Self-love & Affirmations

Professional Experience Article

Mental health and addiction therapy often contain an element of “learn to love yourself.” People will say they need to love themselves before they can love another person. A great many books, videos, and motivational resources are devoted to helping people love themselves.

What this means is that people who have spent their lives worried about how worthless and unlovable they are now spend a great deal of time in continuing to turn their attention inwards as they try to convince themselves that they are, in fact, loveable Remember Stuart Smalley doing affirmations on Saturday Night Live? He was looking into a mirror!

Well, I say “So what?” So what if you are loveable or not? So what if you are worthless or not? I say turn your attention outwards and show love to others and notice how good that feels.

Figure out who you want to be and then live in harmony with that What qualities do the people you admire possess? Demonstrate those qualities.

When we are concerned about ourselves, we are disconnected and the people around us know When we are focused on the people we are with and being attentive to their concerns, joys, and what they are sharing, we forget about ourselves and our Connection is apparent to us and them.

Take sex, for instance. If I am worried that I’m not attractive enough or expert enough or there’s something wrong with me, I won’t be really intimate or connected with my partner(s) Likewise, if I’m thinking about all the good moves I’ve got and how much I love my body since I’ve been working out and how great my last partner thought I was, then I am still not connecting with anyone else. I am probably objectifying whoever I’m with as I think of myself only in relation to how I want them to think of me.

Sure, a lot of us were wounded in childhood and grow up bringing our shame and self-loathing into our adult relationships, but “learning to love” ourselves is not the answer. Children are ego-centric – the world revolves around them and everything is their fault. Being a healthy adult is more about recognizing that we move about in a world with others who have their own feelings and beliefs and even their own selfesteem issues. While we can be attentive to them and even caring and interested, we are not the cause nor are we responsible for their issues. When I have decided what kind of person I want to be and when I bring that person into relationship, then I don’t need to be concerned with whether I love myself or not I can move through the world from a place of groundedness and allow my energy to move outwards to Connect with my partner, my friends, my students, and with the Universe.

Written By: Dr. Carol Clark, LMHC

Dr Carol Clark is an educator and therapist, certified in Sex Therapy, EMDR, Addictions, and Transgender Care She is the president of Therapy Certification Training, International Institute of Clinical Sexology, and president of the International Transgender Certification Association Her books, Addict America: The Lost Connection and My Pocket Therapist: 12 Tools for Living in Connection, will help everyone to live in connection with themselves, others, and the universe.