The Association Against Self-Directed Violence. Are you a badge-wearer?

I am participating in a blog round robin, hosted by Karen of Squarepeg People, whom I so adore and admire. Go over to check out more stories on the theme of ‘Strength from Within’ — encouragement for the holidays from some beautiful writers!

Do you like the idea of unconditional love?

I do.

The idea of unconditional love sounds so nice, doesn’t it? And we’re all supposed to love each other unconditionally: family members, friends, pets, etc. What kind of love is it if it has conditions and caveats? Nay! We like unconditional love.

There is someone that I supposedly love unconditionally. How could I not? It seems almost counter-intuitive to say that I don’t love this person in such a way. Of course I do!

And yet, it has come to my understanding that the unconditional-ness of my love for this person has remained theoretical. In fact, all day and every day I was beating her up with an endless stream of caveats. “I shall withhold my love for you until you..”

…wake up early every morning and do an hour of yoga. Then, get all her day’s errands done in advance before getting a green juice for breakfast instead of, you know, a coffee and a ham croissant, before arriving perfectly on time for work. not waste a minute all day in non-work activities. For lunch, a salad and go out for a walk because it’s good for the brain. Then, work in a perfect focused flow for the rest of the day. Be applauded, acknowledged by others for what she has done. Receive positive confirmation of her intelligence, wit and work ethic from as many external sources as possible. Have a quadrilliion visitors to her blog and a wildly awesome business idea which will surely earn her boatloads of ca$hdollars in the coming months, etc, etc.

Then and only then will she be worthy of kindness, understanding, tenderness, rest.

(Can you tell whom the object of failed unconditional love is yet?)

Because all those nice fluffy love-y things are things that need to be earned. A nice soak in the bath at the end of a long, hard day at work? Why yes, that is proper and deserved. A slice of cake on my birthday because, of course, on the rest of the 364 days, I have virtuously avoided sugar and filled up on kale tofu salads and kept within my calorie limits? Sure, bring it!

Withholding love until she is deserving of them — it’s a good thing! Otherwise, how will she be a productive and worthy citizen? If you just loved her regardless — silly, hippie you — won’t she just melt into a slothful, undisciplined, good-for-nothing blob of peanut butter? We can’t have that!

Spare the verbal rod, spoil the self! 

The conditions of love – they are necessary!

Noble, I might even say!

Hm.

So much for love sans caveats. And when you look out into the wider world, with its expectations of excellence and Puritan culture of righteousness and the atrophied ego, this idea — that self-love should be earned — is ubiquitous and deeply normalized.

An article in a running magazine that was pointed out to me. A runner ran a marathon (or 10K or whatever aspirational distance) despite the way his body made it very clear it wasn’t ready for it.. He pushed through all of his body and spirit’s resistance, ran the entire length and emerged a winner. He (and the magazine, too) was proud of this accomplishment.

My mother just posted on facebook. “I forbid myself from laziness and conflictedness!”

Can you recognize it when you see it?

Making enemies of yourself. 

Whenever you think of your desires as something to ‘forbid’, be ‘overcome’, ‘pushed through’.

Whenever you think you should be something that you are not yet, or that you should be doing something that you’re not.

These are instances of violence against yourself.

We are so culturally conditioned to believe that being violent toward ourselves is a good thing that we often have no clue what it means to love ourselves unconditionally. Because many of us have never experienced it.

Maybe the truth is that we do love ourselves and others unconditionally but are afraid to really live this truth. I certainly believe this to be the case in lots of parent-child relationships. Deep down, I absolutely know that my parents love me unconditionally. If the push came to shove for them to demonstrate this idea, they would. If I somehow ended up the exact opposite of what they want me to be — say, a pennyless, divorced crack prostitute on the streets — I know that ultimately they would take me in with love. Eventually.

But this would come after a lot of fucking resistance, a lot of working through their own surface ideas about what it means for me to be deserving of their love. And what it means to love themselves, having “failed” in raising a ‘good’ daughter.

Lots of: “How dare she throw away everything, after all I did for her?” “Everything is over for her. For all of us. We have failed as parents. What’s the point?”

They would have to work through these ideas in order to come to what’s at the bottom, which actually is unconditional love. Then they would come to their senses. Because the only sense that makes sense is love and they know this on a cellular level.

And so do you. The good news is, the unconditional love toward the self is available to you even if you aren’t sure what it looks like.

This, I know. Because all you are is love and you begin to suffer when you go against who you are. (Another bit of Byron Katie wisdom.)

Think of something that is the loveliest, most tender and sweet creature in the world. (As embarrassing as it is for me to admit, it’s easiest for me to think of a tiny little newborn fuzzball of a kitten. Awwwwwww, kittens! Sweet, warm little beating hearts! I could just melt like a pat of butter on freshly toasted bread!)

What would you do for the most tender, lovely, sweet creature in the world? How would you feel toward him/her/it? What kind of things would you coo into his/her/its ear?

Remember this feeling. Imagine what it might be like to feel this way toward yourself. (if your initial reaction is: “that’s very funny. And also quite possibly ludicrous, you stupid hippie!”, I would join you 98% of the time. But be assured, that’s not you talking. Those are your monsters.)

You might need some tools to take you there.

• Talk to someone who absolutely adores you (and is well enough acquainted with his/her own inner source of unconditional love to not project anything on you).
• Write yourself a permission slip. Or ten. Or 8645 in succession, all day.
• If something crappy happens, remembering that you can choose how to respond to it emotionally. You can choose to respond with kindness to yourself first and foremost, returning any projection that isn’t yours. Clear out your energetic space. I just got a passive-aggressive email from work, blaming me for something I didn’t do because I was on vacation. Their projection. I still get to love myself and possibly give myself a hug for having to deal with crazy people. Instead of beating myself up and spending the remaining weekend in anxious guilt, which would have been my default reaction.

Speaking of which:

• Be a vigilant guardian of your energy. Guarding your own energy is completely independent of external circumstances. ”I have a crazy-ass family and I cannot love myself until they are all fixed and sane and not walking all over my space.” Is this true? Can I just laugh at what happens and hug myself for being alive?
• Entertain — just for a minute, as an experiment — the counter-intuitive thought that the fatest way to getting what you want in life may be through unconditional kindness and gentleness toward yourself. What if the easiest way for me to “eat healthily” was to not worry about it and like myself regardless of what goes into my mouth? What if I could access the greatest amount of productivity by lovingly inquiring into my needs and wants, instead of pushing through them?

If that were true, what would that look like in the context of my life?

If the scene of the most rampant violence in the world wasn’t some far-away land of political conflict but inside your soul, what can you do today to bring peace? 

Won’t you join the Association Against Self-Directed Violence?