Stop Being A D!ck To Yourself
Non-violence. Do no harm, kindness.
Ahimsa is the first Yama, the first guideline on the path of yoga. Yama guides us in making peace with the world.
Pause for a moment. Sit up straight, release anything you have in your hands, roll back the shoulders and take a few lovely belly breaths. you may wish to close down the eyes or maybe soften your gaze. If it feels comfortable for you to keep your eyes closed as you receive these words.
Consider the words ''non-violence''. What comes to mind? What comes up? Where do you feel this?
Of course none of us sets out intentionally to harm ourselves or another, we don't go around punching people or beating them up. However, many of us hurt ourselves and others through our thoughts, our actions and our words.
Think back to the last time you tried to do something and you didn't succeed. Did you talk to yourself like you would a 5 year old, with an encouraging pep-talk full of love and reassurance? Did you remind yourself of your strength and bravery and sat in a mindset of learning as you found an alternative pathway to success?
Or, did you beat yourself up because it was a giant mistake to even start and you were never going to succeed so you shouldn't have started in the first place because you are a waste of space and always destined to fail?
How we talk to ourselves is one of the biggest influences in our lives, friends. One of the best practices I ever adopted was a number of years ago when I found myself in a self-induced flunk. Through my words and my actions I was treating myself like a big giant dick. I thought of my best friend, Friend. Friend is the most brilliant, hilarious, disastrous human being that I have ever met. Everyone I have ever introduced her to loves her within a second, and it's so easy to see why. She is my very favourite person in this entire world and my life is incomplete when we are not together. I describe Friend as I just did, as a wonderfully brilliant human. Yet I would describe myself as a not-brilliant human.
I soon realised if I spoke to myself with even a fraction of the love, and adoration that I speak about Friend with that I could quite literally change everything. And so I did. Every time I'd have a bad or negative thought about myself, or went on a journey of acting with self sabotage, I'd think of Friend. I'd never in a million years think those thoughts about her, why would I do so about myself. Furthermore, Friend would describe me with the same wonderful words that I used to describe her. She sees the brilliance in me, why didn't I see it in myself?
I speak to myself now the way I know Friend speaks about me.... and the way I deserve to be spoken of.
Bring your awareness to others. Bring to mind someone who is successful in your eyes, has everything you want from life. Are you judgemental, jealous?
Bring to mind someone who lives life a bit differently - dresses different to you, likes different music than you, does different activities than you do. Do you laugh at others differences? Talk about them behind their back?
It's confronting to realise how often we act in a harmful way, towards our selves and others. But once we begin to cultivate kindness for ourselves, and begin to accept all parts of ourselves we soon see other people struggle with the same things we do. Each of us are perfectly imperfect and when we accept that within we accept that in others too. This practice removes any barriers between me and them - but an us remains.
Words, both internal and external, are powerful my friends. It's hard. It's something you will always battle with. But become aware - that's the first step. Encourage the awareness. See when it happens, examine it.
The beauty in the practice of ahimsa is the constant need to start again. Every day I try, every single day I fuck up. But, I try again. Did I speak nasty words to myself just then? Did I spend 6 hours on Instagram? Yes and yes? Okay, deep breath.....Let's try that again.
Finding courage is like finding a gemstone in this weird and wonderful world of ahimsa. I believe courage comes from accepting ourselves exactly as we are. Accepting the good, the bad, the quirky, the weird…. the whole-ness of ourselves is an act of courage. Society tells us that we must be all things wonderful and sparkly, shiny and bright all of the time. Life shows us a very different and truthful version of reality. Sure, we are these things some of the time, but we are also sadness and unhappiness. Life isn’t always rainbows and lollipops, sometimes it’s burnt coffee and wet socks.
Courage is found in saying hello to the good and the bad, and finding strength in the beautiful balance of what makes us human.
The stories we tell ourselves are our self-limiting beliefs that exist to keep us small. Without realising it, each and every day we are reaffirming this message to ourselves through the words and thoughts we ourselves think about ourselves! We are causing ourselves, feeding our fear. Let ahimsa take the lead here. Let ahimsa show you the path of true courage, encouragement to try the thing you’ve been putting off... the adventure, the job. Let ahimsa, non-violence, bring you to the heights you wish for your best friend. Because, darling one, you are your best friend. Non-harming starts with you.
None of us are perfect, we are all just souls with stories. We are all here trying our best to be kind, trying to be compassionate and none of us have a fucking clue what we're doing.
Yet, when we find love, courage and space for ourselves we can share that with others. Finding the love for ourself, including the embarrassing bits, the not so lovely bits, the cringe bits, the scary bits, the horrid bits….. and still loving ourselves - that’s Ahimsa. When we find it in ourselves, we find it in others.
My wish for you this week is to find the courage to see how utterly magnificent you really are. How perfectly imperfect, unique and oh so special you are. You, are a beautiful expression of a human. Just as you are.
Perfect, in every way.
Be kind to yourself this week yogi. ❤️