Self-love is a Choice!
What happens in your body when you receive the Who’s Who for a FutureWomenX event?
My heartbeat kicks it up a notch, with that rush of excitement. Like I’m going uphill on a rollercoaster. About halfway through your amazing photos and bios, the rollercoaster pitches downhill, and my stomach drops. That inner critic I call Mary Lou fires up her arsenal, “What was I thinking?! Who am I to be in this tribe of awesomeness?”
Victoria and Meryl warned me that this would happen.
That B*tch, the inner critic, shows up at the age of 6 years old. The rockstar P!nk said that her 6 year old daughter said to her one day on the way to school, “Momma, I’m the ugliest person in my class.” P!nk wondered what 6 year old she needed to beat up and then, reminded herself that it was probably illegal to beat up a 6 year old. The messages, however, weren’t coming from the outside (even though they are). They were internalized.
What messages have you internalized, my Tribe of Awesomeness?
Writer bell hooks says, “There was a time when I felt lousy about my over-forty body, saw myself as too fat, too this, or too that. Yet I fantasized about finding a lover who would give me the gift of being loved as I am. It is silly, isn't it, that I would dream of someone else offering to me the acceptance and affirmation I was withholding from myself. This was a moment when the maxim ‘You can never love anybody if you are unable to love yourself’ made clear sense. And I add, ‘Do not expect to receive the love from someone else you do not give yourself.’”
In this sisterhood of powerhouse women, FutureWomenX helps us connect to our innate power. Together we teach one another how to love ourselves.
Not just our best selves.
All of ourselves.
Even those bits we’ve airbrushed out of our photos or hidden in our bios or punished internally for not being perfect enough. Even those bits we’re told to be ashamed of. Like our sensuality and our anger.
Self-love is a choice. You’ve got to disrupt that inner critic and choose to believe a new voice that says, “You are beloved, just as you are.” bell hooks reminds us that that is where our power lies.
In this month of hearts and valentines that can too often leave us feeling like we are the only ones unworthy of love, let us reclaim a Love ~ Self-Love ~ that will not let us go.