Natural Freedom

Forum for the natural awakening and self-realization of men
It is currently Thu Mar 28, 2024 12:00 pm

All times are UTC+01:00




Post new topic  Reply to topic  [ 14 posts ] 
Author Message
 Post subject: On Liking Yourself
PostPosted: Sat Jul 20, 2013 6:20 pm 
Offline

Joined: Fri Jul 05, 2013 12:11 am
Posts: 2
Whenever I feel uncomfortable or bothered I do a write up session where I write whatever comes to mind. It has the same effect for me as watching my thoughts – I write whatever comes to mind with absolutely no judgement or filtering. This usually leads to very interesting discoveries.

Today I uncovered an important belief but I am now at a standstill. Any advice or discussion from you guys would be appreciated. I am trying to find a different perspective beyond myself.

My apologies for the long ass post. I tried to include the relevant parts of the writing session so you can see where the discovery came from.

“Feeling shitty because I have been in bed all day doing nothing; 13:40 – 15:00. I am avoiding something. I am avoiding packing, just letting my mum do all the work. If I wasn’t older and she wasn’t scared of my reaction then she would be belittling me for this right now. She’s probably thinking how useless I am, how I am lazy and good for nothing. That’s what she used to tell me when I was younger. She used to say I am just like my father: lying around all day doing nothing, with no motivation or drive. If I told her what I was doing this morning – reading subjects that are of interest & meditating – she would probably say I am selfish and don’t care about her; that I have no empathy for others.
Isn’t she right though? Am I not just like my father right now? I spent 2 hours in bed reading articles, looking at artwork, browsing facebook, responding to messages and lost in thought.
(Now I have observed that. So I can simply let it go. I don’t label or judge myself because I realise that the above behaviour is a result of years of programming. This is what I did today; it doesn’t need to become my description of “me”. I am dynamic. I change every day.)

Even if I wakeup tomorrow and everyday for the rest of my life I do exactly what I did this morning, I will still love myself. I will not punish, dislike or get angry at myself. My love is unconditional. My love for myself is unconditional. I don’t have to DO something/anything before I like myself. I love myself because I am.

Belief Revelation:
:arrow: I have to meet a certain criteria before I am allowed to like myself.
This is pure social programming: “You have to be hardworking, successful, good looking, earn so and so before you can be happy” Isn’t that feeling of happiness purely the feeling of self-love and acceptance. Then this belief works by making you a good slave – to your parents and society in general. This has a strong hold, the reason people keep working, aiming for promotions, more money, better gear/possessions, and more people who “like” us, it is all so that one day we can say “oh hey I can like myself now that I have all this stuff” and all of sudden we're happy.
All society’s standards can work from this belief “to like yourself you should look like so and so”

All my life I have been working under the assumption that I need to do and be certain things before I can like myself. That is why I have been working on “improving” myself. Becoming more confident, social, healthier, having more friends, being better looking and getting in better shape. I do all these things to like myself – not out of already liking myself.

The question that popped up
“Why should I just like myself? What have I done/who am I to deserve to like myself”
I can see this belief forming as a result of my parents’ “liking” of me being conditional. If I was behaving well, achieving good grades, doing things to please them etc then I would be treated neutrally/well. But if I didn’t meet the standard then the dislike would be shown very clearly.

Why should I like myself? Because I am myself, I am me. How is it possible to dislike what you are? I have to split myself in to two parts to be able to dislike myself.
I should love myself simply because I am myself. It is my simplest right to like myself.

But what about ego, jealousy, negativity and bad habits such as laziness or over eating. Surely I can’t like or accept myself if the above are a part of me. Why not? Because these are traits of a bad person, if I am a bad person then I can’t like myself.
Vs.
My gut tells me that I should like myself unconditionally. What I feel with conviction is that placing criteria/standards on liking myself is bizarre and unnatural.”

The two paragraphs above show the conflict that I am experiencing. My apologies if the post is hard to follow or understand. It is a pure stream of consciousness and I’ve never before attempted to explain this to someone else. Thank you for taking the time to read


Top
   
 Post subject: Re: On Liking Yourself
PostPosted: Sat Jul 20, 2013 7:34 pm 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Thu Sep 13, 2012 11:07 pm
Posts: 589
Location: The side of a mountain somewhere...
Welcome to the forum nawras. You've come to the right place.

Journaling is a great thing to do, especially when you are being triggered by something. I have done it off and on for 10 years now, and it has always been valuable.

----------
nawras wrote:
Even if I wakeup tomorrow and everyday for the rest of my life I do exactly what I did this morning, I will still love myself. I will not punish, dislike or get angry at myself. My love is unconditional. My love for myself is unconditional. I don’t have to DO something/anything before I like myself. I love myself because I am.
These words sound nice, but they are rooted in ego. You are talking about an egoic "love" here. Egoic love cannot be unconditional love - ego is inherently divisive, always creating us vs. them, right vs. wrong, acceptable vs. unacceptable.

Something I got from GP Walsh is that true unconditional love is 100% acceptance of what is. This includes not just the egoic "you", but also your parents, your experience, the world around you, society, everything.

If you accept everything as it is, then you will not feel conflict over accepting (or "loving", or "liking") yourself. Try it - spend a few minutes just doing nothing, just accepting everything as it is. Allow everything that is to be, everything that happens to happen, every thought that comes up to come up. Just allow it all, as it is, and see what its like to sit with that perspective.
nawras wrote:
The question that popped up
“Why should I just like myself? What have I done/who am I to deserve to like myself”
Should vs. should not is not a particularly useful dichotomy.

The better question is do you reject reality as it is, or do you accept reality as it is. Accepting it means you also accept yourself...

_________________
"The society gives you a map; I give you only freedom. The society gives you character, I give you only consciousness. The society teaches you to live a conformist life ... I give you an invitation to go on an adventure." - Osho


Top
   
 Post subject: Re: On Liking Yourself
PostPosted: Sat Jul 20, 2013 9:09 pm 
Offline

Joined: Sat Feb 18, 2012 3:11 am
Posts: 823
+1 Meraki.

The FEELING of self acceptance does not come from, and is not rooted in the discriminating mind that prefers one thing over an another.

It is simply a different mechanism. You can be full of self acceptance, which is a feeling and a direct, experience based KNOWING of who you are -- and at the same time use the discriminating mind to see something about your body/behavior/patterns etc you would like to change and change them.

They function separately, are developed differently, and there is no conflict here. It's quite simple-- but seeing them as the same thing has led to literally millions of pages and recordings of mental masturbation on the topic, and lots of self help courses etc.

Focus on the feeling. You can't think your way into feeling self acceptance anymore than you can know what an apple tastes like by reading about it.

Also don't delusionally think this discriminating aspect of you will always just 'love' everything you do, every job you perform etc - it's just a mind loop trying to tell yourself you like something you know in your gut you don't like, and is pointless. You will always be improving, but your self-concept will be rooted in something deeper than purely your external results/behaviors.

_________________
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zTXz8xMaJi4


Top
   
 Post subject: Re: On Liking Yourself
PostPosted: Sun Jul 28, 2013 10:31 am 
Offline

Joined: Sun Jul 21, 2013 10:44 pm
Posts: 68
Everything makes sense when you accept yourself. Even when you accept an idea like "I don't like myself". What happens is you move on from it. Then you actually begin to like yourself and your life starts improving. Not automatically at first, but when you start liking yourself and you work on improving everyday, it gives your life more meaning and you can start looking foward to what the future holds.

Accept yourself and move on.


Top
   
 Post subject: Re: On Liking Yourself
PostPosted: Wed Jul 31, 2013 2:28 am 
Offline

Joined: Fri Jul 05, 2013 12:11 am
Posts: 2
Thank you guys. I am so glad I found this forum.

When I posted this I was on what I call an "epiphany high": something had clicked and it felt like this was the ultimate solution to all my problems apart from this tiny little logical issue that I had to overcome. Haha, that's the trap in and of itself :) I do feel like I gain something from these insights and moments of clarity but I become frustrated at the lack of application. There's a sense of "well I know this now, why am I still reacting this way". Thankfully GP walsh's podcasts and your posts Mr Flow83 have been helping me understand the reason behind that.

-----------
Meraki wrote:
Something I got from GP Walsh is that true unconditional love is 100% acceptance of what is. This includes not just the egoic "you", but also your parents, your experience, the world around you, society, everything.

If you accept everything as it is, then you will not feel conflict over accepting (or "loving", or "liking") yourself. Try it - spend a few minutes just doing nothing, just accepting everything as it is. Allow everything that is to be, everything that happens to happen, every thought that comes up to come up. Just allow it all, as it is, and see what its like to sit with that perspective.


The better question is do you reject reality as it is, or do you accept reality as it is. Accepting it means you also accept yourself...
Thank you for taking the time to post Meraki, and for the welcome. The GP Walsh recommendation was great. I've spent the time since posting this listening to and implementing his concepts. I am no longer struggling with the original issue of my post as my definition of self love has changed.
Flow83 wrote:
It is simply a different mechanism. You can be full of self acceptance, which is a feeling and a direct, experience based KNOWING of who you are -- and at the same time use the discriminating mind to see something about your body/behavior/patterns etc you would like to change and change them.
I actually didn't understand what you meant until I started writing this post Flow, but something just clicked. Correct me if I am wrong, I am understanding this to mean that the mind (the voice/logic) is simply fufilling it's function in finding things to improve, associating and as Meraki says making divisions. There is nothing wrong with it other than me expecting it to not be what it is. Therefore self acceptance is not to be achieved by following the mind as it will never reach a destination, it will simply keep coming up with more, as that is what it does. If I know and have that feeling of self acceptance then I can watch the mind do it's job without attaching to every thought.

How do I achieve that feeling of self acceptance then? That's what I am working on right now.
MattD wrote:
Even when you accept an idea like "I don't like myself".
Thank you for that Matt. That was something I hadn't seen or considered - a step away from where I was at. I'll work on it

I'm full of thank yous and that is because that's exactly how I feel about finding this forum - full of gratitude. The shifts that have been happening are crazy. My thinking and subtle being are so different from where I was at even 3 weeks ago its mind boggling.


Top
   
 Post subject: Re: On Liking Yourself
PostPosted: Wed Jul 31, 2013 5:46 pm 
Offline
Site Admin
User avatar

Joined: Mon Apr 12, 2010 12:08 pm
Posts: 3337
Location: UK
Reminded me of :

"Friends can help each other. A true friend is someone who lets you have total freedom to be yourself-and especially to feel. Or, not feel. Whatever you happen to be feeling at the moment is fine with them. That's what real love amounts to-letting a person be what they really are." - Jim Morrison.

Being your own best friend, you would treat yourself the same way.

How genius is that :D

_________________
In building a statue, a sculptor doesn't keep adding clay to his subject.He keeps chiseling away at the inessentials until the truth of its creation is revealed without obstructions. Perfection is not when there is no more to add,but no more to take away.


Top
   
 Post subject: Re: On Liking Yourself
PostPosted: Wed Jul 31, 2013 6:13 pm 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Thu Sep 13, 2012 11:07 pm
Posts: 589
Location: The side of a mountain somewhere...
I think you're "getting it". First off, epiphanies are great and we shouldn't belittle them, but its definitely important recognize that they are not going to "solve everything" either... Like you said - it can be a bit of a trap...
Nawras wrote:
the mind (the voice/logic) is simply fufilling it's function in finding things to improve, associating and as Meraki says making divisions. There is nothing wrong with it other than me expecting it to not be what it is. Therefore self acceptance is not to be achieved by following the mind as it will never reach a destination, it will simply keep coming up with more, as that is what it does. If I know and have that feeling of self acceptance then I can watch the mind do it's job without attaching to every thought.
Nicely written. Sounds to me like you have a pretty good grasp of it. I'm curious if Flow has anything else to say.
Nawras wrote:
How do I achieve that feeling of self acceptance then? That's what I am working on right now.
Quite the question!

This is a topic that can seem very large and complex, and yet when you look back on it, it all seems very simple and straightforward at the same time. Its like dropping a hammer - to someone who is grasping very very hard at the hammer, it may seem like a very difficult and frustrating task to let go of it. They will want strategies and techniques on how to let it go. But once you finally just decide to do it, you just let go of it, you drop the hammer, and looking back, it seems so simple. You actually were putting forth a lot of energy to grasp the hammer, and letting go of it is actually the default, effortless state, even if it didn't seem that way before.

I'll re-iterate what I said before, which is that complete unconditional "self"-acceptance is not achieved by working on accepting yourself, but rather by accepting everything. If you think you accept yourself but not everything and everyone in the world around you, then I would argue that your acceptance of yourself is incomplete or false.

As for how to actually do this? Well, the simple answer is that you just let go of your non-acceptance. You just release your grasp and let the hammer fall to the floor.

The complex answer is that you have to find out what is blocking you from doing it. Self-inquiry like you have been doing (ie. journaling, reflecting, etc) is great. Also practicing allowing everything to be exactly as it is (sometimes called meditation) is also a great thing to do.

Finally - you said you've been listening to GP Walsh recordings - if you're not over at the Balls Project, I would highly recommend it. I've recommended it before - I think that forum and this forum are extremely complimentary, and I think you would find a lot of value over there on questions like the one you're having right now.

_________________
"The society gives you a map; I give you only freedom. The society gives you character, I give you only consciousness. The society teaches you to live a conformist life ... I give you an invitation to go on an adventure." - Osho


Top
   
 Post subject: Re: On Liking Yourself
PostPosted: Wed Jul 31, 2013 11:06 pm 
Offline

Joined: Sat Feb 18, 2012 3:11 am
Posts: 823
Well said.

In the vast majority of cases people identify with whatever the mind is thinking/doing as ME. They also identify with their emotions completely, which always shift and change. It takes only a small moment of focused awareness to realize that thoughts arise, emotions arise, but there is "something" that can identify with them, react to them, fight against them, or accept them. There is something they are arising within, and something aware of them.

Some like to use religious terms, some like to use mental terms like 'subconscious' or 'aware ego' -- they are just labels.. they are models, they are not what it is, but just words used to represent a phenomenon that is happening. Use whatever you like. The most important thing is to actually experience it. The experience itself is neutral and does not have any psychological, spiritual or whatever implications, it just "is"

Self acceptance does not mean exclusively happy or approving thoughts, as Meraki said it is the acceptance of EVERYTHING. As you take that backwards step, you realize that there may be thoughts going on, reactions in the nervous system, things that are what your preferences like or don't like so much, but there is something beyond all of that. There is a posture you can adopt towards it, where you can accept all of it.

The truth is that without a contradicting thought in the mind about what things are supposed to be, there is no problem with what is there.

This does not conflict with having a vision and seeing it to creation. You can have that and still have a posture of acceptance.

You are quite literally always in a state of being and becoming. That too becomes something you accept. There is total peace in this moment right now, and you can still practice a piano so that you play it better tomorrow. You can not be thrilled about your performance today and let it shape your vision of what it should be tomorrow. This too does not require suffering, that's all related to this posture you take with it.

The error is people putting the cart before the horse. The idea that I need to become this, this, and this, achieve this and that, and THEN i will be able to accept myself. This is hell on earth.

Realize that it is quite literally a posture and one you can adopt no matter how "messed up" you are. Ironically the more you do this the easier it becomes to change on the level of the identity/self/mind, because you are not clutching it so tightly, not in such fear and stress about it. You flow more with it and work with it. Life becomes less a thing you are doing 'right' or 'wrong' and more like a canvas you are painting on.

_________________
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zTXz8xMaJi4


Top
   
 Post subject: Re: On Liking Yourself
PostPosted: Tue Aug 13, 2013 1:46 am 
Offline

Joined: Sat Apr 10, 2010 5:51 pm
Posts: 2046
Location: Laniakea Supercluster
On liking yourself...

If not you then who?

To undo negativity it has to be exposed first.

_________________
♫♫♩♫‿◦


Top
   
 Post subject: Re: On Liking Yourself
PostPosted: Fri Aug 16, 2013 9:50 am 
Offline

Joined: Sat Apr 10, 2010 5:51 pm
Posts: 2046
Location: Laniakea Supercluster
Flow83 wrote:

The error is people putting the cart before the horse. The idea that I need to become this, this, and this, achieve this and that, and THEN i will be able to accept myself. This is hell on earth.

Realize that it is quite literally a posture and one you can adopt no matter how "messed up" you are. Ironically the more you do this the easier it becomes to change on the level of the identity/self/mind, because you are not clutching it so tightly, not in such fear and stress about it. You flow more with it and work with it. Life becomes less a thing you are doing 'right' or 'wrong' and more like a canvas you are painting on.
Understanding the process of the mind;

The thing is that we are rewarded for keeping
a certain personality and punished for anything
that isn´t fixed/constant to our personality (in our society)

Pain/pleasure principle, or simply called conditioning.
(or being seen as trustworthy/untrustworthy to
those around us.)

The brain predicts pain/pleasure from certain course of
action, more accurately, what patterns the mind is
used to get from it. (enough references form into
beliefs in a certain limited context.)

We make our choices based on our perception of
reality (=our beliefs about reality) and not reality itself.

_________________
♫♫♩♫‿◦


Top
   
 Post subject: Re: On Liking Yourself
PostPosted: Fri Aug 16, 2013 10:33 am 
Offline

Joined: Wed Nov 07, 2012 12:54 am
Posts: 411
Location: Levelling up.
So Jared, what if we keep on making choices based on a false sense of reality? If our belief of reality is not reality itself, how does one go about determining what is true or not?

Or, does it not matter either way. Since we make our own reality, does it matter what we believe...


Top
   
 Post subject: Re: On Liking Yourself
PostPosted: Fri Aug 16, 2013 11:02 am 
Offline

Joined: Sat Apr 10, 2010 5:51 pm
Posts: 2046
Location: Laniakea Supercluster
Leo wrote:
So Jared, what if we keep on making choices based on a false sense of reality? If our belief of reality is not reality itself, how does one go about determining what is true or not?

Or, does it not matter either way. Since we make our own reality, does it matter what we believe...
Conformity is what happens by default.

We are not born with a ready-made conscious mind.
It is our responsibility to develop it.

Truth has no opposite in reality. What is false
simply does not exist.

_________________
♫♫♩♫‿◦


Top
   
 Post subject: Re: On Liking Yourself
PostPosted: Fri Aug 16, 2013 4:35 pm 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Thu Sep 13, 2012 11:07 pm
Posts: 589
Location: The side of a mountain somewhere...
Leo wrote:
If our belief of reality is not reality itself, how does one go about determining what is true or not?
All beliefs are inaccurate/incorrect. Its not about forming more accurate beliefs, or getting closer to the truth of reality. Its not like today I was 50% off from reality and tomorrow I'm going to try to be only 49% off. You are either in truth, or you are in belief, and if you are in belief, you are in illusion and resistance.

Imagine approaching a situation with NO beliefs. 100% open to what is and what will be.

Imagine approaching every situation for the rest of your life 100% open to what is.

"Enlightenment is absolute cooperation with the inevitable." - Anthony De Mello

_________________
"The society gives you a map; I give you only freedom. The society gives you character, I give you only consciousness. The society teaches you to live a conformist life ... I give you an invitation to go on an adventure." - Osho


Top
   
 Post subject: Re: On Liking Yourself
PostPosted: Sat Aug 17, 2013 4:13 am 
Offline

Joined: Sat Feb 18, 2012 3:11 am
Posts: 823
Jared wrote:
Truth has no opposite in reality. What is false
simply does not exist.
Yes yes yes yes and yes.

Truth IS reality.

The one thing that by definition does not and cannot change, in a universe whose very existence is constant change.

_________________
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zTXz8xMaJi4


Top
   
Display posts from previous:  Sort by  
Post new topic  Reply to topic  [ 14 posts ] 

All times are UTC+01:00


Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 22 guests


You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot post attachments in this forum

Jump to: 

cron
Powered by phpBB® Forum Software © phpBB Limited