“Yoga is the journey of the self, through the self, to the self.” ~The Bhagavad Gita
Growing up, I couldn’t have been further from my ‘self.’ Early childhood experiences taught me to focus all of my energy externally. To put everyone around me first and to be insatiably attentive to their needs. This kind of thinking instils you with an incredibly low sense of self-worth, disconnects you from your own feelings and desires, and ultimately leaves your happiness pinned to other people.
When you have low self-worth, you mostly want to contract away from the world like a turtle. Hiding in your protective shell becomes a way of life because you fear that by revealing who you truly are people will leave, reject, or mock you.
A common response from those around me was “Don’t worry! Just be yourself!” When you have low self-worth, “being yourself” isn’t just something that worries you, it’s not something that simply makes you feel uncomfortable. It is quite literally something your brain deciphers as high risk. The act of “being myself” was unbelievably terrifying. I had my guard up all the time and a face for every occasion.
In my early twenties, I started to analyse my unhealthy thought patterns and tried three different therapists. Each one encouraged me to give a monologue about my life while they vacantly nodded and asked questions such as “How did that make you feel?”
It did nothing for me. What I desperately needed was to cultivate a loving relationship with myself. I needed to get to know the girl I had been and the woman I was becoming. To be there for her, to soothe her, and to cheer her on.
That’s where yoga came in.
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self-worth, yoga, be_yourself,
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