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Hello hello, my name is Sabrina Amina and this is the Feelings Pod.

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Today's episode is a continuation of the last one on love and that took me in some unexpected

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directions.

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Today the primary focus is self-love and recognizing that in order to experience the most fulfilling,

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profound love in this life, it starts here within me.

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It starts with cultivating a loving self-concept.

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It starts with noticing the moments when I'm not fully self-loving and learning how to

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be with those feelings and learning how to move through them and transmute them.

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Learning how to love myself is probably one of the best things I've learned in this life.

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And I think I've definitely talked about self-love in other episodes.

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I like the idea of giving it its own time in this episode.

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So self-love is, I'd argue that we're born with a self-loving concept.

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We come into the world fully expressed and

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perhaps that's not everyone's experience and I certainly don't mean to speak for anyone

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other than myself.

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But I do think that we come from the source of love.

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We come into the world as love and the human experience that we have sometimes challenges

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or diminishes that loving self-concept.

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Yeah, sometimes I think about my younger self and how much she went through and the messages

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she got that she wasn't good enough or smart enough or pretty enough.

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She didn't work hard enough or wasn't doing the right things.

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And when you're young, when I was young and I think this is true for many of us, we do

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our best to please those who take care of us, our primary caretakers.

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And when our primary caretakers lean towards criticism or are not super generous with loving

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language, loving actions, it becomes a little harder to stay in the knowing.

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And as we grow into adulthood, we start to see our patterns and for those of us who have

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access and the privilege of doing the work of deep healing, we can start to come back

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to ourselves.

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And that's going to look different for everyone.

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And instead of getting into how to return to the place of self-love, I'd like to focus

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on this episode on how self-love has created more love in my life.

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First and foremost, it gives me the opportunity to show people how I wish to be loved when

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I'm fully self-loving when I show myself love by setting boundaries, by identifying my needs,

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by expressing my desires, by protecting my peace, by being discerning about the company

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I choose or the way I wish to show up in the world.

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All of those acts allow me to align with the energy of a self-loving concept.

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And from this place, I have no desire to spend time with folks who challenge that or to be

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in spaces where it feels like hard work to prove my worth or show others how great I

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am.

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Being more in love with myself, I feel much less of a need to prove myself to others because

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I know I'm great.

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And I remember first learning about being more aware of the hypercritical voice.

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I call mine Carl for whatever reason.

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One of the techniques I've heard that's helpful is to name your inner critic to kind of engage

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with it.

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And then you can be like, okay, Carl, thanks for your input, but that's not needed right

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now.

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So I was like engaging with that hypercritical voice and learning how to shift that narrative

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instead of, ugh, you're so lazy.

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Just get up and do those dishes already.

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That's pretty harsh.

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I would never speak to anyone like that.

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I really wouldn't.

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And yet I have in the past spoken to myself that way.

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And I still think that voice creeps up when I'm not very well resourced, when I'm tired,

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when I'm not feeling wonderful about myself.

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Carl pops up with the hypercritical dialogue and I'll be like, you know what?

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Yes.

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The sink is full of dishes.

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I really don't want to do dishes right now.

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And that's okay.

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I can choose rest.

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I can lie down.

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Choosing not to do the dishes in this moment doesn't diminish my work as a human.

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Also, laziness, side note.

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Laziness does not exist.

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I highly encourage you to check out the book by Devon Price.

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If you tend to think of yourself as lazy when you're not doing things that you think you

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should be doing.

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If you feel like you're not being as productive as you should be.

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Yeah.

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That's a great resource.

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I don't want to go too much into that because it'll take me down a rabbit hole, moving us

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away from the topic of self-love.

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Yeah.

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Another book that's really profoundly shaped how I've cultivated my loving self-concept

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is Kristen Neff's work on self-compassion, mindful self-compassion.

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I've done a lot of, you know, I've taken her courses.

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I've read her books and learning the meditations and those specific ways to be more loving

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with ourselves.

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Really has, it's like I'm so proud of myself because I've noticed a dramatic shift in the

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way that I speak to myself.

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I speak to myself with more love and respect and self-honoring and acceptance.

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I notice more when I'm feeling difficult feelings like shame or anger or jealousy or rage and

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I can witness the difficult emotions without feeling like I'm a horrible person.

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A piece of the self-compassion work that Kristen Neff teaches is remembering, you know, our

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connection to others and remembering that, remembering and also affirming, yes, I feel

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this way.

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I'm not alone in this feeling.

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Everyone feels this way sometimes.

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And when I started this work, I remember how uncomfortable it was to say really wonderful

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things about myself.

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It felt like, ew, I remember that feeling.

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I was like, why is this so hard?

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Why is it so hard to give myself loving self-compassion?

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And it's a practice.

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And yeah, at first it feels awkward and strange and not really, it almost felt disingenuous.

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I was like, this isn't it.

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But I stuck with it and now I've gotten to a point where it feels much more natural for

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me to offer myself loving words of support in difficult moments than to really come down

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hard on myself.

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And you know what?

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This transformed the way I show up in relationships because if I can't offer myself love, then

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and I'm trying to seek that love outside of myself, it will always be incomplete.

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I will always feel like I'm not enough to receive the love that I'm seeking.

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I will always feel like I have to prove to others that I'm deserving of their love and

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if I can just love myself and trust in that, then I attract more loving people in my life.

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So I have a newfound appreciation for the people in my life who knew me before I really

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started doing any of this healing work.

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Yeah, they saw me before I could see myself and there's just something really special

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about those kinds of people.

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I really honor them and how they've helped me remember my light and my magic and what

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makes me wonderful and special and worthy of love.

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If you're interested in trying something to cultivate a more self-loving concept, I recommend

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a loving kindness meditation, it's from a Buddhist tradition and there are so many you

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can find.

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Personally, my favorite meditation app is the Insight Timer and if you just search loving

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kindness meditation, I mean even if you put loving kindness meditation into a Google search,

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you'll come up with lots of resources and of course, Chris and Neff have great resources

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for loving kindness.

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Yeah.

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So this week, my invitation for you is to notice when you're being less than loving

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towards yourself and see if you can shift that, see if you can move from a place of

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self-loathing to self-loving.

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And it doesn't have to be a dramatic shift from loathe to love because that can be quite

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a big jump but maybe move towards understanding, acceptance.

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Yeah.

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So I think that's all I have to say about that for now.

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I think that's a wonderful way to end the second season of the Feelings Pod.

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This is episode 20 and this week is the Summer Solstice.

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I'm looking forward to sharing more on Feelings with you in the next season.

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All right.

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So find a comfortable position.

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You could be lying down or sitting up comfortably.

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Once you've adjusted and settled in, just notice any micro adjustments you could make

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to get 10% more comfortable.

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I invite you to close the eyes if that feels comfortable or find a soft gaze and begin to

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tune into the breath and really allow that breath to fill the belly.

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And let it go.

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And as you follow your breath, imagine breathing in love.

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Take a deep breath into the belly and imagine that love permeating your entire body and

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radiating outwards.

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And imagine a color that you associate with love.

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And on the next inhale, imagine that color light just filling your entire body, expanding

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from your heart space, radiating outwards, upwards toward the head, downwards toward

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the heart, to your torso, allowing that loving light to expand in all directions throughout

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your entire body.

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Take a deep breath in and let it go.

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Take another deep breath in.

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Let it go.

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Notice that loving glow around you, within you and around you.

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And imagine that loving glow is here to protect you, to nurture you all day long.

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And as you move through the day, imagine moving with this bubble of light that protects a

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loving self-concept.

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Take a deep breath in.

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Let it go.

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You can continue breathing in this space.

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And whenever you feel ready, let the eyes flutter open, perhaps offering yourself a warm

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smile, maybe giving yourself a nice hug.

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Thank you so much for practicing with me today.

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Have a wonderful day.