The skills that I have learnt in the last 10 years have given me more fulfillment and happiness than all that I had learnt in the previous 28 years of my life. Some people call that evolution or growing up. While others have called it finding yourself. I question these definitions. I honestly feel, if I knew then what I know now, then I would have been way more happier in the precious years of my youth. And by knowing I don't mean some secret formula or theory but essential skills that I have learnt and practice daily now. Skills that I wish I had learnt through my education or through my parents. According to me the most essential skills that are needed for us to live a fulfilled and happy life can be broadly grouped into these categories. Love - The art of loving ourselves and others Happiness - The skill to activate happiness Purpose - The answer to why I am here Today I will share with you what I learnt about “love” and how it transformed the quality of my life and my relationships. The most precious kind of love that we must get familiar with is the one that we feel for ourselves. The concept of self-love was so foreign to me as a teenager and young adult. All I could feel was self-doubt when someone criticized me and happiness when someone approved or appreciated me. This dependency on others to make me feel loved and special was devastating for my spirit. I would feel the highest of emotion which felt like I was floating through air or I would feel so low that it felt like the world around me was crashing down. At rock bottom, I had a glimmer of hope when I read Dr Wayne Dyers
“ Your erroneous zones” That book resonated so much with me, I felt for the first time that I had the power to control my emotions, that what I felt did not have to be dictated by the people around me and how they behaved with me. I felt liberated. That started my internal journey to discover for myself how I could love, appreciate and validate myself without any external influence. I started by playing around with affirmations which are just powerful statements that declare to the universe what your state of being is.
For me, they also were new thoughts that I was saying to myself to alter my state of being to that of someone who felt loved and appreciated. So affirmations need not start with what feels like the truth to you, but they do become just that “Your truth” I said to myself often through the day, that “ I love myself”, “ I appreciate myself” ‘ I approve of me”, “I am special” This is, way before I became spiritual. What I learned much later in life when I started to understand that we are more spirit and less physical made me feel even more deeply that I am loved and I am special. The other thing I reminded myself often was that when someone who I love, hurts me , it's still my choice to get hurt or not. Let me explain, our natural state of being is of love and happiness. When we observe something in our reality that makes us hurt or sad, that's because the feedback we are giving ourselves about the situation is making us feel sad. In other words what we think about the situation is what makes us sad or happy. Now, what really made me feel empowered was the notion that I could choose to control my thoughts that were running through my head. At no point would I blame or doubt myself when someone would say something hurtful to me or when I would fail at something I was trying to achieve. I just fed the thought to myself, that “ I am worthy” and “ I am special”. No matter what the situation was. With time I started to really feel the love that I initially was just declaring to the universe. And I remember, when, for the first time I could feel myself really happy and floating through life as a result of my inner dialogue with myself, I felt so strong and empowered. I had done it myself. I was happy and felt loved because - I was loving myself, and I was stubbornly consistent and I was reliable. It felt great. As I reduced my dependency on other people and things to make me feel loved, I felt more stable, more balanced and life became more harmonious. Some of the other tools and processes I used to love myself even more were Meditation Healing your inner child Building a connection with my higher self that filled me with more love for myself and others. Gratitude for my body and what my body does for me. The process of loving yourself is natural and organic for you and that is why it is not hard. Though it does take time and an investment of energy to be consistent and make that a habit for yourself. If you need support and want to learn how to love yourself even more, then reach out to me at nikky@happydayscoaching.com