My Self-Esteem Journey: From Self-Loathing to Self-Love
I hated myself until I learned that I’m more than a flawed human
One of the aspects of writing that I love most is the power to connect with our readers and fellow writers through sharing our experiences, insights, and vulnerability. It brings us closer, helping us feel like maybe we’re not alone in our struggles after all. Whether it’s about love and loss, overcoming obstacles, or mental health issues, we’re there for one another to listen, support, and help however we can.
Recently, I was reading an article about self-esteem, which caused me to reflect on my own sense of self-esteem, a subject to which I had not put my mind for a very long time.
I thought back to my earliest years in life when I didn’t even know what the term “self-esteem” meant. By the time I understood what it was, I knew mine was non-existent. I grew up in a home with abuse, insults, and daily criticism. I heard plenty of unkind comments about how I didn’t deserve anything good, that I should be ashamed of myself, that I would never amount to anything, and … well, lots of ugly things that were certainly not fodder for a healthy sense of self-respect, self-esteem or self-worth.
I remember in my mid-20s telling someone quite casually that I hated myself. I don’t know how it had come up, but to me, it was no big deal to say that. I might as well have said it was a lovely day. It carried no particular emotional charge for me, while the person on the other end of the conversation was utterly shocked. I found this to be strange. What’s the big deal? I thought. Why is that so awful?
Clearly, if I’d scored my self-esteem, it would have been pretty dismal.
I was in my late 20s when I first learned about such things. It was during my training as a volunteer to help women with post-partum depression. I’d had two quite severe cases of it with my babies, including ending up with post-partum psychosis the first time — something that even today is taboo. And when I learned that I could help others get through it instead of suffering alone in silence, I was eager to dive in.
That course was my first taste of something akin to counselling. I learned about such topics as affirmations, the importance of how we view ourselves and negative self-talk. A whole new world was about to open up to me, one that planted the first seeds of understanding that the horrible opinion I had of myself was not normal or healthy. And that it was something I desperately needed to change.
Just a couple of years later, a whole, ugly can of worms was opened with my second divorce. I ended up going for counselling and was stunned to learn that I’d been abused my entire life.
What? Me? Abused?? How was it possible to not know that?
Because it was familiar. It was my ‘normal.’
And so began decades of healing, with my education about self-esteem and my challenges with it being central to much of that journey. As happens with many healing modalities that cause a “worse before better” situation, during the early part of my therapy my self-esteem plummeted before it began to improve.
It was the direct result of addressing a lot of sexual abuse as a child and as an adult, the worst of it having been something I’d buried about my mother. Something she had done to me for years, going back to my earliest memories as a very little girl. Something that left me feeling incredibly humiliated and violated.
Even now, I cringe when remembering it but at least it no longer carries any emotional charge.
It would be a long road to healing my deeply damaged sense of self. There would be years of therapy, and an ongoing personal and spiritual development journey. There would be more marriages and more divorces because those relationships were built on the toxic foundation of unhealthy childhood beliefs and a poor sense of self-esteem.
I made progress in many ways through those decades, but at the core was the issue of how I saw myself, how I felt about myself. And until I could truly heal that damage and come to love and accept myself, no matter what, I would continue to slide into situations that were not good for me.
***
I look back on those early, terrible years and see how much I’ve overcome. I see the journey of healing, allowing the light in a little bit at a time. I see the long road of changing my thoughts, shifting my beliefs, and overcoming numerous anxiety disorders like OCD, panic attacks, agoraphobia, anorexia, and an addiction.
I think about how I moved through and beyond all of that — and more — and somewhere along the way, I stopped calling myself “stupid” or “an idiot.” I stopped seeing myself as not being as good or valuable as others. I no longer saw myself as deserving everything bad that ever happened to me. I stopped feeling like other people only tolerated me but couldn’t possibly actually like me.
After being called stupid since I was little, I discovered that I have a rather high IQ and had my first awareness that I am an intelligent woman. I began to see my gifts and talents. I thought that maybe I had something to offer — somewhere, somehow — even if I didn’t know specifically what that might be. I began to question the beliefs that had been the foundation of my life and choices, and how I felt about myself.
Over time, I came to trust and understand that I was more than a flawed human. The seeds of this understanding were planted in childhood when I started being visited by the spirits of those who had left this earthly life. This began at a time when such experiences were not commonly discussed and I was left to figure it out for myself. It was frightening and confusing as my abilities as a medium continued to evolve and grow stronger. Eventually, accepting these abilities and this connection became part of my ongoing journey of healing as I tried to make sense of my past, who I was, and what my place in this world might be.
Gradually, as I walked that path my understanding of the human/spirit connection became clear. I realised that I am not merely a flawed human; I am a pure and perfect Divine spirit residing in a human vessel, and that the human part of my experience sometimes gets things wrong and makes mistakes without it meaning there’s something inherently “wrong” with me.
Therefore, because my true essence is that perfect spirit, I can give myself grace and forgiveness for those bumps in my road, and move on. It doesn’t take a chunk out of my self-esteem. I don’t think any less of myself for it.
As I reflected on my self-esteem, I realised that the issues I’d had in the past were long gone. Somewhere along the way in my healing and spiritual journey, they had quietly vanished. It occurred to me that there is absolutely no chance that I could speak to myself the way I did in the past. It astonishes me that I used to be filled with self-loathing and now, I have compassion for myself. I love and respect myself, in spite of my flaws — or perhaps because of them, and my willingness to acknowledge them and keep trying to do better.
I realised, too, that tied to a solid sense of self-esteem, I don’t give a rat’s @$$ what anyone thinks of me. My purpose on this planet is not dependent upon, nor is it affected by, the opinions or actions of others. And neither is my sense of self, nor my ability to be happy. I understand and appreciate my value, based on the inherent connection between my spirit — or my “higher self” — and the Divine Creator of All Things.
Thanks to my lifelong experience communicating with spirits, I know absolutely that we are all pure spirits being “housed” in physical vessels. These physical bodies and the human experiences they afford us are temporary. And they are not the truth of who we are.
Knowing this, how can I judge a perfect, Divine spirit as unworthy, shameful, or undeserving of anything good? That spirit is pure energy, the same energy that makes up everything in the universe. It is sacred.
And therefore, so am I. So are you. Yes, even when you slide into the human aspect of your current existence and make decisions or have experiences from that place, or that are not what your spirit would have had you do, if you’d asked.
***
The truth is, you are, at your core, a pure, perfect, sacred spirit. When you understand this and connect with this deeply, you do not have to concern yourself with feeling as good as others, as valuable, worthy or deserving as others, or being liked by others.
You will understand that none of that matters, and that your birthright is to receive the greatest, truest, unconditional love, no matter what. It is the love and acceptance of your spirit and for who you are in your entirety, including your human frailties and errors in judgement.
With this understanding behind you, your self-esteem can only be solid and unaffected by those human foibles that all of us experience.
In those flawed and very human moments, our spirits smile, have a quiet chuckle and love us anyway, which is exactly what we need to do for ourselves.