Loving Yourself - Step 8

As I go through these steps, trying to spell out what I need in my own life in these blogs, they get more difficult.   I guess it is like life.  Step 8 is harder than step 7 and so forth.

To review:   The steps covered so far.
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1. To admit we are powerless over what others think of us.
2. To come to believe that a Power greater than ourselves loves us regardless of anything we do.
3. To make a decision to see ourselves as that higher power of unconditional love sees us.
4. To Make a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
5. To Admit to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the ways we limit loving ourselves.
6. To face these limits, work through our fears in order to love ourselves.
7. To humbly ask that greater power to open our hearts to the love in our lives.
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Step 8:  To make a list of all the times we have harmed ourselves and forgive ourselves for them.

This step is different in several ways from the others.   It is the first time that we take action to prevent Guilt and Shame ruling our lives and preventing us and others from loving us.


Guilt and shame do not have a place in loving ourselves.   This is because both emotions motivate us to remove those thoughts that create the guilt and shame in the first place.   The faster the better.   Usually, this causes us to deny or ignore these thoughts or actions.  Thus, our ability to assess and address our moments of self-harm are short-circuited.

The only way to prevent that guilt and shame from doing this with all of our thoughts about how we may have harmed ourselves in the past, is to reveal and redress them.


1.  Reveal the harm we may have caused ourselves.

Self-harm in this sense does not mean intentionally injuring bodily tissues.   However, it may include this if it is part of your list.   What it does mean is any emotional, spiritual, mental or physical harm to self in which you  have intentionally participated.

When we make a list of those times we participated in self-harm there are a couple of things we need to keep in mind.


a.  Be firm but compassionate with ourselves.
b.  Avoid wallowing in guilt.
c.  Do not be obsessive.
d.  Do not become unduly entangled in irrelevancies or imagined shortcomings.
e.  In a quiet frame of mind, bring up these memories without emotion or self-judgment.
f.  The overall goal is to make our lists from a place of peace, acceptance, and compassion for ourselves.


We need to be open to that Greater Power as we work this step. Often, our tendency is to feel guilty about everything we've ever done and anyone we've come in contact with. Much of what we're feeling  is undeserved guilt.  If we find ourselves enmeshed in this, we go back to Step 2, and remember that we are loved unconditionally, regardless of what we have ever done.

It is also a good idea to set a specified time to work on this list.   Allow no more than 45 minutes or an hour at any one time to go through this.   By spacing these times out we may prevent becoming obsessive about it.

We also need to be open to others, friends during this process.   Sometimes, we need to share what we have uncovered so see if they are actual moments of harmful behavior or if they are based on irrelevancies or irrational imaginings.

The most important thing to remember is to come from a place of peace and acceptance, and if leave this state, to stop and take time to bring us back to this state of reflection.

2.  Redress the harm we may have caused ourselves.

This Step calls for a change of heart. It asks us to drop our defenses, our protective devices, and to begin to seek peace and healing in our perceptions and relationship with ourselves.


In this way we can go down that list we have made and truly forgive ourselves for those actions.  Healing begins within us. It begins with a thought, a vision, a feeling of willingness. A process of healing and love begins when we make the decision to take care of ourselves and to come to a place of peace and acceptance for that younger self who participated in those behaviors.


Take this Step as soon as possible after making your list. Take it whenever bitterness, resentment, victimization, or fear enter in. Take it whenever we seek and desire peace and healing with ourselves and with others. We do not have to do this step too soon. We do not have to do it until we are ready. But we must do it to continue growing in self-love.
 
The end product of Step 8 is to reduce the guilt and blame we carry.  By taking responsibility, we get out of the victim role, and start seeing ourselves as co-authors, with that Greater Power, of our lives.

Loving Yourself - Step 7

On the continuing epic of Loving Yourself, here is the 7th installment.

To review:   The steps covered so far.
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1. To admit we are powerless over what others think of us.
2. To come to believe that a Power greater than ourselves loves us regardless of anything we do.
3. To make a decision to see ourselves as that higher power of unconditional love sees us.
4. To Make a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
5. To Admit to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the ways we limit loving ourselves.
6. To face these limits, work through our fears in order to love ourselves.

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Step 7. To humbly ask that greater power to open our hearts to the love in our lives.


In step 6, the need to include a Higher Power in any solution for dealing with the fears in our lives was addressed.   Step 7, actually trusting in that Higher Power to replace those root fears with the love we need to overcome them.


As part of a solution to overcome fears, not only is there a need for us to Choose to deal with them, but to Choose to believe that the love we need to address these fears is there, is available, is accessible.   That takes faith.   Perhaps the most difficult thing to do is to trust, to have faith in the Higher Power's ability to do this.


On the one hand, we have come to a point where we are ready to face our limitation on loving ourselves.  However, let me reiterate to myself, that only with the faith and behaviors which come out of that faith in a Higher Power will allow me to overcome my fears.


How do we have faith?


Wow.  This is a difficult question.   There is no easy answer to have faith.   However, there is a way to act as if we have faith.   If we tell ourselves that if we had faith, our solution to our fears would work in such and such a way.   Then, instead of dwelling on not having faith, we put that solution to work as if we already did have that faith.


To illustrate this, let's go back to my fear of not being loved.   This is a basic and root fear that strikes many many people.  I know from step 6, that the solution must include acting as if I am loved, regardless of the situation.  I know that I cannot do this.   I can choose to have faith that God will open up my heart and let me experience being loved, at any time, in any circumstance.

So instead of telling myself that I am loved, then trying to act toward others and myself that I am loved, I do the reverse.  I start by acting as if I am loved, and behaving as if I am always loved by that Higher Power.   Then my behaviors will start to convince my thoughts that this state of being loved is real.  Thus, behaviors affect thoughts which affect emotions, which affect thoughts, which affect behaviors.

The Higher Power is asked to help me act as if I have faith in that greater love, and again is asked to help my thoughts change to reflect those behaviors, and again asked to help change my emotions to reflect my thoughts.

This is such an important step in the 12-steps that I want to delineate it again, using thought, emotion and behavior.

Thoughts
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We can change our thoughts before our behaviors, but there are some things we must keep in mind.

1.  Our thoughts have an inertia.   Thinking in one way or another can create a pattern, a habit of thinking which can sometimes be very difficult to break.
2.  Sometimes thoughts are best changed by using some other tool than our own mind.  We can think differently.   Don't get me wrong.   Usually it just takes less effort to change some other experience and let our thoughts build and change off of that.
3.  By choosing to act differently, our mind has less opportunity to sabotage or own effort to change our thoughts.  This also means that we have less defenses up in relation to including God in all these efforts.

Emotions
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Our emotions change as we see the results of our different actions, alternate behaviors.   They also are reinforced by our changing thoughts.  The word "emotion" contains the root "motion". This is because emotions are motivating; they exist to push or lure us to move towards things we feel good about, and to want to avoid or escape from things we feel badly about.  In this context, we need to be aware of the following:

1.  Because emotions motivate us to behave in particular ways, sometimes with such intensity that thoughts and other rational considerations are pushed aside, the risk in dealing soley with them is that we end up behaving in ways we know are bad for us.

2.  Again, by using our behaviors to change our emotions, they become a thermostat, a yardstick, a measure of the degree to which we start to believe that we are being loved; that our actions are having the desired affect.   

Behaviors
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Just as behaviors can affect thoughts and emotions, so to do our changing thoughts and emotions change our behaviors.  It is a cycle that can begin at any point, but by beginning with behaviors, we are acting, we are doing, we are creating our actions.   This anyone can do.   Anyone can change a behavior.   You just act differently.   Not everyone can change or even knows how to change a thought, or choose to feel an emotion.

In my own case,
I act as if I am loved.  Therefore, in any situation where I would have acted like I had the fear of not being loved, I choose to act differently.   Once I am acting as if I do not have a fear of being loved, how I relate to others, and how other relate to me change.   These changes spark my emotions and thoughts to change.   These changes reinforce my behavior, and so on.

To place that Higher Power in context again:

1.  God provides the framework, the reinforcement, the ability to start changing our behaviors.
2.  God again is the conduit through which are behaviors start changing our thoughts.
3.  When our thoughts change, God again is the channel through which our emotions are sparked, changed.

This 7th step is the most challenging.   It actually asks for us to act as if we have faith in that Higher Power.   It asks that we behave in a way different than we may have ever done.

Loving Yourself - Step 6

I am finally on Step 6 of this 12-part blog.   Hope you enjoy.


To review:   The steps covered so far.
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1. To admit we are powerless over what others think of us.
2. To come to believe that a Power greater than ourselves loves us regardless of anything we do.
3. To make a decision to see ourselves as that higher power of unconditional love sees us.
4. To Make a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
5. To Admit to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the ways we limit loving ourselves.
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Step 6:  To face these limits, work through our fears in order to love ourselves.

So; why is step 6 and 7 separate?  It may seem that once we uncover our limitations, share them with others, become accountable, then we should go directly that higher power to overcome these limits, right?

Not so fast!   (I keep telling myself this!)

First, we must reflect on what fears define these limits.   Next, we take a look at what is necessary to overcome them.  Finally, we see how we and God can be a part of these solutions.   

For example, in middle school I was a geek and slightly overweight.   This is a deadly combination.    I was called every name in the book, made fun of, and developed a very poor self-image.   I could take this through all the steps, but what the moral inventory made me see about it was that this was based on the fear of not being loved by others.   This feeling, to a greater or lesser degree has been with me since then.

Reflecting on the fear of not being loved, what do I have control over; what can I do individually to address this problem?   What can others do?  What part needs to be given over a Higher Power?  

Individually, I have the choice on what to do with this feeling of not being loved, or the fear of such.   I can choose to feel it.   To spend my time and energy on re-experiencing these feelings, and dredging up memories which reinforce this.   Or, I could choose to seek the opinions and help of others, and that higher power.

That is it really.   The one thing I can always do with whatever limitation, fear, or obstacle is to CHOOSE how to respond to it.   The most important thing is to CHOOSE!

Now, I can take this fear and see how God can be a part of the solution.   The major thing I must caution against in this step is the tendency to think we can make those changes on our own.

Let's face it, this all ties back to the previous steps.   Besides the choice to do something about the fear, we need something to connect to that enables us, empowers us to follow through with that choice.   In this way, we become co-creators of our lives with God.

I have made the choice that I will turn back to what I know God see's in me, the degree to which God loves me, and uses others to continue to remind me of this.   God is always in my mind as I choose to overcome that fear of not being loved.   God is indelibly part of that process and never separate.

At the end of this step, I have the realization that my part in the process is to choose to overcome these fears and to choose to include God in every process.   When this happens, we are ready for the next step, actually welcoming that Higher Power in these processes.

Loving Yourself - Step 5

I know it has been a week, but this 12 part blog takes a lot of reflection before I even power up the computer.  

To review:   The steps covered so far.
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1. To admit we are powerless over what others think of us.
2. To come to believe that a Power greater than ourselves loves us regardless of anything we do.
3. To make a decision to see ourselves as that higher power of unconditional love sees us.
4. To Make a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
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Step 5:  To Admit to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the ways we limit loving ourselves.

In order to start step 5, like step 4, it is a requirement to have at least reflected on the first four steps.  This is because, even though in step 4, we start taking a moral inventory of ourselves, this is just really just the prerequisite to bringing out what we find in that inventory and start doing something about it.

The core concern of step 5 is to bring out into the open the limits we find within ourselves that prevent us from experiencing unconditional love.   While this step is separated in three different declarations, it is really voicing those limitations to the agents, the powers, the players that affect and are affected my those limitations.   In other words, by speaking our limitations to God (the source of unconditional love), ourselves (the source of our limitations) and others (the mirror held before us to reveal the effects of both the unconditional love we experience and the limitations to that love we still have) we have brought those things into the light of day, given them a reality apart from ourselves.

1.  We admit our limitations at self-loving to God.

This is really the first time in the 12-step process that our Ego is addressed.  I am assuming that in step 1, 2, 3, and 4, we have come to understand truly that the only yardstick for unconditional love must be something greater than ourselves.   We all fall short of that love.  It is only feeding our ego if we believe otherwise.   We all fall short of that love.   In fact, we will always fall short of unconditional love, but, in the process, may increasingly love ourselves throughout the rest of our lives.

We admit to this greater power that we have a limitation.   This diffuses the ego.   It helps to prevent such ego-saving defenses such as denial, rationalization, repression, and blame (projecting to others).

This is a continuing process.  Everytime the ego comes up and tries to defend itself, we must again voice this reality that our limitations are actually our limitations.   Revealed humbly in all honesty.

2.  We admit our limitations at self-loving to ourselves.

So, we have redefined our limitations in the face of God, and now we admit to ourselves those redefined limitations to our-self.   Why?  


It may seem like we are playing hot-potato with the results of our moral inventory.  We are simply seeing that limitation to loving from the vantage point of that greater power, and then back to our point of perception.   This allows a realistic appraisal to begin of that limitation.  However, there is one more step to balance that point of perception.

3.  We admit our limitations at self-loving to another human-being.

We have identified a limitation.   Sharing it with a greater power has de-fanged our ego.  Now we tell it back to ourselves, ego-free (or at least ego-limited).   Now we must share it with another.   This is really difficult because we risk, for the first time, rejection.   The other we share it with may be someone we trust, so that risk is reduced.   It may be your best-friend or priest, or Imam or whatever.   The point of this step is to make a public declaration that we are aware of this limitation to loving ourselves.   For the first time, it makes us accountable to another.   Not that we have promised anything at this step, but rather, another now knows that we are becoming aware of our limitations.   They become a reminder to us that we have begun this process, and a reinforcement to continue it.

As an example of this; when I uncovered the reasons that I limit my own success.  I realized I am not afraid of success.   I am afraid of hard work and additional responsibilities, because I might fail.   This prevents me from expressing the gifts and talents, the works of which I am capable, and thus limits my own view of myself, my own self-love.   Many times, I came to this realization, but my ego instantly started making excuses for this.   I told myself for years that I did not need to be successful.   I didn't need a nice house, or great job, or many friends, or a good vehicle, or good family relationships, or any other relationships for that matter.   At other times, my ego rationalized my situation.   I was not in the position to be successful.   I didn't have enough money, power, prestige, self-confidence.   There was too much risk involved.   Trust me.   The ego can always come up with excuses to protect itself from any kind of criticism, including that from others and from yourself.   Once I shared this with God, I found that the more times I came to God, the less excuses I had, and the clearer my real fear and limitation became.   When I shared this with another friend, she validated that I, indeed, was facing this realistically.   Now when I talk to her, I am always reminded to talk from the real limitation, the real problem.   Then solutions that are created deal with the real limitation.

Loving Yourself - Step 4

Once more, another installment of the Loving Yourself 12 Step blog.

To review:   The steps covered so far.
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1. To admit we are powerless over what others think of us.
2. To come to believe that a Power greater than ourselves loves us regardless of anything we do.
3. To make a decision to see ourselves as that higher power of unconditional love sees us.

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Step 4:  To make a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.

Why is this step step 4?   Why does it have to come after step 1, 2 and 3?   It is impossible to see ourselves in an honest and searching way without having the conviction that we and our self-worth have nothing to do with what others say, do or feel toward us and that we can, through choice, believe and feel that we are unconditionally loved.

The first part of this moral inventory is looking at ourselves.  Through the conviction of being unconditionally loved, this allows us to see where we do not measure up to our own greatest vision of ourselves, without spiraling out of control, down a slippery slope of self-blame, guilt or fear.  Beginning this process always brings up uncomfortable realizations, painful revelations. 

Without the the choice to believe in unconditional love we receive, those feelings will engender some blame, or self-criticism.   Instead of continuing the process of a moral inventory, we stop and retreat, we deny and repress, and feel even worse about ourselves.   The choice to see ourselves through the eyes of love allow us to feel those feelings and yet continue on, because we know that this is part of a process to make ourselves better.

Once we look at these qualities and actions within ourselves that are in conflict with our highest vision of who we wish to be, then we need feedback from others, to see if they are true shortcomings or irrational and untrue perceptions we have created.

For example, I have always seen myself as possessing a brilliant mind.   Looking at myself with honest eyes, I see that I am not as smart as I had always thought.  When I asked on of my genius friends, she agreed with me that I was not in the genius class.   Now, I could have thrown that back in her face, or denied it, thinking that she just didn't know me, but rather, I accepted it and saw that she was right.   

A door opened then to see that I had used the approval from others having to do with my intelligence to feed my self-esteem.   Therefore, I exaggerated my language, my manners, my conversation in such a way to highlight my intelligence.   I purposely cultivated this veneer of being a genius and (unconsciously) being better than anyone else in this way.  In the process, I was removing myself from others, making it harder to get to know me, and keeping people at arm's distance.   It was actually sabotaging my desire to be liked and accepted by others.  It was an unrealistic and irrational way to base my behavior.  Now, I can be sometimes smart and sometimes stupid, sometimes complex and ofttimes simple with people, and it feels much more natural, much more like me.

Sometimes, that moral inventory brings up things with which we are not able to deal.   Some things, some memories, some actions may require more than just ourselves. We can feel those overpowering feelings, feel anxious, even feel paralyzed if the issues are outside of our realm of coping.   This is when we need additional help, sometimes professional help.

This process can take a long time.   In fact, in some ways, it never ends.   But, it is the most important step to further our love for ourselves.  

Loving Yourself - Step 3

This is the third installment of the Loving Yourself 12 Step blog.

To review:   The steps covered so far.
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1. To admit we are powerless over what others think of us.
2. To come to believe that a Power greater than ourselves loves us regardless of anything we do.
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Step 3:    Make a decision to see ourselves as that higher power of unconditional love sees us.

In step 2, the primary decision is to believe that there is a Power greater than myself that unconditionally loves me.  Step 3 is the decision to see myself as that power sees me.   This is much more challenging than step 2.

How do we see ourselves?   What influences shape what we see in the mirror?   What we feel in our heart?

It is so difficult because most of my views of myself have come from other people.   People have told me that I was cute, ugly, old, young, intelligent, stupid, visionary, head in the clouds, from another planet, good-smelling, bad-smelling, funny, sad.   I mean, with all the feedback I get from other people, who the hell should I think I am?  It is very confusing.

If you think about it, we are called every name in the book, every adjective in the language.   So why do we pay attention to some of these things and not others?  It is based on what image we have of ourselves.   In this case, to what we listen, pay attention, and believe that others have said about us match up with what we believe to exist in ourselves.  At the same time, what others say about us creates our self image.


Doesn't this seem like a crazy thing?   How I see myself shapes what and who  I listen to and what and who I listen to shapes how I see myself.

I have gone through periods in my life where I thought I was a wonderful conversationalist.   The few times that friends or acquaintances have said that I was hard to understand, wasn't communicating, or just wasn't making a connection with them, I ignored.   This wasn't the match for image I had of myself, so I shrugged it off.  On the other hand, I never considered myself that spiritual until enough people told me and showed me that I was always in touch with the idea of a greater power, and a world of belief and spirituality.   As this reinforcement continued, I believed even more that I was spiritually minded.

Why is it important to point these things out when I am talking about loving yourself and seeing yourself from the perspective of unconditional love?

Seeing yourself from the perspective of one who unconditionally loves you, helps to filter the feedback from others into the best, first image you have of yourself.   


When we see ourselves in relation to the other people in our life, it is very easy to get into a destructive cycle of accepting the criticism of others and then to be self-critical, causing our self-image to be more receptive to the criticism of others.   In fact, it may get to the point that we start taking the positive responses of others and twisting them to reinforce our own self-critical perception of ourselves.   It is a deadly cycle that ends in a fractured self and, more often than not, depression, despair, etc.

What is great about starting with a structure that is based on seeing us from a perspective of unconditional love is that when we receive criticism, or even neutral responses from people, they are now examined in light of the choice to see them and accept them through the lenses of that love.  In this structure, forgiveness, acceptance, healthy reflection and contemplation can occur instead of self-criticism, self-hate, injured feelings, shame or guilt.

More conscious and reflective self-evaluation stops the immediate and impulsive interpretation of other's views about you from being irrational, unrealistic, uninformed, and damaging.

Choosing to believe and see yourself through the eyes of unconditional love allow you to contemplate and process the opinions and feedback from others, without it becoming an immediate self-criticism or with us rejecting neutral or even good feedback outright. 

If I believe that I am loved, and that nothing and no one can stop or alter that unconditional love I receive from that Higher Power, then everything that I am shown from others about myself, looses it's ability to injure, incite, or even influence me unless I choose to allow it.


In addition, from this perspective, the feedback we get from others that is not in conjuction with our opinion of ourselves can be contemplated.   I see myself as having these qualities, but this other person shows me that their perceptions do not match up.   Is it true?   If it is, does it show me that while I am intending to be this way, I can be better.   Notice I do not use self-criticism.   I do not tell myself how stupid I am for not being where I wish to be.   Since this feedback does not attack my ego, and the reassurance of love give me patience with myself, I have the time and emotional-distance enough to really process these things.   Are they true?   Do they show me ways that I can be even better than I am now?