Comments on: To love myself more perfectly.

By: Indigo

Indigo — Sun, 12 Oct 2008 21:30:58 +0000

I can really relate. I can forgive others but not myself. I can love others but not myself. I can serve others but not myself. I have patience for others but not for myself.

I know where my self-loathing comes from at least. I am an abuse survivor and my dad was a bonnafide monster.

By: Java

Java — Sun, 12 Oct 2008 19:41:11 +0000

Wow. You are talking to the part of me that hurts the most. As much as I do for and give to others, I don’t do those things for myself. I can tell when the subject hits the mark, because I involuntarily begin to cry.

Your response to Marc’s comment turns back and hits the spot again. It’s like you are talking inside my head, but being more rational than I am. I will gladly go to your house and wash your dishes. I would be honored to do that for you. But I have a kitchen full of dirty dishes myself. Why can I not take care of that? Or my laundry. (Oh, let’s not go there right now.) Or the shitload of junk I have cluttering up every corner, every horizontal surface in my house? This junk is a representation of how fucked up my head is.

Where does this shit come from? It reverberates in my head. It is firmly established as the voice of reason. It needs to be deposed, dammit. Why am I so scared to depose it? I’m being eaten alive by my self-loathing. Shit.

By: Chris

Chris — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 15:03:04 +0000

Consider it done, Alan. Thanks.

By: Alan Butterworth

Alan Butterworth — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 11:59:30 +0000

Hi from South Africa,
Great work. Keep it up. Would you like to link to me and I will link to you? I also have some banners that you might like.
Cheers
Sober Alan

By: Chris

Chris — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 06:41:30 +0000

Exactly, precisely correct. It is about the difference between self-love and selfishness. In my life I seem to fail at the mundane things; the things I see other people do with ease and that I have little patience for. The minutia kills me. I’m trying to get myself to the point where I’m OK with hating it and doing it anyway, the same way I would help out a sick friend. Can I love myself enough to do that? And isn’t it entirely appropriate of me to turn to my HP for help in that (those) areas of my life? And isn’t NOT doing those things also NOT recovery? If I am to “bear witness” shouldn’t the tiny stuff get managed?

By: Marc

Marc — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 05:08:05 +0000

Basically, you are talking about seeing oneself as just as much a child of God as anyone else. Not more deserving, but certainly not less deserving than anyone else of all manner of joy and affection. Diminishing ourselves, thinking others somehow more worthy than we are, is really dissing God’s work.
I know one of the ways this operates in my life is when I consider working on a script honoring the talent God gave me with words. It’s an entirely different dynamic when I was trying to wring a result out of it that would “make me happy” or rich or validated. That’s would be great, but it’s no longer the motivation. The joy of the creative process is the cake, the rest just potential icing.
We don’t have to learn to love ourselves as much to get out of the way of the love that’s there. We block it, constantly, making a decision we are unworthy of it because we’re replaying some long ago tape.
Anyway, the answer to your question is no reason at all Just don’t confuse self-love with treating yourself to things when you can’t afford them. That’s just rationalization.

By: Stephanie

Stephanie — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 02:17:32 +0000

Talk about judging ones self, jeez, that’s all I do lately. Can’t everyone see what a fuck up I am? I pray that I am able to see myself for what I truely am one day soon. A loving mother, a trustworthy friend and a beautiful woman….