Forgiveness and self-love

Acivity is the enemy of reflection.  Don’t get me wrong too much reflection and we can become morose and even depressed.  But too much activity and we can gloss over or repress our feelings and emotions.  It is, like most things in life, a balancing act.

Forgiveness is an especially tough one.  The need to forgive can be masked by so many other emotions like guilt and even anger.  We need some real time to reflect in order to discern what we need to forgive ourselves for.  For me a big one was to forgive myself for being such a lousy mother for so many years. (I still make many, many mistakes i must forgive myself for, in spite of my huge improvement). 

We carry around this guilt or anger or feeling of uneasiness or dissatisfaction.  Something is nagging at us and won’t give us any peace.  Usually when I feel that way I know I have done something “wrong”.  It takes a little bit of soul searching to figure out what it is and then more soul searching to actually forgive myself.   It means that I have to admit I am not perfect and I actually made a mistake. (See my last post). Then I have to tell myself I am human and we all make mistakes.  That is how we learn and grow after all as mistakes are our great teachers.  True forgiveness means I can’t call it up at a later time and chastise myself for this mistake or failing.  Often I find I say I have forgiven myself only to catch myself beating myself up at a later time.   Identify, forgive, learn the lesson and then close the door on the recriminations, guilt, anger, etc.  We want to dispassionately remember the event or mistake so we can call up the lesson but we don’t want to continue to berate ourselves for making the mistake.

It is so true that until we can learn to forgive ourselves we can’t possibly forgive others.  Is this another aspect of self-love perhaps?  We often confuse forgiveness of others with simply accepting bad treatment from them.  There is a difference.  Forgiveness means we let go of any anger or judgment.  The false forgiveness may simply be a lack of boundaries where we are willing to “forgive and forget” bad treatment or behavior.    Forgiveness is not easy or automatic.   We develop a forgiving heart by forgiving ourselves and then when we have acquired a forgiving heart we can also forgive others.

Perfectionism and self-love

So many of us grew up believing we had to be “perfect” in order to be loved. We had to earn love. (Have things changed?)  It was not until I became an adult that I realized love is a gift. I still have a hard time believing it.

Being “perfect” meant conforming to the societal norms for a “girl”.   We were polite, considerate, thoughtful, never boastful or ambitious, supportive of others, put the needs of others ahead of our needs, patient, humble and much more.  We were supposed to blend in.  We never wanted to call attention to ourselves. (This is one reason we struggled in the work world).  We would berate ourselves mercilessly if we failed in any small way in our pursuit of perfection and love.  We would harshly judge and certainly avoid other “girls” who failed or chose a different path. We looked for “perfection” in others as well but we were hardest on ourselves.

It is impossible to accept who we are if we are always falling short of this “perfect female”. (We are even afraid to admit we have any faults or shortcomings or even make mistakes and so we are dishonest with ourselves and others.)

Doesn’t genuine love happen, not when we glorify or idealize another person, but when we love them with all their shortcomings, foibles and faults?  We don’t really love another person if we love the image or fantasy we have created of them.  The same can be true of us. Perhaps that is what the “experts” mean when they say you have to love yourself before you can love another. It is only when we accept ourselves for whom we are (and admit we are not perfect) that we can accept others for who they are. We can experience genuine love. It seems self acceptance is one part of self-love.