- Do you face each day as it comes reacting to events or circumstances as they arise?
- Do you feel connected to those around you?
- Do you think a happy, fulfilled life belongs to a chosen few?
- Do you live each day peering out from your comfort zone watching your hopes and dreams pass you by?
How we connect to others and everything around us ultimately boils down to the following question…How do we connect with ourselves?
Often what we think are challenges with others are actually challenges with the relationship we have with ourselves. We can only love and accept others to the degree that we love and accept ourselves. I learned this invaluable lesson some years ago when I finally made peace with my mother whom I wrongly blamed for how bad I was feeling due to her divorcing my father some years previous. I played the victim and blamed her for everything that was wrong in my life. Truth was I didn’t like myself and didn’t know how to either. I was reacting rather than responding to what happened to me. It was only when I decided to find out who I was and learned to love myself and value myself that I realized my mother did what any other self-respecting woman would do, she very bravely walked away from a toxic relationship with my father. With two kids, no money and living in a foreign country, it was no wonder she was beside herself with worry, battling depression and fear of failure. The choices she subsequently made reflected this and I was there to point the finger of blame. I wasn’t ready to remove my victim t-shirt just yet. Once I healed the relationship with myself I felt a veil had been lifted, I accepted and understood my mother completely and I healed the relationship with her. We now share a wonderful, close, loving bond and friendship. She’s my rock and I am hers.
It’s true, life really is an up and down experience and at times it feels more like we’ve been hit by the roller coaster and dragged along its tracks rather than riding it merrily with our arms in the air! But whilst we are not responsible for things that happen to us we are responsible for how we respond to them. We don’t see the world as it is, we see it as we are, so pausing and understanding ourselves is key and honesty is the starting point. So, what conversations are you having internally? What stories are you telling yourself? Have you developed some inaccurate thinking habits? Are you seeing life through the filters of faulty thinking? How do you see the world?
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