Are you being selfish when you do what brings you joy, even if others don't like it? Do you feel trapped, believing you can't really take loving care of yourself without being unloving to others? You might know that you need to be loving to yourself, but do you know what loving yourself actually means?
Hi everyone. This is dr. Margaret Paul with the Inner Bonding podcast. And today I want to talk about what it means to them. You love yourself. Most people, no that you do need to be loving to yourself, but do you actually know what it means to really be loving to yourself? You know, the, the, the problem, the most of us have little or no role modeling regarding loving ourselves when we're growing up because your parents or other care givers, you know, it didn't didn't know, they, they likely didn't know how to love themselves.
So it's often challenging to know what loving ourselves looks like. It's through my work with my energy child and my spiritual guidance that I've discovered what loving myself really means to me. And I'm going to share some of that with You. One of my clients I'll call her. Sarah asked me all I know about loving oneself. It's not to let anyone anymore abuse me in any way, including yelling, criticizing me, et cetera.
As I write this, it sounds like I just described protecting yourself. So maybe I don't know what loving myself really means. I'd love to hear your definition. So first lets take a look at what loving yourself. Isn't it's not loving yourself to reject and it was then and Yourself by ignoring your feelings by staying focused in your mind. Instead of being present in your body with your feelings, by judging yourself, by numbing your feelings with various addictions or making others responsible for your feelings of worry, safety and lovability.
None of that obviously is loving to yourself now in relationships, loving yourself, doesn't mean I'm just going to take care of me and screw you. I'm not responsible for how my behavior affects you. That's your problem. If you love me, you'll do what I want or whatever that is. I'm only trying to help you and support you and what I believe his good for you. Even though you haven't asked for my help or for my, my opinion, I'll put my full attention on you and sacrifice myself for you.
So you will put your full attention on me and sacrifice. You know, Yourself for me when I do I'm hurting, it's your fault. And it's up to you to fix it since I need your attention and approval to feel good about myself. It's okay for me to do whatever I can to get what I need such as being overly nice, being angry, blaming you or withdrawing it. Oh, I love from you. If you love me. And I ended up with him disabled or dying as a result of not taking care of myself physically, that's your not mine.
So obviously none of that is loving to yourself or loving to anyone else loving Yourself is about taking those actions that attend your own feelings and your own needs. When you take loving action on your own behalf, you're letting yourself know that you matter, that you're important that you count. So you're loving it. Yourself when you practice in Bonding, which means attending moment by moment to your own feelings so that, you know, immediately when you're abandoning yourself with self judgements and addictions and staying in your head or making someone else responsible for you, you are compassionately opening to learning about it with your own fears and beliefs that may be causing Yourself abandonment and open to learning about what it means to be present and loving to yourself in the face of the day.
Life's various challenges. Yes, it means exploring your limiting beliefs and resulting behavior that may be causing your painful feelings. It means opening to your higher guidance for information about the truth regarding your beliefs and the loving action toward yourself. It means taking loving action on your own behalf, based on what's true rather than on your false limiting beliefs and then evaluating and how you feel as a result of taking King loving care of yourself.
You know, that's a brief outline of the six steps of Inner Bonding, which is a such a powerful pathway for learning to love yourself. Right? Loving actions may include such things like eating nutritious foods, avoiding junk food and sugar, eating when hungry and stopping one full, getting enough exercise, keeping your work and home environments clean and organized, making sure you get enough, sleep, creating a balance between work and play.
Making sure you have time to get your work done as well as time to do nothing, reflect, learn, and play and create. And you know, it means creating a good support system of people who love and care about you. It means being organized with your time, getting places on time, paying bills on time. It means choosing to be compassionate with yourself rather than, and then judgmental towards yourself. This is really such an essential aspect of loving yourself.
Anytime you judge yourself, that's the opposite of loving yourself. Being compassionate with yourself is a major part of loving yourself. It means for you creating a balance between time for yourself and time with others in it means making sure that you're physically safe, but I things like wearing a seatbelt in the car, a helmet on a motorcycle, the scooter or bike goggles when necessary, things like that, just to keep your body safe. Now for me personally, loving myself means that I'm responsible for learning to manage and regulate my own feelings so that I can bring myself inner peace and joy.
And so that I don't dump my anger and my neediness and my pain on others. It means I'm responsible for defining my own sense of worth and giving myself the attention I need so that I'm not needy of getting this from others. So I can share my love with others and support them in doing what brings them joy, which I can't do. If I'm abandoning myself, it means I'm responsible for managing my time, my space, my finances in ways that make me feel safe and don't place an unnecessary burden on others.
It means I'm responsible for learning how to access a spiritual source of love. So I can love myself and share love with others rather than always trying to get love from others. It means I'm responsible for taking care of my physical wellbeing, eating healthy foods, getting exercise, getting enough sleep so that I can enjoy a healthy body. And so that others don't and don't eventually have to take physical care of me unnecessarily.
There's always those situations where somebody does need to take care of it. You have been in a bad accident or something like that, but it really is up to us to do all we can to keep ourselves healthy so that we don't burden those around us. I'm responsible for the effect my behavior has on others when I've acted out in ways that are hurtful for them, I'm responsible for taking loving care of others when they are my responsibility such as a child or people who are old, sick or disabled, who I've agreed to take care of.
There are times when it's loving to me to put myself aside for others, like for an infant or toddler or when others need me, because they can't take care of myself. When my, when my kids were little or babies, you know, babies cry at night, they need to be fed. There need to be changed. And so often, you know, I was just really tired, but because I wanted to be a good mom, it was loving to me to get up and tend to them. Even though I was so exhausted, it took me many years of inner work to really understand what loving myself it looks like for me.
And it may be different for you since each of us has different things that make us feel, feel loved and feel important. You might want to take some time to about what loving actions you can take on your own behalf that would make you feel loved and feel important. Part of loving yourself as being loving with others. It's not loving to ourselves to be unloving to others, being loving to others while your loving yourself includes things like being kind and compassionate towards others without compromising your own integrity or ignoring your own needs Means and feelings.
It may be, you mean saying know when you mean? No and yes. When you mean yes. Rather than giving herself up and going on along with someone when something that, that, that you don't want to do or automatically resisting when another wants something from you, it may mean taking care of your own needs instead of trying to change and control others, except in your lack of control over others and neither accepting them as they are or not being around them is loving to you. And to them, it means speaking your truth about what's acceptable to you and what's unacceptable.
And then taking action for yourself based on your truth, not just telling somebody else how you feel, but then taking care of yourself. It means taking personal responsibility for your own feelings and needs instead of being a victim and making others responsible for your feelings and needs. It means creating a balance between giving and receiving rather than a one-way street, but with another person.
And, and this is very important. That means letting go believing that you're responsible for others feelings and that's the big major issue. And a lot of relationships. One of the questions I often hear from my clients is if I take care of myself and do what brings me joy, aren't I being selfish, actually, nothing could be further from the truth. The more, an accurate definition of selfish is expecting others to give themselves up and do for you what you can and need to be doing for yourself.
So L let's take a closer look at this false beliefs that this false belief that loving yourself is selfish. I'm going to give you an example. My client I'll call her June is a very bright and vital woman. She grew up in a family that valued women, staying at home and raising their kids. So she didn't want to be judged or rejected by her family. So June followed into her mother's footsteps, giving up her budding career and in TV advertising to get married and have children.
June became quote, good mother driving it, right, kids everywhere. You're going to PTA meetings and showing up at all her kids events, doing volunteer work. There's nothing wrong with any of this, except that Joan felt so trapped and unhappy and angry. A lot of the time, she really wanted to be expressing herself in the world in some way, but she believed that it was her and to stay home with her children.
Now, the problem is it an unhappy, angry, irritated mother. Isn't a good mother and June is going to continue to feel irritated and that angry and unhappy as long as she's not doing what brings her joy. But she said, if I go back to school, which is what I want to do, aren't I being selfish since I chose to get married and have children, don't I owe it to them and to be here for them as much as I can. No. I said not.
If it means giving herself up and being miserable, not if it means giving to them out of obligation, they're not going to benefit from this. They want a happy mother and they need you to be a role model for taking personal responses, stability for your own happiness. You're going to find. And then if you do what is loving to you and brings your brings you joy, your children will also benefit. They might not like it in the short run because they're so used to you being there all the time, but in the long run.
And they're going to turn out to be happier and healthier adults. Here's another example. Raymond is a medical doctor who works long hours to support his family. He's not happy working so hard comes home exhausted, and it takes care of various household chores. And it was sons can have the time to play sports and do their homework. He ended up with no time for himself. He's often short tempered with his wife and children. 'cause, he's working to R and D has no time for himself, wants to ride his bike and to pursue to his love of writing.
But he said, if I work less than we have less money, aren't I being selfish? Don't I owe it to my family to keep up their standard of living. You're being selfish. If I expect my kids to do the chores, in addition to doing this for me, of course, and their homework, no, I said, you owe it to yourself and your family to be a happy, peaceful, and joyful person. The very best thing you can give your family is your happy and joyful presence. And there's nothing wrong with your kids.
Participating in household chores. We're being, self-responsible rather than selfish. When we take loving care of ourselves, we're being selfish. When we don't take care of ourselves and then expect others to give us what we're not giving to ourselves, we're being selfish. When we expect others to give themselves up for us, we're being selfish when we're angry and demanding of others, because we're not taking care of ourselves. We're being selfish when we imposed or irritated, withdrawn, so, and anxious and tense energy onto others.
And instead of doing whatever we need to do, would you do to be peaceful and joyful? You mean selfish when we're taking care of ourselves from a wounded place and ignoring the needs of others and ignoring the effect that our behavior has on others. It's important to understand that whatever we do that is true. I really loving to ourselves that is in the highest good of our soul's journey on the planet is also loving to others.
It's never in our highest good to be mean to others or to disregard other's feelings in needs, but it is in our highest good to follow our higher guidance and do what really brings us joy and fulfillment. Our actions don't benefit anyone. When our behavior comes from fear and obligation and guilt others, do you feel the lack of love and our energy? Even if the action looks loving or honest and authentic actions, actions with your loving to ourselves are also loving to others.
Living in our truth gives others an opportunity to take care of themselves. If June goes back to school, family we'll need to learn to rely more on themselves instead of running to her for everything. If Raymond takes time for themselves, maybe it's children, we're learning to take more responsibility around that and the house by taking care of ourselves, we give, we give others the chance to step up to the plate. Maybe they will. And maybe they won't, but our loving behavior toward ourselves always gives others an opportunity to grow in their own personal responsibility and their own level.
And you know, as, as well, no, the other thing about loving herself is that when you're truly loving yourself, you let others off the hook. How, how are you letting others off the hook? Well, it was a whole bunch of ways. Others, you don't need to read your mind when you're meeting many of your own needs and asking outride when there's something you need help with others, don't need to hold back or be careful or to walk on eggshells.
When you're taking care of your own feelings, others can receive great joy in giving to you when they don't feel obligated to give to others can speak their truth. When they know that you're open to learning and wanting to grow, they can be honest. When they know you're going to deal with your own feelings, rather than blame them, there's or free to take loving care of themselves when they know your doing the same and that you support them in their highest good.
As part of being loving to yourself, others can be spontaneous with you knowing if they make a mistake, you're going to do, I take responsibility for your own feelings about it. Others feel free to be with you because they want to not because they feel they have to. You have to interrupt primary relationship with your partner will likely feel attracted to you when you're coming from your power, rather than from your fear.
If your partner feels obligated to have sex with you because you've made him or her responsible for your happiness and sense of worth through sex, your partner may feel resistant to having sex with you. Laughter and fun and play flow spontaneously. When neither partner feels responsible for the other's feelings or feels obligated to spend time or, or, or give approval or have sex fax, each person feel free to pursue their passion and purpose.
Knowing that their partner is taking care of themselves and not waiting for the other person to make them happy. Loving partnerships are about learning, growing, and sharing love and companionship. They're not about taking responsibility for making the other person feel happy, safe, security, and validated, and paradoxically. What are you you fully take on the responsibility of making yourself feel happy and safe and secure and validated a loving relationship ports.
And it enhances these wonderful feelings. But when you expect your partner to do this for you, then your self-abandonment creates your misery insecurity and lack of self-worth. As long as you're abandoning yourself and expecting your partner to do for you, what only you can do for yourself, your partner's love will never there be enough to give you the happiness, safety, security, and sense of worth that you see.
Here's another example, Myrna, eight years old is a successful physician and she sought my help because she often felt inadequate while she really valued herself as a doctor, she did not value herself in her important relationships with friends and family. And she said, she, she, she wanted to be in a loving relationship, but she took no actions to meet available men.
So as we worked together, it became apparent that Myrna rarely to do it, loving action and her home on her own behalf with her friends and family. For example, Jessica was one of the marinas miRNAs friends and Jessica would often get angry and blame run it when Myrna was not available for like to have dinner with Jessica, Myrna would then feel guilty and responsible for Jessica's feelings and meet her for dinner. Even when she went was exhausted from work, Myrna would feel drained after these dinners and depression and ask for a few days after never realizing it.
And it was because she had abandoned herself. Myrna realized that the reason she was afraid to be in a relationship was because she had no idea how to take loving care of herself around others. She was terrified of completely losing herself in an important relationship. She realize that if she couldn't speak up for it, Yourself with her friend, Jessica, how could she ever speak up for herself and take loving action for herself with the man she loved.
She realized that she would continue to feel lonely and, you know, anxious and inadequate and depressed until she learned to take responsibility for herself, for her own feelings. Instead of taking responsibility for other's feelings, many people suffer daily from anxiety and depression and stress and anger, as well as from feelings of guilt and shame and inadequacy. The major cause of these feelings is a lack of loving action on their own behalf.
A lack of personal responsibility for their own feelings and wellbeing. They are not loving themselves as a result of practicing. Inner, Bonding learning to take better care of herself when she was alone. And with others, Myrna no longer felt depressed and inadequate. She gradually lost her fears of being in a relationship and is delighted to now be meeting available men. I hope you can see how very, very important it is for you personally and for your relationships for you to learn, to love yourself.
And that's exactly what the Inner Bonding process is all about. So I encourage you to go to Innerbonding.com take our free course. If you, if you don't know Inner, Bonding take my Love Yourself course go through self quest, join Inner Bonding village, where you get a lot of stuff. read the books. There's so much available on the Inner Bonding site a lot that's free. If you can't afford, of course you can learn Inner Bonding on your own if you want to, or you need to.
So I really encourage all of you go to Innerbonding.com. Learn how to love yourself. It's the best thing you can do for yourself and for others and for our planet, many, many blessings to all of you.
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