Be Kind, You Deserve It
There is no question that we, as people, are hard on ourselves. Whether it’s due to the way we were brought up, the media’s insistence that we are not good enough as we are, social media comparisons, or so many other reasons, there is always something in ourselves that we can find fault with. There is a multitude of negative thoughts that can bring us down, and we don’t deserve that abuse.
Lately, the “millennial burnout” (many articles have been written about this) has infiltrated me and my friends. Living in L.A. is especially challenging and we need to work that much harder to just survive, let alone have any spare time or money for our own self-care. That feeling of never being or doing enough creates an overall cloud of failure that can be super hard to shake. From that notion of failure comes an onslaught of inner negativity, stress and anxiety. It’s hard to enjoy life when we’re constantly talking down to ourselves. Of course, there are things we would like to change or better about ourselves (inside and out), but the vitriol with which we talk to ourselves can be catastrophic.
What a heart breaker
In addition to feeling burnt out (I have 4-5 jobs) and striving to live in a way that makes me happy, I come from a familial dynamic in which I put pressure on myself to be the “good kid.” My older brother was troubled growing up and I saw the hardships he put my parents through. I did not want to replicate that. Instead, I swung wildly in the other direction, determined to make my parents happy and proud, to light up when talking to their friends about me instead of feeling ashamed. To be clear, my parents did NOT put this on me; it was a learned behavior, and somewhat decided on, based on watching their relationship with my brother destruct over time. So, here I am, holding myself to impossibly high standards, trying to achieve this ideal of “goodness” that I may never reach. And my parents ARE proud of me, they DO light up when talking about me. So, when can I relax and be myself and all that implies? When can I be nicer to myself and say, “You’ve done well, Lacey, take a moment to breathe?”
A few years ago I had an epiphany that helped out a lot. I wrote about it in my first blog post. I had been trying so hard to be the “cool girl” that I was betraying who I naturally am inside. Once I embraced that person and all her idiosyncrasies, the standards became irrelevant and I became much happier. The negativity started to decrease and I wasn’t as stressed or sad anymore. Of course, I have moments of both, but they are now fewer and farther between. I’ve “found” myself, to embrace the cliché.
There I am!
I took an acting class a long time ago during which we did an exercise (I forget why) that came to mind when talking to a struggling friend. In the exercise, we closed our eyes, put our hand over our hearts and thought about ourselves as children. I took time to really see that little girl with blonde pigtails, innocence and hope in her eyes, and a smile for days on her face. We then were instructed to think about all the negative things we say to ourselves on a daily basis – you’re not good enough, you’re not pretty enough, you’re too pushy, you’re too emotional, you’ll never have success, you don't deserve love. Would we say those things to this child in front of us? Would we tell this full-of-life version of ourselves they were not worthy of everything they wanted in life – love, success, happiness? Would we knowingly shoot down everything that child ever dreamed of?
No, absolutely not. How could we? Then why do we tell this to ourselves? We’re still the same optimistic and inspired person somewhere, deep down. We should talk to ourselves the way we would that child – encouraging, loving and hopeful. The acting exercise completely broke me in a way that showed me how important it is to be kind to ourselves, and how vicious I had been being to myself without reason. A weight lifted off of me and my storm cloud of negativity gave way to sunlight. Now, whenever I feel that cloud creeping back, I think of the smile on my face when I was in first grade, and can’t bear to tell that girl whatever destructive thing my negative inner voice has to say.
Although, she's up to no good... I can feel it.
I know these are trying times and that burning out is a very real problem we have to deal with. I know it’s difficult to not compare ourselves to others online and wonder why we haven’t done X, Y or Z yet. I know that there will always be things we want to better about ourselves. But I also know that there’s some truth to having that little version of us inside that we have got to treat better than we have been. We need to be gentler with them, kinder, and let them come out to enjoy the sun sometimes. Life is difficult enough, and goes oh so quickly, there’s absolutely no reason to make it harder on ourselves. We are enough as we are, and we are loved.
