One of the most common questions I've received throughout the years have been how to love your self?
Maybe it's just recently when I started to truly understand how.
See I've been a people pleaser and someone who always wanted people to like me so I would over-give and act selflessly to my own detriment. This past year I learned to say no and set boundaries, stop pushing myself to do more when I didn't want to.
Also started respecting my own needs and developing compassion for myself and my own reactions. Understanding that resentment is a byproduct of over-giving and of people pleasing which are all signs of co-dependency.
I stopped being this person that's everything for everyone because it was exhausting. I'm not a saint. I'm a human who's gifted but that's where it ends. I still eat and have needs and sometimes those needs are specific for me.
Somehow after my awakening I thought that I had to be some sort of superhuman. That because I had had a Kundalini Awakening and a self-realisation that I should be selfless and need nothing. Ha what a joke and what little love for myself.
2020 was the tipping point for me, where I gave to everyone and everything and in the end I felt broken and completely exhausted and I was angry and resentful and I felt so ashamed for feeling that way. Yet those feelings took me on an inward journey where I visited my shadows and somehow found a place where I was tired of giving and giving to people that just seemingly took me for granted and left me with bread crumbs. Yet by all means I take responsibility for having ended up in such a community and in those relationships, both "friendships" and partnerships.
Somehow I've carried my selfless over-giving self as a badge of honour. Blah is all I say to that.
Underneath it all was a deep sense of unworthiness, that if I didn't do everything and give my all, all the time then I wasn't lovable. That somehow this over-serving self was who I was supposed to be..
Coming back to today, when I know that expressing my needs makes me happy. That I actually listen to what I need and how I feel. That I'm not neglecting myself because I have some subconscious feeling of not being deserving of abundance or of having my needs met. Or even just acknowledging that I have needs and I too need rest and sometimes more than the average person.
I honestly don't know where this subconscious feeling came from other than that I feel it was much older than this lifetime. Though I can see certain inherited traits from my mom they're not at all as severe as mine have been. Nor can I say when I healed from them. I know it didn't happen in one instant but rather in increments as if peeling an onion.
A lot of guilt and shame came up through every layer, a lot anger at myself and others and a lot of shame for having done that to myself. To have given away myself over and over again. To not have had more respect for myself. For not having treated myself better. For not having made better decisions in regards to who I surrounded myself with. For not knowing better.
Feeling shame for being so angry. Yet little by little the anger softened. Mostly through my determination of not wanting to get stuck in the past, or being a victim or holding on to anger and angry thoughts. BUT allowing myself to feel it and then asking my guides and God to please help me find better feeling thoughts. To help me find a way out of this whatever it was.
I found a lot of guidance on Instagram in regards to people pleasing and co-dependency and awareness helped me to understand my pattern and that it was all based on a need to control my environment because a part of me didn't feel safe otherwise. That was key because it made me realise that I had to become comfortable that some people will not accept me or like me or understand me no matter what I do or say. Nor can their acceptance ever make me feel truly safe inside. That was something that I had to figure out on my own.
Yet learning to listen to myself and to listen to my own needs have made me feel safe within. I've let go of the ideas that I have to live up to others expectations of who I should be and accepted who I am as I am. With my strengths and my weaknesses. That I'm human and that's ok. That I don't want to bow down to others to be accepted. I rather walk with my back straight, heart wide open. But that requires that I listen to myself and my own needs. That I listen to my feelings and allow myself to have feelings without judging myself.
That I close the doors on relationships that doesn't make me feel good, that I close the doors on relationships that are one sided and that drains me. That I respect that there's a little child within me that needs to be heard. That when I fill my cup and respect myself and my own needs, happiness comes as a byproduct. That when I listen to my own feelings and voice my needs in my relationships, that I feel better and more at peace with the world. That when I give a voice to my need then others don't have to guess what I need. That when I say no to things that I don't want to do, or relationships that I don't really want to be in. I have much more energy for the things that I want to do.
A great by product is that I feel that I have more energy to my clients and to the people that are really dear to me. I can love everyone, but everyone doesn't feel good to my energy. That took my a long time to truly admit to myself. That I don't want to be around just anyone. That I can be picky and choose who have access to my time and energy.
So I feel for the first time in my life, I've become my own best friend. I'm the one holding my own inner child's hand saying we got this - I am taking care of you now. You don't need to do all of that selfless stuff anymore because I can see how much it was draining and hurting you. I am taking care of you now. I am going to say no and I'm not going to worry about what others think about that because for me to be at my best, I need to look out for me first. That's self-love, that is self-care. That's how I really started to love Me. I started to show up for me and stopped abandoning myself for others.
Thank you for reading.
Much Love, Kristina
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