You Shouldn’t Hate Yourself So Much
No man lives without flaw. No woman exists without imperfections of character. No gender-fluid individual occupies this space without fluctuations. Nobody gets through this little slice of paradise without facing up to ridicule, hate and distaste. Nobody is perfect because nothing is perfect to begin with. It’s an insurmountable expectation to hold. By nature of the fact that you even exist suggests that you are flawed. At least that’s what fundamental Christian philosophy posits. What I’m getting at here is that none of us are infallible, none of us are perfect, or without vices.
It’s very easy to fall into the trap of expecting perfection though. I do this to myself quite a lot. You can be aware of the fact that everyone is flawed and still beat yourself up when your own flaws are revealed. I do this. I think we all do. Whenever I behave in a way that I have rationalized as ‘not something I would normally do’, I get angry at myself. I refuse to even entertain the idea that I could even make a mistake, let alone accept that I made one. This leads me down the path that sounds like ‘I must be a bad person’ in my head. That’s not true. Being a human means we’re entitled to make mistakes. This only becomes a problem when you refuse to learn from these mistakes and move forward.
When someone gets angry at me because they disagree with something I’ve written or said, my mind automatically assumes that I’m morally on the wrong side of the conflict. However, when I step back it’s easier to see then that, just because your perspective is wrong for certain people that doesn’t imply that your perspective is universally wrong. There are very few things that are universally wrong.
I’ve written about this before, and it’s become as much about self-help as it is about helping out others. See, writing about mental processes is therapeutic in such a way that it forces me to rationalize why mythought processes happen. If I didn’t dothis I wouldn’t be able to write these mental health pieces, and so it’s a win-win situation. There’s absolutely a mental blind-spot that exists here. Youknow that everyone has flaws, yet refuse to accept your own? That’s an issue that you need to become aware of before you can work on it.
What am I saying here? Give yourself a break. Take a day off from being your worst critic. Understand that you have flaws just like everyone else. Understand that nobody holds your own flaws against you as much as you do. Acknowledge the mistakes you do make and work towards minimising their occurrence in the future, but also show some compassion if you do make mistakes.
Go easy. Life is tricky at the best of times, and it’s chaosat the worst of times. It’s all a little more doable if you’re playing on the same team as yourself.
G’luck.