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The article takes you through steps that I followed to find my own voice and creative uniqueness.Our self-worth is intrinsic but it usually requires self-awareness to uncover our talents, our spirit.
Finding Your Self-Worth Through Self-Awareness
- As a Spiritual Writer, I have chosen self-awareness and inner growth as a focus for my writing. I am committed to learning from others and try my best to put, at least some of what I have learned, into practice in my own life. I believe what Neale Donald Walsch has said, “Words may help us understand but experience allows you to know.”
- I am working on mind-heart integration whereby I understand who I am through clearing emotional blocks and listening to my heart. I have spent several years doing that and there is still much to learn.
- If you listen carefully to many spiritual teachers, such as Paul Bauer, Susan Castle, Gregg Braden, Dr. Dov Baron, Lynne McTaggert, you will hear each one of them mention how important it is to complete our emotional healing. They may not dwell on it, but they recommend this before we work with others, before we attempt to find our life partner, conduct intentions or just to find our true voice, our authentic self.
- Writing and speaking have been a part of my life since I was a teenager ... writing poems and essays, being class valedictorian, a debater, a toastmaster and recently, an author and speaker. After many rejections of my writing and attending writing workshops where I was told that I needed to find my voice, I stopped writing and began to look within myself.
- Have you at some point, known that you need to look more deeply into what’s going on inside of you? I had questions, BIG ONES... Why has so much gone wrong in my life? I knew that I repeated mistakes. I knew there were negative behavior patterns. I was determined to find out what was causing my negative behaviors and what I could do to change my life.
THINGS I HAVE LEARNED:
- Although you can be intelligent, competent and successful in many areas, you can also carry a negative self-image, frequently engage in negative self-talk, be perpetually busy, hold many fears, repeat failed relationships and have no focus.
- That although most of the world focuses on the intellect and our external world: this is only one reality. The other reality is our inner world that is driven by our hopes and dreams: our heart’s desires. The inner you is activated by our own observation of it ... observation of your thoughts, your emotions and how that feels in your body. Our whole body is our subconscious and every cell holds memory. Each and every cell listens to what we say about ourselves. What do you say?
- That the longer we are quiet and have most of our chatter silenced ... the sooner the inner you arises. There are many meditation techniques available. Many teachers will say that it is all in the breath. Dr.Chopra suggested a short mantra recently at his Halifax, NS presentation that we can silently repeat while breathing deeply ... “I Am”. He says it has no karma attached to it.
- We need to be patient. Our progress goes back and forth, inner vision develops a little, we have more energy and can feel the inner space growing: it feels like freedom and strength. There are moments of inspiration.
- We accept concepts intellectually and it takes much longer for the concept to become real in your heart, so that we can live it naturally. If we rush our growth, it becomes empty, we become bored and listless since we are in unfamiliar territory and still identified with ego.
Okay then, what can we do: How can we care for ourselves?
- If we are perpetually busy, our ego has a hold. We have less energy and may even feel totally drained. Our body is responding to our heavy emotional attachments: resentments, jealousy, anger, and envy. I learned that when I released these emotional attachments and my victim status, I had more energy. How do we do that?
- Regularly observe your inner dialogue ... notice what makes you feel good, what makes you feel bad, identify where you feel that in your body through deep, relaxed breathing. You have heard the phrase, “What you resist, persists?” So, simply sit with it for a while. Then, let it go. This is a practice that we need to do regularly.
- Only you can observe your mind and identify what thought, smell, color and touch, triggered your emotions. The very act of observation slowly closes down your ego and your fears diminish. You identify that you do have control and you can simply decide that you no longer need the drama in your life. As you cut emotional links you gain emotional composure and you reduce your needs.
- Improve your inner dialogue ... this keeps us in the present. Once you identify where the negative feelings are coming from, you can change them or take a program to release your programmed beliefs.
- Ask yourself if you offer joy and hope to others or idle gossip and misery? Genpo Roshi says that, “Participating in slander and gossip is a symptom of how inadequate we feel. If we truly felt whole ... we wouldn't need to fall into the trap of negative speech. When we see that our own true nature is not lacking in any way, we ultimately want to rejoice and celebrate other peoples' success and well-being.”
- How do we find our true nature, uncover our innate abilities and talents? Truly knowing our self-worth is often the answer to how we accept ourselves-even celebrate who we are?
There is more:
- We are not yet emotionally grounded, because our subconscious is deciding for us, based on our beliefs that we created from childhood experiences. A great deal of our unhappiness comes from a ‘brain set’ that we created in our early childhood.
- We realize from our ‘Observer Self’ and meditation that we feel heavy inside. I created a metaphor that worked for me: My cages are within and I am not free. I learned that emotional freedom and inner peace is a process that does not happen by itself. We evolve into freedom, as we gradually set free all past influences that we interpreted as ours that really were distorted or belonged to someone else.
- My inner work required a willingness to go into my shadow. Going there means to become self-aware, to face the pain, the insight and growth it has to offer. It literally creates a wonderful space inside where before there was guilt, shame, anxiety and self-effacement.
- It takes no more time and money to “go there” than it does to pay emotionally and financially for the addictions we develop to food, TV, exercise, shopping, alcohol, relationships and diets.
- Learn the wisdom of your heart. Your heart constantly sends messages to your brain. Are you listening or do you listen only to ego?
- You can begin to literally feel ‘space’ opening inside. I began to feel lighter and develop clarity.
- You gain confidence as you discover more about yourself. As I had less drama, I was more willing to trust my own voice and take on a practice that fit me. I began to find my spirit.... the Source energy, which brings feelings of love with it, feelings that leave me in joy or peace. I judge less and appreciate more.
Pathways:
- Counselors, mentors, life coach
- Books
- Workshops
- Energy Workers
- Spiritual Groups/communities
- CD/DVD’s
- Programs (On-Line)
- Hypnosis
- Specialized Programs (Sexual Assault Programs)
- Webinars
- Teleseminars
SUMMARY
Taking care of yourself is letting your heart know that you are responding to its needs-the needs of your soul. It is self-development through self-awareness: wherever we find it. People and resources will come to you. Some will resonate with you and some will not. Trust your intuition.
- Use whatever form of meditation works for you. There are many techniques and resources available.
· Make a decision to choose the feelings, thoughts and actions that take you to whom and where you want to be.
· Take time to learn what your purpose is. It will evolve over time and you may have more than one. For example, I can use my talent and interest in writing and speaking to carry messages from my spiritual process to share with others. The particular message may vary a little from group to group and over time.
- Gift yourself with a reading escape, a dessert, enough time in your week to exercise.
- Do whatever it takes to get in touch with your true self. Find the resources to guide you to loving yourself unconditionally.
- Understand and experience our own divinity.
- Spend more time with groups that lift you, help you discover the meaning of living from our heart.
- Ask your self regularly if what you do is taking you in the direction you want to go. Our activities should support whom we are, where we want to be and what we want to do.
- Express love to others. Service to others may be the fastest way to be happy ... giving away what you want most.
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