Reflections

Our society has been promoting self-love and the idea of putting yourself first for a while now. I’m sure you’ve all battled with the idea of just doing what’s right for you vs. the possibility of hurting others. I hear why self-love and care is so important, but I also wonder where we should draw the line.  Where does self-love end and selfishness begin?

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Self-love comes from a place of peaceful acceptance. It is your ability to honor all your successes as well as your short comings. Loving yourself means appreciating who you are as a person. It means knowing how to take care of yourself, while also developing the capability to love others for who they are as well.

Selfishness is the lack of concern for the values of others. It is acting only on self-interest with disregard to the effects it may have on others.

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Loving yourself is coming to terms with your flaws and critiquing them constructively. It means you know yourself very well, and understand that all you ever need is within you. You do not find it necessary to stress or prove yourself to anyone, because you are at peace with who you are. Whereas selfishness comes from a place of fear. It is when you constantly feel the need to impress yourself and impress others. Selfishness is attacking others personalities and beliefs to satisfy your inner ego. Selfishness comes from the inability to love oneself. It may seem that a selfish person loves themselves way too much, but on the contrary. They are actually quite unfulfilled. How can you expect someone who can’t see the beauty of their inner-self to see the beauty in others and the world around them? 

The way I see it, a person that has self- love can give love because they have love. To create a world of harmony you must learn to love yourself and love others.

It's All About Me!!

“We cultivate love when we allow our most vulnerable and powerful selves to be deeply seen and known, and when we honor the spiritual connection that grows from that offering with trust, respect, kindness and affection.

Love is not something we give or get; it is something that we nurture and grow, a connection that can only be cultivated between two people when it exists within each one of them – we can only love others as much as we love ourselves.

Shame, blame, disrespect, betrayal, and the withholding of affection damage the roots from which love grows. Love can only survive these injuries if they are acknowledged, healed and rare.”


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Most blamers see nothing wrong in blaming others for anything and everything. When things go wrong in their own lives, someone else is always to blame -- nothing is ever their fault. They tend to be irrational; therefore you can't reason with them. Don't even try.

It's best to avoid this type of personality (narcissistic), as this disorder includes being negative, which can have a destructive affect on you.

Don't become a victim of a negative personality. It can literally ruin your life, especially if you and your accuser are related or are close friends.

You may even be better off by choosing to disassociate (and thereby severing) the toxic relationship. If you find that you just can't do this, at least set up specific boundaries to protect yourself.
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At one time or another, most of us are blamed for something we didn't do. It feels unjust and unfair. And, it is. Even though we may be completely guiltless, we feel guilty.
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I've learned that anyone who accuses us of improper behavior and lies isn't really worth worrying about. Your accuser has personal issues that have absolutely nothing to do with you. At the time you are being blamed, knowing this may not help much. Even so, it is true.
Often, jealousy, insecurity, and low self-esteem are coursing through a liar's veins. The only way they can feel their own importance is to gossip viciously about other people, bringing them down so that they themselves can feel better about who they are.

To intentionally accuse someone of doing something they know is a lie gives the liar a feeling of importance. Feel sorry for them, my friend. They are miserable individuals and cannot find joy within. They are unable to feel good themselves so they continue this endless road of slum and slime as they pass judgement and make up lies about other people.
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You do not need to prove your innocence to anyone if you are indeed innocent. You already know in your heart that you have clean hands. This is all that matters. It is not necessary to prove to anyone that you are not guilty. Do not fuel the evil fire by giving these lies power.
Only by feeling love for our enemies (anyone who is against us) can we be free. So try to forgive and that includes forgetting.

Is this easy? No, it isn't. In fact, it's hard...very hard. But if you can grow to this level it will help you to feel peace as you struggle through a difficult time. Have patience, both with yourself and your accuser. The truth will eventually be known, and it is truth that will set you free.
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Help is on the way. You're going to feel relieved as you learn how to deal and cope with destructive behavior. No longer will you have to be a victim of blame and negativity.

Sorry, but the world doesn’t revolve around you!

"I’ll bet you know someone who believes the world revolves around them.  Maybe you are one of these special people.  But I have to tell you, that if one more person is trying to get into the trunk of my car while driving at seventy miles per hour I think I am going to scream.

I don’t care if it’s someone’s impatience when standing in line or waiting for a returned phone call.  Or, people who believe that when they text or email you, you should have your cell phone or laptop available at a moment’s notice and respond before you take your next breath – these people need to understand that other than them, we have a life.  Or, is it parents in a restaurant that let their kids create chaos all around them while they scream and yell and you are trying to have a romantic or business meal?

Know anyone like this?  Come on…. It seems that most people today feel that they should be the center of everyone else’s world.

Maybe a customer feels they are your only customer and you should respond to their every request immediately or a supervisor who expects you to drop all of your routine tasks to immediately respond to a request of theirs regardless of its urgency.

I could give you dozens more examples where people believe that they are the center of the world, but I’m sure you don’t need more examples as we all have to deal with these people sooner or later in a variety of settings.

Why do so many people work themselves into a twit when life doesn’t go the way they expect or according to their schedule and agenda?

Is it ego or arrogance?  Is it narcissism or selfishness?  Is it their stress level or insecurity? Or is it just their need to feel important in some way?

There’s a book here, but I won’t bore you with numerous causes or reasons for this behavior, but I will give you four causes that I believe are at the core of this behavior. But, before I do, consider – are certain mindsets, positions, professions, age groups or different cultural backgrounds a contributor?

I’m not suggesting everyone or anyone in these groups falls into one of the four categories listed below, but  I have come to believe that the following tend to be indicators of how someone will tend to approach life, relationships or careers from a position of – “control obsession” (just made that up).

Low self-esteem – Self-esteem is simply how you define yourself.  With low self-esteem we will tend to always belittle ourselves in some way especially in the presence of others.  Out conversation will tend to be self-demeaning and apologetic.  I’m sorry is one of our favorite phrases when we have a low self-esteem issue.  The opposite is just as bad as when your self-esteem is too high you will tend to approach life and others with conceited, haughty, arrogant, snooty or puffed up attitudes.  Either one – low or high self-esteem has its drawbacks and causes us to, in some way alienate others.

A lack of a patient mindset – A major cause of stress is impatience or the need for things to happen on our schedule and according to our agenda.  When they don’t well, you’ve seen how these people can behave whether in traffic, a meeting or a restaurant.  Patience is the ability to flow and accept life.  It doesn't mean you have a victim mentality, but that you understand that stuff happens, that you often can’t control.  The key is to learn to deal with what you can control and let go of the stuff you can’t

The need for validation – Many people suffer from a need for appreciation, acceptance or validation.  In order to receive these they will often make themselves the center of attention in some way.  Whether it’s the way they dress, talk, brag or just inject themselves into conversations or situations – their goal is to be noticed and sometimes appreciated regardless of their status, position, background or any other life or career circumstance.

Over the top ego – We all have an ego or the need to feel important, successful, smart or any other trait that sends the message to the world that we are better than others in some way.  This is normal behavior.  The problem arises when this need becomes the single or major focal point of our life and we can’t admit failure, mistakes, bad decisions or any other action that might make us look unimportant, unsuccessful or just not up to other’s standards or expectations.  When ego becomes the major life driver we will tend to create distance between ourselves and others and send the message that we are just better or smarter than the rest of the world.

“Don’t go around saying the world owes you a living. The world owes you nothing; it was here first.”

Mark Twain

Pain

When it happens, you won’t want to believe it. You’ll take their word for it when they say they’re busy, swamped at work, “just doing me.” You’ll make excuses for them, put your finger on extra loud in case they call. But you’ll still feel the change, and because you can’t rationalize it, you’ll try to ignore it.

It’s a specific kind of loneliness that hits you like a wave of nausea. When the two of you are having a beer and you realize that you have both been staring out the same window for twenty minutes, nothing to say, the opposite of a comfortable silence. When they cancel plans consistently and stall when giving you reasons. When you scroll through your contacts and stop at their name and almost call but don’t, feeling suddenly, inexplicably, abandoned and confused.

Sometimes there’s no huge fight that marks the end of a friendship. No falling out, no major disagreement. Sometimes it just falls apart for no good reason. Distance...  New relationships… Priorities... Somehow these things can become more important than your connection; they shouldn’t but they do. And as we get older we tend to downsize, prioritize. Trim the corners of our lives, keeping what’s important and discarding what isn’t. Sometimes we stop needing people in our lives and it isn’t even conscious. No one wakes up in the morning actively thinking “Hmm, I think I’ll stop being friends with so-and-so today.” It just goes out with an empty fizz, like a cigarette hitting the bottom of a Coke can.

In so many ways, losing a friend is worse than losing a lover. Lovers are transient for the most part but friends are supposed to be there for you always, or so we like to believe. Friendship is a special kind of love that’s not supposed to fade. You never expect the one person you thought you could always depend on to disappear without saying goodbye. And when they do you feel sickeningly stupid and cheated, wondering what you meant to them all along, whether you were just convenient or in the right place at the right time. You never really know for sure.

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In life, it’s a given that you will lose people. People will flow in and out like curtains through an open window, sometimes for no reason at all. But losing someone important to you will feel like a sucker punch every single time, and you’ll never see it coming. Which makes the friendships that do hold out, the ones that make it through countless breakdowns and breakthroughs and changes and years, so damn important.

Strangers X Best Friends

Do you have that one person you were once so close to -and for so long -that you are now basically nothing more than strangers with? Maybe you don’t know exactly what happened, as if things drifted slowly and although there is no “bad blood” things just don’t seem to work anymore. Strangers can become best friends just as easily as best friends can become strangers, it’s odd. But why does it happen?

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I know I have experienced this a number of times in my life and maybe you have too. We have friends that we just can never picture ourselves not having close to us. We love them, they bond and connect so well with us, they are there for you and you are there for them. Then one day, as if out of nowhere, you realize they simply aren’t a big part of your life anymore.

You don’t know whether to feel bad or feel like it’s somehow your fault. Maybe you didn’t reach out enough or maybe you did something wrong. But the truth is, if you can’t put a clear cut answer to why, it’s probably simply because paths changed and you simply didn’t connect in the same way. It’s not to say you can’t again or that you are suddenly not friends, but more so that it’s simply not a serving aspect of both of your journey’s to be that close anymore.

I believe that to be entirely okay. There is nothing wrong with having amazing people in your life one day and simply going separate directions not long after. We have to respect each other, our journey’s and where we are going. We cannot judge one another for our choices or because we feel inspired by something else. So often we can talk poorly about those who have drifted as if they didn’t “value” the friendship, but is it really about value? Is it about making something work simply because it was once there? Or is it possible that we can play roles in each others lives for periods of time and move on?

We are beings of change and we can go through changes very quickly. Who we are one day can adjust very quickly and sometimes that means we take different paths in life. This can lead you to new people and ultimately new “best friends.” What I’m trying to say is, if you ever feel guilty or bad about how things may have drifted from close friends of your past, don’t. It’s normal, it happens, it’s okay and if you like, you can communicate with those people about it.

Imagine you and your best friend (or friends from your past) like radio stations. Sometimes, you are all tuned into the same thing and vibing the same way, then, people change and the frequencies of each person change. Suddenly you’re dialed into different stations and they just don’t mesh in the same way. Instead, you now mesh with another person or group of people who are dialed into your station.

This doesn’t mean we can’t remain friends simply because we change, it simply means it happens, and when it does, it’s okay! I have many friends who I don’t see as often but can still call up and connect with very easily. I will always be grateful for those friendships no matter what, but does it mean we will always be super tight? No, and that’s cool.

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Sometimes things can drift because something happens between us. It can be big or it can be small. These are the types of “splits” where we ask ourselves: “are we simply not friends because we are unable to move past a disagreement?” Many times we can still very much be dialed into that same station with another person, yet someone peeved the other one off and no one wants to give in. This is where we can really just take advantage of a great opportunity to learn a lot about facing ourselves and communication.

This type of situation is one that is just so tough to see. We spend so much time holding grudges and holding onto toxic feelings and judgments because we can’t just make peace with what may have happened. Deep down, we all seem to want to have these people back in our lives but at some point, we simply don’t know how to make it happen anymore. Either we are too scared to be the one to call them first or we just don’t even know what to say.

If we let it go long enough, we can completely “get over” what happened, but still have no clue how to rekindle that friendship because we don’t know how it will look. Funny thing is, I’ve seen so many examples of accidental meetings in these cases where the two friends hit it off like no tomorrow. Imagine if one were to have just called the other years ago?

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Yours And Mine

Yours and Mine

I recently had this discussion with some good friends of mine. We’re all strong, fiercely independent women who never had anything handed to them in life. We’ve worked hard for what we have and have accomplished many amazing things. We have learned to do things on our own without anyone’s help, especially men. Personally, I have done it as a necessity, not as something I particularly want. Trust me, I would love a man around the house. I am very much a traditionalist when it comes to gender roles. Yes, I said it.

I believe men should be men and women should be women. I love taking care of my man and doing all the traditional women roles like cooking and cleaning and making him feel like a king. That’s just who I am. But, I also expect him to be a man who takes on that dominant protective role. I think it provides balance. Maybe some people will think the way I think is backwards and women and men should be equal and yayyy women blah blah blah. Hey I totally agree that women and men should have equal opportunities but I want a man who takes care of me physically, emotionally and mentally and I will, in turn, take care of all his needs. Is that too much to ask?

Uncertainty

Reality is filled with uncertainty.

Seldom do we have an exact picture of the path ahead, so we accept what arises with determined courage.

It is natural to uphold a level of control, yet we need uncertainty to prevail since the seeds of opportunity lie in the unexpected.

At a deeper level, we fear uncertainty because we lack the life skills to navigate through it. Recognised as the mind’s negativity bias, we doubt our capacity to cope with the unexpected and exaggerate events to the detriment of our mental and emotional wellbeing.

With so much talk of stress these days, we need to know what the imminent future holds in store for us. Yet the security we crave for is but an illusion to lull us into a false sense of safety.

Author David Rock states in Your Brain at Work, “The brain craves certainty. A sense of uncertainty about the future and feeling out of control both generate strong limbic system responses.”

As a result your brain looks to your external environment to reinforce a known sense of balance. In primitive times our ancestors had to contend with a variety of conditions to sustain life. The threat of wild animals, adjusting to climatic conditions, fear of attack from rival tribes and the outbreak of disease, were barriers to their survival.

Thankfully, life in the modern world is not as bleak, yet modern life is replete with its own stressors which pose a hazard to our wellbeing. Uncertainty for the modern man is contained within: intimate relationships, volatile economies, uncertain job security, weather fluctuations and health concerns.

Bruce Hood affirms in his book The Self Illusion, “…in situations where outcomes are important, we get stressed by uncertainty and feel the need to do something so that we can have the illusion that we can control events.”

To retain binding command of our lives is both a blessing and curse. In one way it affirms our sense of safety, knowing we need not contend with tentative conditions. On the other hand, its misleading bias is overstated by our limited control, if any.

It is no surprise that the mind is notorious for emphasising circumstances which appear less dramatic than they are. Known in psychology as catastrophizing, the inherent bias to perceive events within a negative context.

The fear of “not knowing” what lies ahead impedes our long term welfare. At a deeper level, fear of the future terrifies us because of the unfamiliar conditions which lie ahead. It interferes with attaining emotional freedom.

“Faith means living with uncertainty – feeling your way through life, letting your heart guide you like a lantern in the dark.” – Dan Millman

So how can we embrace the unexpected without the barrage of emotions which ensue?

To accept uncertainty in our lives requires a change in perspective. We yield to the intrinsic forces of life instead of oppose them. However uncomfortable it may seem, we surrender to the natural order of events by leaning in to our fears and insecurities.

You reason with your anxieties by perceiving them with a logical mind instead of becoming embroiled in them. Otherwise, we risk activating our fight or flight nervous system every time, which senses we are in imminent danger instead of being uncomfortable.

Remain present in your body when anxiety threatens your emotional wellbeing. Choose a proper time to examine the motivation for your anxiety.

Have there been moments in the past which caused similar anxiety?

If so, are you repeating those same feelings instead of facing them?

Fear is a confronting emotion, though we gain strength when we embrace it as a useful emotion. I often remind myself that fear is an illusion. I can reduce the volume of fear by being exposed to it moderately each time.

We rarely have all the answers, which means uncertainty is as much an inner declaration that everything will turn out well in due course. It strengthens our resolve and commitment to the natural cycles of life. Change in itself is terrifying, not the conditions themselves.

The key lesson is to be comfortable with uncertainty – why? Because it exists and we should avoid retreating in resignation wishing life were different.

We evolve by being exposed to uncertainty and confronting our fears, otherwise they dominate our mental landscape and grow in intensity. To that extreme that which we oppose must be met head on.

It was the Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius who declared, “If you are distressed by anything external, the pain is not due to the thing itself, but to your own estimate of it; and this you have the power to revoke at any moment.”

Find middle ground between living with uncertainty and maintaining a level of control, short of manipulating outcomes. Let go of tension, anxiety and fear by embracing the unknown. Consider uncertainty a worthwhile journey toward a daring future.

Uncertainty allows us to re-evaluate the past and make new choices in light of what transpires. It presents opportunities to create a compelling future based on new information. Often, our most ambitious plans emerge through the obscuring veil of uncertainty.

Welcome curiosity and excitement which go with uncertainty by affirming your belief to move through it with ease. The vital lesson is to expose yourself to uncertainty by building your tolerance to it.

To know the future, we must become acquainted with our present actions while embracing uncertainty. In doing so, we move toward the unknown with firm ambition to resolve the past