So now that you understand what areas of your life you are struggling with because of a lack of self-love and you already have started cancelling out the self-criticism. You are now ready to dig a little deeper and understand self-worth (worthiness) and how it is part and parcel of self-love.
What I learnt through my sessions with Simone, was no matter how you phrase it – “I am not smart enough.” “I think I am ugly.” “I am such a bad mom.” – they all boil down to one ‘lie’ we keep feeding ourselves “I am not good enough.” Or “I am not worthy.”
I am so guilty of this and telling myself this multiple times every day. Now I understand why I have not achieved the goals I so desperately want to reach,of course I have failed at certain tasks – how was I ever going to succeed when I was telling myself all the time I was not good enough or worthy of that happiness. We all do this! If this was your husband or someone close to you telling you this daily it would be deemed emotional abuse and yet – we emotionally abuse ourselves all day long, every day of our lives.
This was so incredibly profound for me when I realised what I had been doing. It made me very emotional and you may be getting emotional at this point as well and that’s fine. Feel that emotion, breath into it (as Simone would say to me), sit with it, feel where you feel it in your body, place your hand there breathe deeply and release it.
With that, here is your next tool…
THE TOOL – Affirmations
Affirmations are by far my favourite tool! I feel it is so incredibly powerful. It is something you can do multiple times a day wherever you are. What I learnt is the word “not” or any negative language, must never feature in your positive affirmations. The universe doesn’t understand “not” eg. “I will not feel sad today.” The universe only hears “sad” and gives you sadness.
Some good examples of positive affirmations you can repeat at least 5 times a day in a mirror to yourself looking yourself in the eye in the morning and at night are:
- “I love and approve of myself.”
- “I am willing to learn to love and approve of myself.”
- “I am enough.”
Simone says…
Now that we have stopped the bad pattern of mental behaviour (self-criticism) it’s time to plant seeds with a mind programming technique. Now, don’t get flashes of some super government intelligence organisation that uses mind control; I’m taking about a type of mind programming called affirmations.
Let’s use the analogy of the garden. You sub-conscious mind (which is soaking up every thought, positive and negative and turning it into your behaviour) is the garden and this garden has been largely unattended to your whole life. It has some good trees and shrubs and maybe even some flower and fruit baring plants, but it’s also got some weeds, dead trees and poisonous elements. We need to de-weed, prune, trim, and shape the garden. When we stop all self- criticism (see blog post 2) we essentially stop feeding the weeds and negative elements of our garden and starve them out. We want to then plant seeds for what we do want, so that they blossom into the life experience we desire. And so affirmations are seeds, they are positive, present tense, first person statements about what YOU DO WANT (not what you don’t want).
Just like a plant in a garden, when we plant an affirmation we need to nurture our seeds, water, give them sun and air and tend to them. So, practice your affirmations daily. This is one of the simplest ways to start to love yourself; say nice, kind and loving things to yourself. Remember you are the only thinker in your head and you are always listening so make sure you’ve tuned your mind radio to something you’d like to hear.
Our next post follows on Monday 25 June!
Simone Naidoo is the founder and CEO of On Purpose Personal Development. Her approach to personal development is holistic ( IQ & EQ) and as such she is a Life Coach & Inspirational Speaker; Herbalife wellness coach and runs workshops and seminars. Her company’s mission is to help people do their life’s most important work: Figuring out who you are and what your purpose is.
If you would like to get in touch with Simone Naidoo, a qualified life coach, visit her website: www.on-purpose.co.za
Photography: Main Picture – Tegan Smith
Picture of Simone – supplied
