How are you getting on with ...

People with whom you spend a lot of time have great influence on you – on your mood, on your views and even on the way you talk. Sometimes you can dramatically change the quality of your life by setting aside people who ‘drain’ your energy and associate more with people who inspire, support and from whom you can learn.

There is one person though from whom you cannot distance yourself or cut yourself off. Even if you change your haircut, work, partner; even if you go to a distant country – you will see the same person in the mirror. That is why a unique relationship with yourself is so important. The comfort of your life, your potential for change, your effectiveness and also relationships with other people depend on it. You spend most of the time with yourself. Is it not worth it to give this relationship primary importance?

After you find out how to nurture the relationship with yourself, after you get to know yourself a little more, after you two possibly become friends, you will discover that you will save a lot of time and energy. Because we spend too much resources on doing what is doomed to fail – on an attempt to run away from ourselves. We have various ways to do this – avoiding silence, escaping into addiction, workaholism, pestering other people, etc. All that is in vain. It is like an attempt to stop thinking.

When you finally get to meet yourself it might seem uncomfortable at first (do you not feel uncomfortable when you meet an aunt whom you had not seen for 15 years?). Slowly you must come to terms with yourself – but this is the only way. But afterwards, after you become a support for yourself, you will gain infinitely and other people will be drawn to you as if you had a magnet in you.

 The key is arranging for time only for yourself. Find some time during the day that will be devoted only for you. Do something just for yourself, take care of the needs you discard and focus only on you. That is not egoism – it is a smart investment that will yield gains to all around you – because if you feel better, everybody else who surrounds you will feel better too.

Let us discuss one by one the possible advantages coming from having a good relationship with yourself. Good relationship with yourself is a relation on many levels. Firstly, it is a relationship with the body. Imagine that you adore your body, you know how to read its signs and that everyday you feel relaxed, well-rested, full of energy. A distant vision, isn’t it? It doesn’t have to be like that. We all remember moments when we felt good in our bodies. Often those are memories of holidays or childhood. We are all familiar with such a state. What we need to do is to learn how to remember how it felt and learn techniques which will enable us to feel like that everyday, not just on holidays.

Think about your lifestyle. Do you eat when you are hungry? Does the type of food you eat make you feel good? Or do you stuff yourself with whatever falls into your hands and then you feel guilty? Or do you starve yourself to look like models from the magazines? Do you have problems sleeping and do you sleep long enough? Do you do any sports? But above all, do you like your body? Do you appreciate how extraordinary a treasure it is? Probably, like most people, you have a lot to work on in that respect. Our civilisation pushes us away from our bodies. We live, if you pardon the expression, in our heads. Most important in our lives are creativeness and new ideas. We are surrounded by more and more technological improvements. Sometimes we can spend whole days sitting, forgetting about eating and the need to sleep – not to mention physical exercise. It is important to look after your body, otherwise it might make itself heard – it can ache, become ill, it can give us a fright with different symptoms. Although they might not have physiological basis but they are very annoying. Those symptoms, for instance, are panic attacks, anxiety, psychosomatic pains, etc.

Another advantage of having a good relationship with your body is that you become more assured and confident. When we regain our body-consciousness it is as if we were moving back into our bodies. When that happens more people start to notice us. Others start feeling better and safer around us as they are be able to sense our boundaries. To better understand that difference, imagine two people. One is cut off from the body, sleepy, hungry, or eating something nervously, moving around chaotically, incoherent when communicating – the other is self conscious, well-rested, present and in good touch with oneself and with the interlocutor. What do you think, how will you feel after meeting with the first and then with the second person? Probably the first person made you feel uneasy and strange, or the person is making you tired. When you are with the other person you have the chance to slow down, rest, and also to get into deeper contact with that person. Which person do you want to be? Remember, you will be spending the rest of your life with the person you choose.

A good relationship with yourself is a good relationship with emotions and also with various elements of our personality. Most likely you were torn apart by contradicting wants many times – for instance, wether to say something which is true but something a given person might not like to hear, or keep quiet – not exposing oneself to criticism/ rejection/ anger of that person. Reconciling conflicting emotions requires maturity. Children cannot reconcile contradictions. The mother cannot be good and evil all at the same time. Evil becomes projected onto someone else. A good relationship with oneself involves integrating the contradicting emotions that we experience. This is because the situations we encounter are very rarely clearly black or white. Life is full of all shades of grey and people who we are in contact with us can be good and bad at the same time (for instance at one time they can be nice and on another quite annoying, or they can be optimistic with regards to some things and pessimistic with regards to other). When we become accustomed to experiencing contradicting emotions, they no longer get confused in our heads. ‘I feel angry at my husband, but I love him at the same time, that is why I will not throw a dish at him but I will tell him about my anger’ When we stop living in the ‘either-or’ world we can make choices that will respect emotions/ needs/ drives of others. Of course one cannot have it all. Sometimes we have to make choices and then we chose not only what we want, but we also chose that we will not be able to have the other thing. That is when we have to come to terms with the choice we made as well as with the one we did not. Similar applies to various elements of our personality and to small bits of our personal history. What elements are we talking about? Every person is different and has unique qualities. However, usually our personalities consist of a child – creative, spontaneous and sensitive; we also have an adult that contains a set of all imposed norms and rules (superego); some people have an inner critic, a controller, a policeman, a Cinderella, a fool, a tough guy, a crybaby, etc. It is important that all those elements do find their place inside of us. We become greatly affected when a trait that is forming an essential part of is unwanted and we want to get rid of it. Paradoxically, if we give some space to that element of our personality, if we welcome it and accept it, it will blend in with the rest and will cease to exert its power. We get the chance to choose only when we are aware of the whole array of our subpersonalities and when we can integrate conflicting energies – just as in the case of our emotions. At first it might have been difficult to imagine such multiplicity and the thought of all these voices within us might be terrifying – what a nightmare if all of those elements should call out at the same time demanding different things. However, if we look at it from a broader perspective we will see fantastic resources in this multiplicity. In various circumstances I can ‘use’ different elements of my personality – e.g. on a party I can have fun with the help of the inner fool or trickster, and later at work utilise the controller or the creativity of a child, etc. When we look into everything that shaped us it becomes clear that there is a vast amount of qualities, subpersonalities and experiences from which we can draw. How will that affect the sense of self-worth?

Finally, a good relationship with yourself is also a good relationship on the spiritual level. Do you have your place in the world, in the community you live in? Do you feel your work is your calling? Are your relationships with others deep? Can you feel a sense of belonging to a bigger picture? Regardless of religion or philosophy you expound you need time and space for your spiritual growth. Spiritual practice should be as important as brushing your teeth. Expanding the notion of spirituality to personal growth: Do you have a clear, well defined goal to which you strive? Life without goals, long and short-term, is barren and empty. Spiritual emptiness reflects itself both in the body as well as in the emotions. When you realise your wants, it will be easier for you to reach for success, life will become colourful and you will feel more and more energy within. When you are wondering about without a purpose you lose your energy, you become disheartened and tired. Therefore, devote some time to ask yourself what you desire and then write it down.

I will end with a few words on coherence. Coherence means orchestrating all of the above elements. Good mood and health is the product of coherence of the body, mind and spirit. Our thoughts have real manifestations in the physical world (sexual fantasies are the evidence) and the body influences the mind (smile and unwittingly you will feel better). When your self is unified, the language of your body, the words and the tone of your voice convey the same message. Your actions are congruent with your convictions and values. Other people can read you and they feel good around you. The external world is like a mirror in which your coherence (or its lack) reflects itself. Internal conflicts provoke external ones. The quality of the relationships with others is a reflection of your relationship with yourself.

By Zuzanna Zelazny