What is loving yourself? Perhaps the best answer comes from learning what it is not.
It is not egotism or conceit. It is not telling the world to admire you. It is not an advertising campaign. Those behaviors are theatrical, invented, and only convince the naïve. Observant people will quickly recognize such attempts to win attention and approval for what they are. A pose cannot substitute for poise. The results you strive for, respect and self-respect, can not come from such methods.
Self-Deprecation is another behavior that will not work. It will only lead to self-contempt, because it is a behavior motivated by the desire to gain attention. It is merely another attempt to gain the spotlight, to be "center-stage." This is true even if the audience is only one person, and even when the reaction is unfavorable. It is destructive in another way, as well. If it started out as some sort of game to fool people into recognizing your "obvious" virtues by comparing them to your equally "obvious" flaws, your insincerity will soon be detected. In a short time the very people you wish to impress will begin to distrust you in other matters and judgements.
Self-pity is another easy way to let yourself down. In effect, you are saying to yourself and to others that you are not equal to the job of living. When you say "Poor me. The world takes advantage of me," you are really saying, "I don’t think enough of myself to take care of myself. The world ought to do it for me." The world, in its turn, is perfectly willing to accept your own assessment and reply: "You don’t think very much of yourself? Perhaps you are right!"
Nothing succeeds better
than accepting yourself as you are,
a person with presence and potential.
Your presence and your potential are really the same thing. You are living NOW. In this day. This hour. This minute. This second. Yesterday is a settled debt. Whether it is paid in full or only in part, you will not receive anything more from it. Tomorrow is an I.O.U., a non-negotiable promissory note that exists only "on paper." The only real time you have to work with is Today.
As you live through Today you make decisions that will affect your life. And making decisions is unavoidable. Even deciding not to make a decision is a decision – a decision not to change.
The most important decision you can make is to care about yourself.
That is the first decision!
That is the big decision! You must say to yourself something like "I need me. I am the only me I’ve got. My life affects other lives. I, therefore, am going to be the best I can be for myself and for the world. I am going to be the sculptor of my individuality. I will discover my talents and then I will not hide my talents. Rather, I will invest my talents wisely. I am going to dismiss the clouds that surround me so that I can let my light be seen."
Who are you? The answer to that is the answer to some other questions: How do you define yourself? Who do you want to be? What will you do to achieve that goal? Only you can answer these questions. Remember, you are "given" very little: your height, the color of your skin, your gender are unchangeable for the most part. But almost everything else is chosen. Externally you can now choose your weight, your hair color, the shape of your nose, even the color of your eyes thanks to contact lenses. Of far greater importance, you can choose things like a caring disposition and a kind heart. You have to see your potential and become the sculptor of your individuality.
Michaelangelo made his magnificent sculpture of David out of materials that had been rejected by other sculptors. What they saw was imperfect stone he saw as the raw material of a masterpiece because he took the time to truly examine it. Will you reject the material you are made of before you have investigated it with a truly open mind? The other sculptors saw only the limitations in the stone. But the limitations weren’t in the stone. The limitations were in their imaginations, their experiences, their vision. Michaelangelo didn’t even see the stone. He saw the figure inside the stone waiting to be released. He was a great artist. So must you be. You can never be Michaelangelo. But, remember, he could never be you, either.
Life is an ever changing scene. Little choices, made in an instant, can have a profound effect. An engineer moves a pencil a hair off in drawing his plans and a road goes to the wrong town. You are the engineer of your road of fate. Your every decision can make a big difference in who you are, who you want to be, and most important of all = the reality of your situation.
I remember seeing a little sign once. It said something like" "I must be great, ‘cause God don’t make no junk!" Another sign I saw, which should go right next to the first is: "Be patient, God’s not finished with me yet." In both cases I saw the signs in places where they were obviously meant to be read by children. But we must never stop being in a sense like children. We must always be open, eager, and ready to live. We must always bear in mind that we are "not finished, yet." The potential for growth is never-ending unless we shut the door on ourselves and block the way.
Even as we hold on to the spirit of being a child in certain ways, so, too, must we be good parents to ourselves. A good parent recognizes dangers a child may not see and grasps opportunities a child might miss. A good parent loves the child for itself and its individuality, guiding it without stifling the spirit of adventure, fun and creativity, and the channeling it out of unsafe expression. A good parent does not overprotect but is there to dust off the child after a spill and set him on the right track, again, and again, and again.
When the ever-learning, ever-striving, child in us appears to fail, we must see the failure through our parental eyes and pick ourselves up and start again. A baby learning to walk does not see the inevitable falls as failure. To the baby, falling down is not something to stand in the way of learning. On the contrary, it is part of the basic learning process of standing up. Just as we must be innocent with ourselves, so must we be persistent.
We are not ever, any of us, completely "finished" – not as long as we are alive Today.
The above is an excerpt from It's Yours For The Asking, by Dr. Oscar Bekoff
Second Edition Copyright 1999 Dr. Oscar Bekoff
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced, in whole or in part, in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the author. Address inquiries to Oscar Bekoff, Ph. D., Litt. D..
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