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Feb. 21st, 2003 11:39 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
johnpalmerOn a good day, when my heart was filled with love, and my head was clear (i.e.: undepressed):
I think that, if a child gave me a scribbled drawing, saying "I made this for you", it would be a beautiful picture.
I think that if a child tried to clean up a mess, even it was a bigger mess afterwards, it'd touch my heart deeply.
I think that if a child sang me an off-key, nonsense song, it'd bring a huge smile to my face, and I'd say that the child sang beautifully.
I was reading a Live Journal entry, and a thought came to me.
If you love yourself, as dearly as you might love a child who earnestly and happily tries to be nice to you, you should accept your limitations and faults, as easily as you'd accept the limitations and faults of that child.
And, as angry as you'd be at a nasty critic who'd hurt the feelings of children who are doing their best, I think you should be that angry at the internal critics who'd do the same thing to you.
So if you wanted to sing a song, for yourself, and stopped, embarrassed at how terrible you'd sound - even if no one was listening - maybe it's time to turn a sharp eye at the voice that told you not to sing. Maybe it's time to say "don't you *dare*! I don't care if it's the worst singing of the worst song in the world; you have no business hurting that person's feelings! *I* wanted to hear that song, sung out of sheer happiness, and a desire to make *me* happy as well!"
It's not just singing, of course... there's a lot in life where folks end up not giving themselves the same break that they'd give to someone else they loved, who they believed was doing their best.
I hope, the next time I hear the self-critic starting up, I'll be as ready to protect myself from unwarranted nastiness as I would be ready to protect another. I hope the same holds for everyone who reads this, who has their own nasty self-critic.
I think that, if a child gave me a scribbled drawing, saying "I made this for you", it would be a beautiful picture.
I think that if a child tried to clean up a mess, even it was a bigger mess afterwards, it'd touch my heart deeply.
I think that if a child sang me an off-key, nonsense song, it'd bring a huge smile to my face, and I'd say that the child sang beautifully.
I was reading a Live Journal entry, and a thought came to me.
If you love yourself, as dearly as you might love a child who earnestly and happily tries to be nice to you, you should accept your limitations and faults, as easily as you'd accept the limitations and faults of that child.
And, as angry as you'd be at a nasty critic who'd hurt the feelings of children who are doing their best, I think you should be that angry at the internal critics who'd do the same thing to you.
So if you wanted to sing a song, for yourself, and stopped, embarrassed at how terrible you'd sound - even if no one was listening - maybe it's time to turn a sharp eye at the voice that told you not to sing. Maybe it's time to say "don't you *dare*! I don't care if it's the worst singing of the worst song in the world; you have no business hurting that person's feelings! *I* wanted to hear that song, sung out of sheer happiness, and a desire to make *me* happy as well!"
It's not just singing, of course... there's a lot in life where folks end up not giving themselves the same break that they'd give to someone else they loved, who they believed was doing their best.
I hope, the next time I hear the self-critic starting up, I'll be as ready to protect myself from unwarranted nastiness as I would be ready to protect another. I hope the same holds for everyone who reads this, who has their own nasty self-critic.
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Date: 2003-02-21 06:24 pm (UTC)A while ago in a.c., I was bemoaning my own particular demons. I picture them as a little man (why male I don't know - most of my critics growing up were female) who pops up in the back of my head to jabber nastiness at me. A friend in a.c. gave me a virtual 6 foot long red plastic inflatable hammer, with which to play whack-a-mole with this little man.
It helps - if only because the image of the hammer itself is so wonderful.
I often wish that the child I was had been trusting enough and open enough with others to let the adults in her life know what was going wrong with her. I suspect they would have reacted with compassion, and tried to alleviate some of the her suffering. Not all, I'm sure, but some at least. I was not, after all, raised by monsters. She needed love, that child, and more specifically she needed the outward manifestations of it - the hugs and touching, the gentle words. She didn't get them - or at least not as many as she needed, and I so wish I could go back and give them to her - or if I could suspend disbelief long enough to do so. She was an interesting child - self-assured, outgoing, introspective.
The good news is that recently I've been excavating bits of her, redeveloping those characteristics in myself. I'm not exactly sure when fear took over my life - but I find myself more and more willing to face those fears these days - and more and more satisfied with the results.
So....I'm learning to forgive the adult me her faults in order to allow the child me to bring forth her strengths.
And so it goes....