Perhaps you know what it is like to have great understanding for other people and still be strict with yourself. When you make a mistake, an inner voice immediately speaks up, judging and pushing. For many people, self-love sounds like a beautiful word that stays out of reach in daily life, and some even fear it could make them complacent or selfish.
Unconditional self-love is something else, and it can be learned.
What unconditional self-love really means
Self-love means relaxing into the person you are right now. Not the person you should be, and not the person you will be after the next step of your growth, but the one who is here today, with everything that is present.
Unconditional means that your love for yourself does not depend on conditions. You may love yourself when you are sad, and love the part of you that feels sad. You may love yourself when you are angry, and meet the part of you that feels angry with warmth. Feelings are not mistakes that need to go away, but parts of you that want to be seen. Especially in difficult moments, you need more love from yourself, not less.
The loving view of your inner world
One key to this is the view of the inner witness. You can step back inwardly and look at your thoughts and feelings without immediately falling into them. From this stance you can accept your inner dynamics lovingly and still readjust when that is needed.
It is like loving parents who correct their child without shaming or judging it. The child remains loved, even when its behaviour needs a new direction. You may treat yourself in exactly the same way, because correction and love do not exclude each other. On the contrary, real change happens most easily in a loving climate.
Why relaxation is the gateway to your inner voice
In each of us there is a subtle inner voice that comes from our deeper being. It gives you new insights and thoughts you have never thought before, and you recognise it by the fact that these thoughts feel good and leave peace behind.
You hear this voice best when you are relaxed. And you are relaxed when you feel safe and loved. This is exactly why self-love is so much more than a nice feeling, because it creates the inner safety in which you can perceive your own guidance again. Self-judgment makes things loud and narrow. Self-love makes things quiet and wide.
Self-love changes your relationships
The relationship you have with yourself sets the tone for all your other relationships. When you are inwardly strict with yourself, you look for the approval outside that you do not give yourself, and you slip more easily into patterns such as people-pleasing or losing yourself. When you rest within yourself, you can give without giving yourself up, and allow closeness without losing yourself. You can read more about this in my article on relationship patterns.
When self-love does not want to come
Perhaps you sense while reading that you understand all of this and still cannot feel it. That is not a weakness. It is usually a sign that old imprints stand in the way, for example self-judgment learned early in life. Such patterns sit deeper than the mind, and that is exactly where they are allowed to release.
In my Self Love Seminar we look together at the relationship you have with yourself. You learn to understand your patterns, and you receive impulses and exercises for more self-acceptance, inner clarity and emotional balance in your daily life.
Something in you has been waiting for a long time to be accepted by you.
You can find all the information about the Self Love Seminar here: https://sandragrosshealing.com/self-love-seminar/
