When I enthusiastically retired in late 2009 I had a lot of things planned for the first year and the luxury of not having a daily schedule beyond excited me. I visited Mother in Texas, went to Hong Kong for two weeks with my sisters, enjoyed a two week car trip from New Orleans to Jacksonville, Fla., with a friend, another trip back to Texas when Mom was ill and yet another when she died. In spite of the busyness of the year I still had plenty of time to realize that I’d retired far earlier than my financial circumstances realistically permitted and that there are lots of hours in the day to use.
I was so needy of a period of time to recover from years of life, I wasn’t too concerned about rushing into anything; be it a part time job or volunteerism and I soon run out of travel resources. So I read and read and read. One of my retirement gifts was a Kindle and I loved it. Having at my fingertips almost any book I could think of and immediately played right into my love of reading and my compulsivity. It became very expensive as I was downloading 2 to 3+ books a week. (Get a friend to share books on your reader). While looking through the 175, 178 books listed under Religion and Spirituality in the online bookstore, I came across, Louise Hay’s, You Can Heal Your Life. I’d heard about her books for years but for some reason had never read. I quickly downloaded and soon understood why this book had come to my attention now. “When the student is ready, the teacher is there”. I was ready, and Louise, the teacher was there. The premise of the book is about learning to love self. One of the exercises is to use a hand held mirror, look into your eyes and say, “I love you Liz and I accept you exactly as you are”. What the heck, I had the time and the mirror and I knew there was plenty of evidence that I’d never really learned to love me. And here’s how it went. I looked into the mirror and said, “I love you Liz and I accept you exactly as you are”. And then immediately I said, “Wow, you need a facial, some of those blackheads look like they’ve been there for years and do something about those teeth!” An important part of the exercise was not to criticize myself at all. Suddenly this was getting much more difficult. But I was committed to giving this an honest effort and for the next few days, several times a day; I repeated the mantra while looking into the mirror. Stopping years and years of self-criticism was the most difficult part of the exercise, but I persevered. On about the 10th day of this practice, I looked into the mirror and said, “I love you, Liz and…..and then I started to sob. “I don’t even know what I love and accept myself means”. When the wracking sobs stopped, I started writing what I thought loving me might mean. And this is the list I came up with.
I Affirm me.
I Appreciate me
I Approve of me
I Believe In Me
I Care for me
I Champion me
I am Compassionate to me
I encourage me
I take the steps necessary to energize me
I enjoy me
I forgive me
I lift me up
I listen to me
I am Kind to me
I nourish me
I nurture me
I am patient with me
I please me
I respect me
I speak well of me
I support me
I am generous to me
I am giving to me
I am kind to me
I am pleasant to me
I am tender with me
I became more comfortable with the exercise and could actually look into the mirror and not even see all the things I’d spent a great deal of time criticizing. That was a huge step forward. When I’d forget what loving myself meant, I could always refer to my list. However, old, entrenched habits die hard and I needed to add to the mirror work.
Recalling the effectiveness of religions creating an oft repeated Creed for the purpose of training minds and hearts to take on and in a particular set of beliefs, I created my own Creed. It’s lengthy and covers everything I could think of to help me love me. Year one I read that daily and the more difficult the day, the more times a day I read it. I always, always felt better when reading it. I tried not to have an expectation of what the outcome of learning to love me would be. For the time being, I just had to trust that it was a good thing and so the outcome would also be good. I did wonder how I would know when I actually loved myself. Would I feel something? Would I look different? Would the weight I’ve wanted to shed for years magically melt away? Would I suddenly embrace exercise and a healthy diet? Would I smile more? Would I be kinder? It was still a mystery what healthy self-love looked or felt like.
There were certainly times when feeling dark or blue or unworthy showed up. Thomas Moore’s, Dark Night of the Soul, helped me to understand that the dark side is part of the human condition. However, I chose to believe that the more I loved me, the less the dark side would show up. The dark can be very seductive and I had to think about whether or not I wanted to go there. I determined that I did not and could actually quickly pull myself from the ditch.
After 6 months or so of the practices I realized that I felt good, day after day, week after week, month after month. Wow, this must be a manifestation of loving me and a good one at that. It sometimes felt strange and uncomfortable to feel good all the time since that had not been my history and there were times I struggled with that, strange as that sounds. I had to make a choice that it was ok to feel good; I was worthy of that.
To Be Continued....
