self love

self love became quite a topic yesterday over on fb!
if you haven't been over to the bone sigh arts facebook page and
would like to read some of the comments there, head on over.
as always, there was great input from the community there.

between that, and a conversation with a friend, i got to thinking about
HOW we grow self love.

i've been stumbling around with that kinda thing for a lotta years now.

i started out years ago thinking if i could SEE myself,
that would help.
i was obsessed with the idea.

you know......really look.
i figured you couldn't really start until you could see yourself.
and i just felt like i didn't have any kinda accurate picture of who i was.
all i would have to do is start looking, right?!

oh my gosh, that turned into such a darn struggle.
HOW do you see yourself?
it's so easy to skew things and filter things...
how in the world do you accurately do that?
and then there seems to be weird blocks in what you see.
it's harder than i ever thought.

i never really figured that out, and finally threw up my hands, gave up
and decided i wasn't gonna try anymore.

i think that's when it started happening.
of course.
i started seeing more and more.
there sure seems to be something in that whole 'releasing' thing....

i was never really sure how i did it or how it happened,
but i was starting to see.

and i think that's mattered a lot.

but lately.......another piece of the puzzle has come into it all,
i think it's important -

when i do something that's not really in line with who i want to be,
i can be pretty darn hard on myself.
my first instinct is still to beat myself up.
so i've got a lot of work to do yet....
BUT!
i have started to get to the point where i stop and really look
as to WHY i did whatever i did, or reacted however i reacted.

and i'm noticing more and more often that i say to myself  something like -
'of course you felt that way. of course you were gonna react like that.
look at what it hit and the hurt it brought up.'

i find compassion for myself.

how's that for a concept?!

and i think in that compassion, i see myself even more clearly.
and i'm gentle with myself.
and it opens the door to more self love.

i heard from more than one person yesterday how they hated themselves.
i always feel very sad when i hear that.
but i know words just can't change those feelings.
but i think this thought about stepping back and understanding why we did
something or reacted a certain way would help with that.

because the people i hear it from have suffered some pretty horrible abuse.
if they could step back and say 'oh gosh, of course i react that way. it
brought back all those painful feelings.' or 'of course i reacted that way,
i'm insecure because of all that happened and i'm still growing my confidence.'
stuff like that......well, it seems like that would be one heck of a start into
the self love stuff.

i know that's not easy.
that's the nature of the abuse monster.
but...it's something to consider and hold...

for all of us. abuse or no abuse....
for all of us just trying to love in any way at all.

seeing ourselves.
and adding compassion to the mix when we're unsure of what it is we're seeing.

i think that's a good place to start.