Learning To Love Yourself

What Does Learning to Love Yourself Mean?

Learning to Love Yourself isn’t all that easy!  Do you, like me, get frustrated when you hear all those TV celebs or online gurus who shout:  “If only you would love yourself more, you could be healed, happy and rich?”   Or do you watch yet another Oprah “Super Sunday” with another author who spouts a sure-fire cure?  Does that leave you scratching your head?  Or maybe wanting to smash your head into the nearest wall?  And then because you’re positive that you’re the only person out there who doesn’t “get it,” who doesn’t love themselves, do you feel so helpless, frustrated, and angry that you head toward the quick comfort of Ben & Jerry’s?   Yes?

Yes!  And me too!  So believe me, I know your pain.  Because when I was in my late twenties and early thirties, and trying to make sense of my own tortured and toxic past, (a childhood that almost killed me), I was reading one of the umpteen self-help books piled high on my bedside table, when I literally threw a book called, “Love Yourself Now!” across the room.  I was so angry at it, because I couldn’t figure out what I was doing wrong.  I simply didn’t understand what the hell the writer was saying.

And that’s because I didn’t know then, what I know now:

Learning to love yourself is not just one simple thing.

Learning to Love yourself is extremely complicated because of so many inter-connecting and conflicting subconscious, sabotaging thoughts, beliefs and behaviors.

Is it even doable?  Yes!

Can I help you love yourself and get happy?  Absolutely.

How?  Can  I hypnotize you into loving yourself?  No.  Anyone who promises you that has a deed to the Brooklyn Bridge in their back pocket.  All hypnosis is self-hypnosis.  No one can hypnotize you into doing or believing anything that your brain argues with and doesn’t believe.  That’s just how your brain is wired.  But by learning to use focused concentration, which is a more accurate way to describe hypnosis, you can begin to learn how to argue with your self-sabotaging thoughts, be aware of self-destructive behaviors and make a conscious decision that you want to change.  And then, you begin to make choices in the moment that are in line with your intentions.

And it’s those choices, moment by moment, thought by thought, that will make you happy, that can bring you joy and change your brain in the process.  That’s the pure science of it.  But it’s a process… it is not a quick fix.

What the newest brain science proves is that cognitive behavior modification, awareness therapy, and narrative therapy (which is what Past Life Regression turns out to be) can literally change your brain, and your own brain wiring.  And because of that, you can start learning to love yourself, by doing things that are self-loving.

How?  The work I will help you do – and yes, it’s work — (Sorry folks!  They took away my magic wand in this lifetime.) — you will uncover the subconscious, subterranean beliefs that make you so self-sabotaging, or self-defeating and un-loving.  Then you can learn how to stop the sabotaging thoughts, and make choices in the moment that are in line with your intention.  Which means, however, that you have get honest with yourself.   First, you must begin to aware of what you’re actually thinking, doing, and believing about yourself, about your life, and about your world.  And you’ll learn how to stop your own wonderfully efficient “inner criticizer.”  Call it your own “inner demon.”  (It could be your internalized mother, father, grandmother, or first grade teacher.  The one who convinced you that you weren’t good enough.)

But at the same time, you also learn how to be more loving to yourself.  And that means that you begin to accept yourself as who you are right now.  You learn how to appreciate, to support and to validate who you are right now.  You let go of the past, and stop making yourself nuts about your “future.”  So it means living in present time.  My channeled books,  Excavating to the Core, and Moment by Moment give lots of practical and doable exercises if you want to download those from my website.

Past Life Regressions can also help you to love and respect yourself more.  Because, in a Past Life Regression, you’ll discover that you are not just a person who has a “soul.”  You are, more accurately, a soul who has a worker-bee person called you!   Yes!  You have a specific purpose.   When you experience your own “higher self,” and understand your own soul purpose, you experience your life from a “higher” perspective.  It’s as if you have a drone shot of your life.  And that can change your perspective on your life completely.  You no longer feel like an innocent victim of circumstances beyond your control.  Instead, you see all your “issues” as obstacles on your own hero’s journey.  And then you will become the hero of your own life.  In brain science?  It’s narrative therapy.  And that changes your brain.  Literally.  Everything becomes an obstacle for your “hero self” to overcome.  Makes it very doable.

How can you start?  Simple.   Begin by looking at how you spend your time.  I work with many artists, writers, actors, and musicians who are frustrated because of their creative careers.  But when they see, understand and realize that most of their time and energy is spent complaining to themselves and their friends about their work, or lack of it, they begin to understand how useless that is.  And they stop it!

Then they get focused, inspired, and excited about the process, and then they succeed!  That’s an act of self-love.  Making a commitment to yourself and keeping it, yes?

So ask yourself some simple questions:

What would it look like if everything that you did were an act of self-love?  Self-care?

What would your actions look like if you were completely loving to yourself in your physical body?  Your intimate relationships?  And your career goals?

What would you do tomorrow that could bring you joy, make you happy and show yourself how much you care about your body?  Your intimate relations and your work?

Then make a commitment to yourself and pick one thing.  Just do one thing at a time.  Then congratulate yourself for doing that one thing, and you should reward yourself.  Try it.  It works!

Oh, and how did I show my own self that I loved me?  And how did I reward myself for years of hard work?  When American Airlines said that I had enough miles to go to Europe, I booked a flight to Rome because I love Italy!  When I trained with my darling teacher, Brian Weiss, MD, I saw so many different lives there.  So the picture above is from the apartment I rented in Positano, Italy, on the Amalfi coast.  Five days in healing heaven for me.

Give yourself the gift of learning these techniques that will help you to learn to love yourself.

If you need help, please give me a call at 323.933.4377.

I look forward to hearing from you.