – for this is the starting point in this journey. How could you begin to doubt the veracity of those voices, those experiences that tell you that you are not worthy of love, affection and acceptance?
For me, the way out was exploring and engaging in healing relationships, healing communities, healing environments. Today, I’ve become very impatient in certain respects – if a relationship has a whiff of toxicity, I’m out of there.
And I’m not talking about romantic relationships here, just normal ordinary human relationships. You see, we were born into relationships. We were made for connections, basic but meaningful human connections. A lot of brokenness and lost-ness come about as a result of dysfunctional relationships of some shape, form, colour or odour.
The beginning of me doubting the erroneous belief I’d had about my self-worth was my engaging in healing and empowering relationships, where I was challenged to trust myself to make my own decisions and that they would be right for me; where I was told that – and treated like – I was the expert in and of my own life (how those words used to vex me!) and the expectation was that I knew how to swim out of the dark murky waters that threatened to swallow me in that season.
And guess what? I did. I have. I am. And moreover, I’m now in a position of supporting others in their journey of self-discovery, self-acceptance and self-expression. And I’m certainly loving it, loving me, enjoying myself and my own company, feeling very content in my own skin… Of course there is always room for growth. And I’m loving that too. And I’m choosing, on purpose, to invest in healing relationships and nurturing environments to ensure a continuous sustenance of my growth and personal development.
If you need to find yourself, to accept yourself, to enjoy yourself: you do not have to suffer in silence. You do not have to go it alone. Send me a message, let’s talk. No obligations on your part. Just a virtual coffee and a chat. Let’s begin to break that sense of isolation and begin to get you back on track: to knowing, accepting and loving yourself just as you are.
Because: You are enough, just the way you are.
And if you find it difficult to accept that statement right now, I hope that you can at least entertain the possibility that at some level, it could be true…
