SELF ESTEEM: Belly Fat. Beware if you enter this article, you may realize something about yourself you may not like. This article is all about how the inner critic can block our self esteem!
This morning I was on Facebook. Yes, I admit it.
Someone had found my profile and liked a number of photos of me. There was one, I noticed, revealed a thick midsection on me, what I thought was 20 pounds of excess belly fat.
I am the one on the right in the red dress. You might think I look just fine. That is my point.
All I see is the belly fat. A man I know was flirting with me by liking the photo. Apparently he did NOT notice the belly fat, but I did. lol!
When I saw the photo liked on Facebook, I felt mortified.
But at the same moment I realized this was about the third thing I had criticized myself about this day and it was only 6:40am! Not only does feeling “less than” make me feel anxious, but as well it blocks me from attracting positive experiences into my life.
DO I SEE A PATTERN HERE? Yes.
I realized I was very critical of myself. I decided at once to simply not be critical of myself today, for just one day, to see how it feels, to see if I could do it, and to give myself a little peace.
Do you criticize yourself? If you do you probably criticize other people too. This can affect your self esteem, your sense of being connected to others and can even make you feel lonely.
No one, not even you, is good enough.
So what can you do about this? Well, first you have to become aware of the behavior, how insidious it is, before you can do anything about it.
Then you need to gently stop doing it.
I decided today I would try to simply love me for me, without any requirements. If my belly is bloated, well that is ok.
If my hair is thinning (it is), well I still am worthy of love.
If my posture is faulty, that too can be just fine. Ugh!
Why do we allow the inner critic to control us? Why do we stop ourselves from experiencing unconditional love?
My father was like this. He used to spend all of his elocution time talking about everyone, how they lacked this and that. He started to make me feel self conscious about my worthiness.
I am sure he did not do this deliberately, but it affected my self esteem nevertheless.
So usually smack dab in the middle of our upbringing there was a critic that you modeled. It could have been a teacher, a parent or a bully who started this pattern in you.
Those that practice Catholicism might realize that being meek is an esteemed quality, great for entering heaven. I was raised Catholic.
Catholicism, a beautiful religion, is about unconditional love, yet it states you will be rewarded if you are meek. I love aspects of this religion, but the encouragement to be meek is not a healthy attitude for vibrant living in this century.
We need to be alive, alert and engaged in using our faculties to grow, shine and win! Working on self esteem, feeling worthy and knowing that being perfect has nothing to do with you, are all great success attitudes to have.
So in my Healing to Happiness I intend to.
- Be less critical of myself. This does not mean I won’t seek improvement. It means that I will love where I am and launch from there. Those that denigrate themselves, stay stuck!
- Be alert to progress, things I have accomplished. I make a vow to love myself completely, to award myself a progress notation when I see it.
- Send an award to my subconscious for being ME, complete with defects!
- Award myself for being imperfect too! Hey, it took guts to put on a red dress over my bloated belly, go out and smile at the camera. At least I showed up! Belly fat award, here it comes! lol!
- Take deep breaths to relax, go outside in the sunshine for a walk in the middle of the day, chew some Double Bubble gum if I feel like it!
- Today I promise to love myself unconditionally.
Perhaps some of these promises to myself will inspire you to live in the light of unconditional love of self.
Namaste,
Spirit Medium Laura
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