Be Good to Yourself

            For many people, this is a difficult thing to do. There are layers of reasons as to why we struggle with this, but the root cause always seems to be the same: we just don’t care enough about ourselves to care for ourselves. Let’s take a moment to explore why we need to be good to ourselves and how to do it.

            Simply put, negativity is like a poison and the only antidote is positivity. If you’re too hard on yourself, you’re feeding into the negative energy instead of the potential positive energy inside of you. This creates a snowball effect, a perpetual circle of physical and psychological pain.

            Our minds and bodies are opposite sides of the same coin. If you have emotional pain or stress, chances are your body does too (and vice versa). Lack of confidence, for example, is often the source of bad posture. In turn, bad posture causes all sorts of pain and strain throughout the body, especially in the back, neck and shoulders. When we finally decide to change our behavior, we have this chain reaction of difficulties to overcome. Fortunately, this cycle works in the other direction as well. Once you start improving one area, a positive reaction is brought about in all areas. If you make an effort to have better posture, your body will hurt less and the release of physical stress will improve your confidence. If you’re too hard on yourself, you’ve probably been taking advantage of the negative side of this cycle.

So how do we turn this wheel in the other direction so that it works for us? We start by understanding how difficult it will be. A lifetime of negative thinking and behavior cannot be turned around in a short period of time. We may struggle for years to reach our goals. Of course, I am not saying this to be discouraging, but to be realistic. The more objective we are about our goals and ourselves, the more room we have to forgive the mistakes we make along the way. These mistakes are the key to success; the sooner we accept this the easier our journey will be.

Mistakes are not the end of the world. If you’re on a diet and you give into a slice of pizza, the answer is NOT to eat more junk food. That voice in your head that says “Hey, you’ve already fallen off the wagon, might as well eat what you feel like” is the negative spinning wheel. It is the part of you that says you don’t matter, that doesn’t care about your well-being and wants to hold you back because it doesn’t want to move. If you eat a slice of pizza, be happy that you didn’t eat the whole pie. Be happy that you went as long as you did without pizza. Be happy because that slice showed you that you may have set your standards too high. Use every setback as a means to re-evaluate what good you are doing instead of an excuse to revert to bad behavior. Making a mistake means that you have more to learn, not that you’re an idiot. Often, the setbacks we have show us that we are trying too hard and need to take a different approach to achieve our goals.

The greatest catalyst for positive change is forgiveness. Criticizing ourselves and making things “off limits,” reinforces our bad habits. It highlights the lie that says we’re not good enough and that we do not have the power to conquer our shortcomings. Forgiveness allows us to accept that the things we are not good at are things we can improve. Positive reinforcing the good we do will encourage good decisions in the future. Rewarding yourself for good behavior (even a simple pat on the back or giving yourself an imaginary high five) will inspire you to do more good things. Even when doing wrong by yourself or putting yourself last has become almost a default setting, you can change. If you keep working hard, being good to yourself can become second nature.