Unconditional Love

[LittleMissMuffet]

They say that unconditional love is the 'cure-all' for any problem.

...The last couple of weeks or less, I feel much less stressed. It is like I have gone from being quite fragile to considerably stronger. My "emotional stamina" seems to have gone up. I find that the same basic worries still exist, only when they come down on me, it is with much less pace and force. Also, the fears and worries that I still have, when they do seem to show-up and illicit a negative reaction from others (which I notice all too keenly) - this is now more like "water off a duck's back". Things don't seem to get at me like they used to. And I feel able and even very happy actually allowing myself my nerves and imperfections.

Why has all this happened....? Good question: I can't see clearly enough as yet to really say just what has allowed me to feel so much more secure.

What I can say, however, is that only a day or two before I felt a new emotional peace around others -I deliberately told my self things like...

That I love and accept my self regardless of all my flaws and peculiarities. That I know my self better than anyone else does, and that it was time to accept my sense of who I am instead of questioning it and measuring it up to some imaginary, unseen standard that "everybody else has". ...and this supposed universal standard for 'normal' and 'acceptable', because it is imaginary, it can only be a massive kind of pressure. Really, I don't believe that it even exists except in my imagination. And, pretty much I am saying that I'm giving-up looking towards others for approval.

And, not wanting to get too philosophical, but really I think that somehow by some foolish way of thinking, that I've been trying to change my self too much to fit in with others ...all the while, not only failing, but sufferring miserably with the strain of it all. To truly fit in could only ever be an equal portion of my self (with my way of thinking and feeling) in balance and relative to anyone else. So, it occurs to me that I do pretty well on putting pressure on my self ...and I've come to feel an easy shame and sense that I have to change so much... whilst not even giving my self a basic true acceptance of who I am, and therefore as a result, this is equivalent to not knowing the difference between what I can and cannot change.

In any case... I've sung a few songs to my self: to prove my undying love and acceptance for my one and only!!!! ....Seriously though: if doing such a thing occurs to you as being self-indulgent and even narcissitic, ask your self what is truly wrong with loving oneself? ...Moreover, don't you think that not loving oneself may in fact be the problem of social phobia in its simplest description-?

Well, they say that unconditional love is "the cure-all" ...and I'd take this further to say that unconditional love is the fuel that allows the engine to keep going and the car to climb all those hills. well, crappy metaphor or not: increasing one's "emotional stamina", the threshold for which a person will become stressed by any stimuli that arouses them -or, as our psychiatrists put it: desentising oneself to stressful situations- is the aim in recovering from this anxiety disorder. It is the same as what people say: in order to change your experience, it's necessary to accept the totality of who you are right now. To not call our self or our situation "bad" -to avoid judgement whilst we seek to change our experience. ...Our experience is undesirable, yes, but our judgement of anxiety as "bad" and evil is what has perpetuated our anxiety and made us get stuck in the very same experience we are so desperate to get out of. (desparation being the problem).

So we need to perception -to change the way that we behold things ....who we are, how we regard anxiety, shyness and anyone who is this way... because obviously so far our perception is one that involves judging ourselves, and in doing so obviously misses a significant portion of the whole picture. ...Just as it is impossible that anything is bad in and of itself, and that if we see anxiety as 'evil' and bad, we only keep experiencing it.

Well, what about simply accepting who one is right now, period.
...there is no catch, nothing to think about. Just to accept just how you are- on your own behalf without the need for anyone else to: in fact this is absolutely essential. And I believe that it is the only way to be free from anxiety: just as it is really a defintion of freedom from anxiety.

Unconditional love and acceptance of who one is (on one's own behalf) is accepting and giving allowance to one's emotions, no matter how seemingly unacceptable and troublesome. And it's the second half of what is needed to actually be able to fit in and be in sinc with other people. -like how 'it takes two' for either to 'fit in'.

And even if it sounds absurd to serenade yourself with love songs (...though, I actually think its funny and enjoyable!! :lol: ) what is there to lose from fully loving and accepting oneself with abandon. Just without any 'buts' or conditions: there is no need. ...and could the result be really worse than the result of previous ways of regarding yourself with all your anxiety-? And if something is happening that is undesirable, then our perception is not clear or in keeping with the truth -where the 'truth' is a better possibility and better reality for us. And we obviously judge ourselves (as I've described above). And a clear perception of the truth does not divide good and evil: there is no judgement. ...And this is God's perspective, where "God's perspective" is the perspective of a higher, happier, and more accurate view of ourselves.
God does not judge: so why should you.

Anyhow, I don't mean to lecture and I apologise if I come across as pushy and all-knowing. I think to my self that there is probably something missing from my awareness about how a person gets from A to B.
Yet, I also know that unconditional love, one way or other and regardless of what stage in this process of changing identity, that unconditionally accepting all of who one is, is without a doubt THE way to speed up the process. And if there are certain important steps in between that a person needs to go through first in order to make the rest much easier and quicker: it is still good to keep in mind such a thing as unconditional acceptance and love of who you are, and on your own terms and behalf.
....In short, it is a great little reminder. Because 'unconditional love' indeed is the cure-all for any problem; and at the very least, practising it always improves things.
And, one more thing: try it.
could it be any worse than what is already happening and has happened? And it is exactly what we are looking for.

 

[maggie]

hey LittleMiss...i think you bring up some really good points..and i'm glad it's worked for you ..when you say to 'love and accept yourself regardless of flaws and peculiarities'..i've never done that..not even close. I spend much of my time stressing about 'things i should have done', 'ways i should be' ,'opportunities i've missed'..and looking at others, wishing i was like them... who are 'everything i'm not' ...and at the end of the day, more often than not, i lie in bed thinking of everything i'm not, instead of anything that i may be..and you're right, it's counter-productive..i'm really gonna try to change that mindset..and read through your post a couple more times :wink:

 

[LittleMissMuffet]

I wish that I had been more to the point in my post; I fear that I've missed expressing the most important points by gabbing on too much about how such a thing may work.

The real point is that I think that unconditional love is absolutely necessary before a person could stand a chance of changing themselves.
Ironic, yes? ....It's basically that you can't even begin to control -change?- the emotions that you have until you account and validate every single one of them. It is really ironic, in that it basically means that you can't change until you come to believe that there is no need to change at all.

And, the thing is that we are dealing with emotions: emotions in a way, know no logic. So before we can 'rationalise them out', that is to say, before we can control them by exerting all those new perceptions that we want to have ...I believe there is needed just fully emotionally accepting everything about oneself. This involves no thinking, and likewise, no conditions and is purely emotional. ...The logic in doing so is that courage and determination -shown by completely accepting that one is overall undoubtedly fine, even wonderful -allows it so that a person can and will -by definition- succeed in what they want to accomplish.

And I really do think that unconditional love and acceptance of who a person is (on their own behalf) is indispensable for being able to do anything at all with what you've got. This is a statement of belief in your self. It says that without doubt, things will work out for me. It means that a person does not doubt themeselves to the extent that they follow through with unconditionally accepting themselves. It means that it is actually possible to succeed (even if it may take some time) doing what a person wants to do: their is no obstacle just as their is nothing 'evil' or unnacceptable within the person: all of who a person is and their characteristics are manageable. And there is a way, even if it can't be seen with perfect clarity just now -but 'a way' does exist.

....I'd like to understand ideas like: having faith when surrounded by darkness; like how they say that "all knowing contains a component of not knowing"; that to wrap one's mind around the otherwise scary unknown, a person needs to be open and accepting of the unknown ....I want to understand how these ideas work.
...for now though, unconditional love, seems very much to be the major starting point ...it would hold all a person's potential and all those unrul emotions that (otherwise!!) won't be tamed.

 

[JamesMorgan]

Like 'falling in love' with love!

Like 'falling in love' with being ourself.

Like 'falling in love' with accepting ourself.

Like 'falling in love' with accepting others for who they are.

I love it!

 

[LittleMissMuffet]

I think I can add a futher few thoughts to this...

Here is an important question:
How does a person know who they are?

...think about this for a bit. -Are there certain rules, standards that determine who we are? And what 'standards' are these?

Because we are dealing with emotions, and furthermore, emotions that we are yet to understand about ourselves: socially phobic/anxious people don't know where they fit in. We are unsure as to how we (more specifically perhaps- our sensitivity) fits into this world. We don't know how much of this is "right" and how much is "wrong", where by 'right' and 'wrong', I mean we don't know how much to change vs how much we cannot and therefore should not change about ourselves.

...But the real question is: How does a person determine such things -and how does a person determine who they are in this world?
...The answer is that everything is relative. "wrong" and "right" are only ever relative to a specific situation, which depends upon how one person relates with a different person. And "right" is how well these two different persons/opinions are negociated.

In other words, I am saying that identity is in fact flexible and that the only way to answer the question "Who am I?" is to invent this moment by moment. Or, it is a question of self-definition rather than a straight answer to the question "who am I?"

Because everything is relative, emotions and value judgements that go-into how we know who we are (and where we fit in) can only be "measured", ie: determined, by beginning completely from scratch. ...what decartes probably called "bottoming-out".
He did this to abolish all his current perceptions and beliefs of what is true and who he is. Being that identity is continuosly being created and is not ever fixed. This is also the exact same aim that our psychiatrists are trying to get us to acheive: to drop our old/current perceptions (which we note, are doing us harm). To begin from what we know and to shape a new sense of what is true and what we know, by accepting the unknown (what is in darkness) -that we can create a new "identity", a new form for how we are in this changed world (where we find ourselves unhappy in an unbalanced sensitivity).

Losing the fear of the unknown -which is the fear of our sensitivity, our emotions is what is needed. When this fear is lost, we can recreate our boundaries and our sense of where we fit in.

Yet, how to lose such a fear....?
That, to me is a big question.

And my hunch is that through simply accepting with trust that all of who we are is fine -that our unknown sensitivity is not to be feared, but is perfectly acceptable ...this is how we can "bottom-out". Drop our old perceptions, which no-longer protect us, and no-longer give us who we want to be ...or is it, who we think we are....? ....whichever it actually is (I'm not sure) through an unconditional surrender to believing that despite however things may look or seem to be right at this moment (phase etc) that overall, we are perfectly acceptable. That our sensitivity (or whatever we are ashamed and uncertain of about ourselves) has 'bad' aspects only as much as it can have 'good' aspects. ...I think that then, we can accept the unknown of our emotions in the sense that 'the glass is half full' as opposed to 'half empty' as it has been felt as before. (THe truth of course is that both are true, and our unknown sensitivity/undefined sensitivity has equally bad and good aspects; yet through accepting this more correct fact, we can bring out what we want to bring out. Through accepting all of it we can control parts of it.)

So I am saying that make value judgements about ourselves and anyone else, and to know also who we are and how our sensitivity (shyness, introversion, selfconciousness etc...) fits in, we need to start from scratch and to abolish what we so far believe -we have to drop our old perceptions. THis is because emotions can only be "measured" through a new comparison between the known and the unknown, between the me and others, between my sensitivity/introversion and others extroversion. That only through such a comparison is it possible to even know what about ourselves is appropriate or "right" for us to express.

And to be able to drop old perceptions - I honestly think that having complete trust that I am fine as I am and that the ultimate outcome here is guaranteed ...there is nothing to fear about my emotions and whether they are overall acceptable. They can only be acceptable. Just because they are unknown to me, and hidden in the dark, they can only be part of a bigger and more complete picture of what is real and who I am. (and the law that everything is relative in the world, makes this an irrefutable fact). ....So unconditional acceptance of all of one's emotions, and all that is hidden still in the dark, is how we can then bring this to light ...this is then how we can determine 'right' and 'wrong', which are relative and a person can only find what these relative judements are from a point of view that sees both sides to anything and that accepts everything first.

And, unconditional acceptance is what allows a person to therefore CHOOSE to express what about themselves that they want to express/experience. But without this total acceptance, it would be impossible to have any (lasting) control over what happens.


..Ok, now if someone could please explain to me the missing steps. How it is that someone can go from seeing the glass as half empty to also being half full...? It isn't that what I've written above isn't true, yet how come it suddenly has occured to me as being true when I've already known this before-? There must be some other step involved, eventhough unconditional acceptance ("bottoming-out", trusting "anxiety's offer of the open" as was written in a philosophical article about anxiety) is part of what goes into having a new perception.

I'll have to give this all some more thought :wink:
...but hopefully someone can get the jist of what I'm trying to say and maybe they can fill-me in on what is missing in my understanding.