Be You: Declaration of Self-Esteem

I am Me. In all the world, there is no one else exactly like me. Everything that comes out of me is authentically mine, because I alone chose it - I own everything about me: my body, my feelings, my mouth, my voice, all my actions, whether they be to others or myself. I own my fantasies, my dreams, my hopes, my fears. I own my triumphs and successes, all my failures and mistakes.

Because I own all of me, I can become intimately acquainted with me. By so doing, I can love me and be friendly with all my parts. I know there are aspects about myself that puzzle me, and other aspects that I do not know -- but as long as I am friendly and loving to myself, I can courageously and hopefully look for solutions to the puzzles and ways to find out more about me.

However I look and sound, whatever I say and do, and whatever I think and feel at a given moment in time is authentically me. If later some parts of how I looked, sounded, thought, and felt turn out to be unfitting, I can discard that which is unfitting, keep the rest, and invent something new for that which I discarded. I can see, hear, feel, think, say, and do. I have the tools to survive, to be close to others, to be productive, and to make sense and order out of the world of people and things outside of me. I own me, and therefore, I can engineer me. I am me, and I am Okay.

--- From Self Esteem by Virginia Satir

Be You: Recognize Your Worth

Imagine that you were in charge of the care of a three month old baby. At feeding time, would you feed the baby with no strings attached? Of course you would! You won't say, "Okay kid! Unless you can do something smart and witty; unless you can sit up and say your ABC or make me laugh, you don't get a drink!" You feed the baby because it deserves to be fed. It deserves love, care and fair treatment. It deserves all that because, like you, it is a human being, a part of the Universe.

You deserve exactly the same. You deserved it when you were born and you deserve it now. Too many people get the idea that unless they are as clever or as smart or as handsome or as highly paid or as sporty or as witty as other people they know, they are undeserving of love and respect.

You deserve love and respect just because you are you.

Too rarely do most of us focus on our real inner beauty and our inner strengths. Do you recall watching 'boy meets girl' movies? As the boy and girl struggled through thick and thin, you hoped and prayed the who time that everything would work out. He went to war, she left home, he came back, she was gone, he found her, her brother told him to get lost, she told him to get lost, and all the time you hoped that they would live happily after. They were married and strolled off into the sunset as the curtain came down. You dried your tears and clutching your empty popcorn bucket, strolled out of the theater.

We cry at these movies because at our deepest level, we care. We love. We hurt. There is that inner core in all of us which is simply beautiful. Depending on how much we have been hurt, we will expose our deepest feelings, but we all share these qualities.

When we see the news stories which portray the plight of the starving around the globe, we all ache inside for them. Each of us may have a different view as to how they can best be helped, but we all care. That is the way we are.

Accept that you have these qualities - the capacity to love and empathize and be human. Recognize your own worth and constantly remind yourself that you need to be treated well.

( extract from Andrew Mathews' Being Happy)

Pic courtesy: Microsoft

Be You: A Self Esteem Series

Over the next few weeks Training Gyaan will be dealing with a series of self-esteem articles, exercises and meditations. Here is a lovely quote from Brian Johnson to get you started on this journey.

Quit putting yourself in a little box by trying to live consistently with your past and explaining every little action you take. BE YOU. Fully. In this moment. Independent of what others may or may not 'expect' from you.

Enter your email address:

Delivered by FeedBurner

Pic courtesy: Microsoft