Home cooked meals, water sports and nail polish

[justnothing]

Once again it’s been a long, long time since I last posted anything here, but today I felt like sharing a little positivity. For the record, I feel rather stupid and awkward for doing so because “maybe the nice feeling won’t last long anyway and I’ll just end up looking like an ass spewing sparkles and rainbows all over, only to end up moping like some depressive attention seeking idiot later on”… but here goes anyway.

A few months ago I came to the realization that I’d been neglecting myself all my life in every area. I didn’t bother eating well, dressing well, grooming myself, putting my house in order, etc’ and I realized that this was essentially a continuation of the neglect I experienced as a child. At the time I developed a defense mechanism that said that I “didn’t deserve to be cared for anyway” and that receiving good care “wasn’t important” anyway. As a result I grew up to be the kind of person that never cooked or cleaned because I “didn’t have the energy” and never bought new clothes because it was “a pointless waste of money” and never went to theme parks or the beach or the pool or anywhere because I didn’t have “the time or the money or the energy” and anyway “there was no point”. However, ever since I realized that it all boiled down to self-neglect, I realized that investing time, money and energy into all this stuff (into me, essentially) IS important and that I DO deserve it, just like everybody else deserves good care. I also realized that I’m the one responsible for myself now (as an adult) and as such I need to start being a good parent/partner/friend to myself. As a result I’ve been making a point of taking much better care of myself in all these parameters: I got myself new clothes, started cleaning my place up, engaged in different fun outdoor activities (we’re talking ice skating, bowling, water sports and the like), taking walks and even cooking (as in… actual cooking… not microwaving). The reason for all this – at the risk of sounding like a L'oreal commercial – because I’m worth it .

So anyway today I was standing on a hill (I live in one of those places) and experiencing the wonderful air, the wonderful view and the wonderful breeze and something occurred to me: The way most children learn to see value in themselves, is by observing the value that their caretakers seem to see in them. And the way their caretakers convey that sense of value is mostly through grooming, nurturing and taking good care of their children (mind you… by this I mean also on an emotional level and not just on a “keeping the children fed and clean” level). And I’d noticed that lately I’ve been feeling a lot happier with my life… and not just because of the physical pleasure of better food and theme parks – but because these days I’ve been feeling more “loved and valued” even if the person doing the loving and valuing is myself (actually… maybe in many ways it’s better that it be me than anybody else, as an adult).

And I realized… you know how they say it’s really important to learn to love yourself but never really say how? I mean there are little methods like looking in the mirror and saying nice things to yourself or just saying nice things to yourself regardless of the mirror? Well… I just realized that it’s like with every other relationship… words are nice and dandy but what really counts are actions. You can say “I love you” to someone a million times a day but ultimately it’s just lip service if you never DO anything nice for them. This is especially true for A) children – who are dependent on you to take care of their basic needs, and B) yourself – who is even more dependent on you to take care of all your basic needs.

So yeah… definitely keep on saying nice things to yourself – but remember to back it up with nice things you’ll DO for yourself. I don’t mean draining your bank account to go on wild shopping sprees (which is NOT doing yourself a favor) but at least investing enough in yourself to feel like you matter and (hey, I can’t help it if “L’oreal” have it right) that you’re really worth it.

[eeks]

Once again it’s been a long, long time since I last posted anything here, but today I felt like sharing a little positivity. For the record, I feel rather stupid and awkward for doing so because “maybe the nice feeling won’t last long anyway and I’ll just end up looking like an ass spewing sparkles and rainbows all over, only to end up moping like some depressive attention seeking idiot later on”… but here goes anyway.

Welcome back!  Go ahead and spew as many sparkles and rainbows as you like.  I have in my personal healing process flip flopped between expansiveness and joy, and anxiety almost as a "backlash", so I get it.  These experiences are all part of you, so you are under no obligation to be consistent, just as honest with yourself as you can be

And I realized… you know how they say it’s really important to learn to love yourself but never really say how? I mean there are little methods like looking in the mirror and saying nice things to yourself or just saying nice things to yourself regardless of the mirror? Well… I just realized that it’s like with every other relationship… words are nice and dandy but what really counts are actions. You can say “I love you” to someone a million times a day but ultimately it’s just lip service if you never DO anything nice for them. This is especially true for A) children – who are dependent on you to take care of their basic needs, and B) yourself – who is even more dependent on you to take care of all your basic needs.

So yeah… definitely keep on saying nice things to yourself – but remember to back it up with nice things you’ll DO for yourself. I don’t mean draining your bank account to go on wild shopping sprees (which is NOT doing yourself a favor) but at least investing enough in yourself to feel like you matter and (hey, I can’t help it if “L’oreal” have it right) that you’re really worth it. smiley

So it sounds like, for you, loving actions help you feel loved and cared for.  I'm curious, too, if loving actions, for you, fill a particular "gap" from what you didn't get in childhood?  And maybe someone who received the actions but not the words, for instance, might need to work more on questioning what the inner critic says?

Regardless, the "pattern" that you seem to be describing here of observing yourself, taking actions then checking in with yourself about how those actions affected your thoughts and feelings, is key to personal healing.  Seeing what it is that makes you feel loved and cared for, no matter what anyone else says works for them.  Words?  (which words?)  Actions?  (which actions?)   

[justnothing]

Welcome back!  Go ahead and spew as many sparkles and rainbows as you like.  I have in my personal healing process flip flopped between expansiveness and joy, and anxiety almost as a "backlash", so I get it.  These experiences are all part of you, so you are under no obligation to be consistent, just as honest with yourself as you can be

Hehe, thank you. I had been wondering about the validity of this feeling, knowing that it probably won’t last long, so it’s good to know that going back and forth like that is normal.

So it sounds like, for you, loving actions help you feel loved and cared for.  I'm curious, too, if loving actions, for you, fill a particular "gap" from what you didn't get in childhood?  And maybe someone who received the actions but not the words, for instance, might need to work more on questioning what the inner critic says?

Well yeah, I suppose so... .mind you, my mother did have to work two jobs (being a single mother) and just never had the time or energy…

As for the inner critic… I’m not sure… I used to have an extremely harsh inner critic to the point that I’d actually curse myself several times a day, with the most colorful language, most of the time for virtually no reason. (Well, actually I still tend to do that but much less often). So I’d say one probably has to work on both… I guess the main reason I put so much emphasis on the actions here is because up until now I had never realized just how important they are for healing.