Loneliness and Self-rejection

When we reject part of ourselves we feel rejected.

It can be very tempting to push away the parts of ourselves which we do not approve of. Yet, I notice that when I judge part of myself and push that part away as being “not okay” somehow, then that part feels pain. Guess who ultimately feels that pain? I do, of course. After all, it is part of me which I am hurting by my rejection.

The pain might not be obvious. It might be more of a numbness that an obvious painful feeling. Yet, it will be there weighing on my sense of wellbeing so that it is hard to be truly happy. Perhaps that is what causes so much of the depression in our world. So many of us putting so much effort into pressing down – depressing – parts of ourselves. Perhaps depression is what we get when we repress so much of ourselves that we lose contact with who we really are. It is the result of having judged ourselves, bit-by-bit, out of the right to live.

There is a way out of this, of course. It is to beginning to accept ourselves and being willing to let go of judgment. It is in learning to be kind and compassionate towards ourselves no matter what we are feeling. It is in letting our feelings “be” yet being bigger than our feelings.

Freedom comes from our feeling about our feelings. It was astonishing to me the first time that I discovered that I could feel good while feeling bad. I felt very sad about something and I felt kindly towards this part of me and somehow it all felt alright. The sad feeling was there and the feeling kindly about it was there too. And it was all alright just as it was.

What a difference from my previous stance of judging myself as “wallowing in self pity” when I felt sad or hurt! The interesting thing was that the sadness left me much more quickly when I was kind to myself about it than it ever did when I tried to bully myself out of it. Somehow the kindness dissolves the sad (or angry, or bitter, or whatever) feelings. Or maybe it is more that those unhappy feelings somehow get resolved and the energy which was fueling them becomes positive and constructive.

Loneliness is like a barometer showing me how cut off I have become from myself. The more lonely I feel the more cut off I am. It is tempting to assume loneliness has to do with contact with other people, but that is only true up to a point. The ultimate cause and cure for loneliness comes from inside us and our attitude to what is inside us.

Becoming more accepting our ourselves, becoming less critical and blaming of what we do, and generally being kinder to ourselves, reaps huge rewards in leading a happier and more fulfilling life.

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