Hello Everyone! Mindset Mondays is a new blog thread that is going to be based on simple mindsets that have helped people become happy, healthy, wealthy or even just a more productive member of society. Every Monday we will dissect a mindset that is expressed in an easy to remember and conceptualize “one-liner”. Although I do call out some bad mindset's and make a joke of certain things, this is meant to spread positivity and productive mindsets. So let's learn the difference between self love and self awareness aka how to love our flawed selves!
This week we will explore:
Self Love VS Self Awareness
The Problem:
We are taught as kids to have good self-esteem. We are taught that no matter what, we are loved. This is great in order to make it through puberty without killing yourself but after that can be harmful. It builds confidence in ourselves which is essential to becoming great people but it can also stop us from introspecting and finding things we are not very good at.
Sure, there are plenty of people with low self-esteem that need a bump. And there are tons of people that are over-confident and need to be knocked down a peg. But for most of us, we are in the middle, struggling to be simultaneously confident and self-reflective.
“Self-love is a good thing but self-awareness is more important”
In the video, Louis C.K. perfectly explains how this plays out in society. When talking about two girls conversing, it is pretty obvious that they are not existing in the “real world.” Being too awesome for someone has never been a thing. Because her friend cannot tell her what is actually wrong, she goes with the self-esteem building comment that we are taught is the correct response. He’s a piece of shit, you are awesome, and he can’t handle how awesome you are.
I also had my own run-in with this exact situation the other day when I heard two girls talking about how shitty she treats her unsuspecting boyfriend. She said she starts fights for no reason and messes with his head because she thinks its fun and it's a part of her “charm”. She said to the other girl, “I love being sassy and its funny because he doesn’t get it and he can’t handle me.” No honey, you are just being a bitch to a person that is trying to love you. Don’t label this as sass, its mean.
I see this play out everyday life. People are completely blind to their flaws. Introspection scares the shit out of them so they overcompensate with delusional confidence. They build this reality around themselves that keeps them from having to admit there is something that might be wrong with how they act/see the world or that they might have to make a change in themselves.
The Solution:
Find your confidence in the fact that you are constantly looking inside yourself to find things you improve on. Again, Louis C.K. hits it on the head when talks about when someone calls you an asshole. Instead of saying, “no I’m not!” say, “ohh god what did I do? How did I get here?”
It can be scary to look at yourself with judgment. You never know what you will find or how much work it will take to improve it. Once you start down that path It is easy to fall on the slippery slope of self-loathing and lose the confidence in yourself you had when you were blind to your flaws.
Don’t be too hard on yourself but really take inventory of your strengths and weaknesses (often times they are the same thing). Make the decision to improve yourself and commit to it.
It might help to find a trusted friend or parent and ask them what you suck at!
Here is also a list of things that I have noticed incredible results in my life when I decided to start to change them:
- Communicating better
- Don’t react poorly to things that are unexpected or upsetting
- Don’t let emotion cloud your judgment
- Don’t be passive or aggressive when confronting someone.
- Define what is wrong and make the discussion about finding a solution.
- Think about things from other people’s perspective (have empathy)
- Becoming an individual and a free thinker
- Challenge your own ideas before you cast them onto other people
- Have something to offer before asking for something in return
- Know that you are probably wrong most of the time and try to understand things better instead of thinking of new arguments that prove you are right
- Be useful and productive
- Expect to work for things you want and prefer things that take work to get
- Challenge yourself (don’t give into the creature of comfort inside you)
- Help others succeed
I know I am not perfect but I am so much happier when I know how to go about understanding how things went wrong. These are things I try and work on every day. They are the reason I write these blog posts, meditate, and ask my friends to let me know if I am fucking up. I am not afraid to share my flaws because I would rather be known as someone that is working on themselves rather than someone that is ignorant to their own shortcomings. Know something I suck at? Leave a comment and ask me the same question, I welcome it!
Now that you are on your way to improvement, you can feel confident in your abilities to be self-aware make positive changes. An enormous feeling of confidence and motivation comes every time you do something better than you did it last time. You can say to yourself, “despite my flaws, I am better than I was yesterday!”
Why It Is Important:
There is nothing worse than having someone you love that would be the best person on earth if they just….(fill in the blank)
This is the question we must ask ourselves. What is that one thing that makes us hard to live with? Learn to love criticism, for it is giving you the answers you seek. Learn to give communicate warranted and constructive criticism to the ones you love. Learn to love the tough times because it can be a chance to practice virtues like patience, empathy, love, forthrightness, or understanding.
Self-love is important because it is the thing that keeps us going and wanting to become better. As long as it doesn't trick us into thinking we are perfect, it can be the main driver in our pursuit of improvement. Self-love should come from your self-awareness.
Learn to love the person you are because you are the type of person that is focused on improvement. Who couldn’t love that?