My life does not belong to others and I am not here on earth to live up to someone else’s expectations.
Living consciously implies that my first loyalty is to truth, not to making myself right.
The concept of romantic love as a widely accepted cultural value and as the ideal basis of marriage was a product of the nineteenth century.
The first act of honoring the self is the assertion of consciousness: the choice to think, to be aware, to send the searchlight of consciousness outward toward the world and inward toward our own being. To default on this effort is to default on the self at the most basic level.
I accept my aloneness. That is, I accept that no one is coming to make my life right, or save me, or redeem my childhood, or rescue me from the consequences of my choices and actions.
Innovators and creators are persons who can to a higher degree than average accept the condition of aloneness – that is, the absence of supportive feedback from their social environment.
Everyone who has any familiarity with psychology knows about the danger of disowning the murderer within. Far fewer people understand the tragedy of disowning the hero within.
Genuine self-esteem is what we feel about ourselves when everything is not all right.
Sometimes people who feel fear in the human realm drop to a very low level of consciousness in their relationships and seek the safety and security of competence in the impersonal word of machines, mathematics, or abstract thought.
The higher our self-esteem, the more likely we are to be creative in our work, which means the more successful we are likely to be. The higher our self-esteem, the more ambitious we tend to be, not necessarily in a career or financial sense, but in terms of what we hope to experience in life – emotionally, creatively and spiritually.
So far as we can ascertain, in primitive cultures the idea of romantic love did not exist at all.
Our liabilities pose the problem of inadequacy; our our assets, the challenge of responsibility. Our strengths or virtues can make us feel alone, alienated, cut off from the common herd, a target for envy and hostility, and our desire to belong can overcome any desire to actualise our highest potential.
What we make an effort to learn and what we achieve is based, at least in part, on what we think is possible and appropriate to us.
I can be loved by my family, my mate, and my friends, and yet not love myself. I can be admired by my associates and yet regard myself as worthless.
Conscious individuals know that if they wish to advance in their careers they cannot rest on yesterday’s knowledge and skills. An overattachment to the known and familiar has become costly and dangerous; it threatens both organizations and individuals with obsolescence. Scientific.
While healthy self-assertiveness requires the ability to say no, it is ultimately tested not by what we are against but by what we are for.
If someone I like does not return my feeling, it may be disappointing or even painful, but it is not a reflection on my personal worth.
I am responsible for my own existence and happiness.
I accept the reality of my problems, but I am not defined by them. My problems are not my essence. My fear, pain, confusion, or mistakes are not my core.
I choose to value myself, to treat myself with respect, to stand up for my right to exist.