SELF-LOVE
I continue to Shine some light, with thoughts on self-love.
I cannot celebrate for having loved myself that much, most of my life. However, when I divorced, and later, when I started my thoughts-training-program, and I gradually began to see positive results, I realized what were my most valuable assets. From that moment, I authorized no one to discourage or devalue me.
TOSS ALL TOXIC RELATIONS
You can kill someone just with words, certain looks. One way to ensure I would preserve and maintain my own self-motivation was to do a vast spring cleaning around me. I systematically removed all toxic relationships that plagued my life.
I did an inventory of what I had, what I wanted to keep, and what I wanted to be released from.
In order to be able to do this, first, I needed to have an awareness of the self: what activities and beliefs I value, what I expect and need in a friend, and moreover, the negotiable qualities I am willing to accept.
Determine what was upsetting for me and eating me away was not always easy. Even less to then express my emotions! The day I establish a pattern of honest, self-expression to create boundaries, I becan to toss the toxic out of my life. When I do not communicate assertively, ironically I turn inward and I begin to find fault with myself. I feel guilty about what I should have done or said. When this happens, I lose my power. I do not want that happening to me anymore.
At one point, I had to have an honest, intimate conversation with myself about my relationships.
Now, I protect myself physically and spiritually. I do not let negative people use me up and erode my self-esteem. I stand up for myself. I allow my real spirit to shine. I stopped pretending to acquiesce to those who constantly ask from me. My soul feels lighter.
FIND THE WOUNDED CHILD
At our very core, we are love. It is our true nature. What causes someone to spiral down into anxiety, agitation, loneliness or self-judgment is the conditioned mind, the wounded child.
I had to look in the mirror to see what were my own wounds. Self-love, the feeling of being loved and supported by the universe, begins from being deeply loved by parents in a way that fills the child up. Most parents of my generation, and the previous generations, did not know how to do this for their children. The result of that kind of limited-love parenting is that children grew up feeling empty and unloved, lacking self-love and lacking the sense that they are loved.
I learned that it is possible to self-cure the wounded child.
The book «Les 5 blessures qui empêchent d’être soi-même» (http://leseditionsetc.homestead.com/BLESSURE.html) from Lise Bourbeau really helped me to understand my wounds. This book is translated in English (Heal your wounds and find your true self), German, Russian, Italian, Croatian, Spanish, Greek and Turkish.
The five wounds are: rejection, abandonment, humiliation, betrayal and injustice.
By the way, we all have wounds! It is impossible for one individual not to have any. We all carry something from our childhood.
RE-IMAGINE YOUR CHILHOOD
After my father passed away, in 2009, I went into a totally crazy scrapbooking spree. I scrapbooked hundreds of pictures, 10 to 12 hours a day, for months in a row. I developped at the same time an interest in genealogy. I toured the province to meet all my distant relatives. We looked at their photo albums, and we exchanged some very old family photos. I became a friend of an 80 year old woman. I visited her once a week and enjoyed her talk about childhood memories of my family, while I showed her how to scrapbook. I also bombarded my 90 years old uncle with a ton of questions.
At the end of this adventure, I had a huge box of scrapbooked pages, covering 15 Robichaud families, dating back several generations. I’ll leave it all to my son.
I also engraved my name on the family epitaph, at St. Mary Salome village near Joliette, under the name of my father. I did some research to find the grave of my ancestor, François-Xavier Robichaud. The village gave me permission to engrave his name on the epitaph.
All this helped me to reconcile with my past.
Now that I know where I come from, I can walk towards what I want.
CREATE A DEEP CONNECTION WITH HIGHER SELF
There is a great confusion about what is the higher self and what it means in this physical experience. The higher self is the non-physical part of our being, which is not in our body. It is connected to our body through the soul. The higher self has all the knowledge of the humanity, all the memories and much better understanding of who we really are than we do ourselves.
It is really useful to get to know our higher self because it can guide us when we are unclear about something or it can answer the questions that we are unsure about.
LOVE
Love cannot be true if it changes for any reason. Love is supposed to be constant, through any difficulties. Shakespeare Sonnet 116 (published in 1609) is my favorite. Although Shakespeare’s intent was to apply this Sonnet to marriage, I take his description and apply it to my own self-love. I fail to love myself as much as I would like, but it’s better than it was.
Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O no! it is an ever-fixed mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken.
