Sometimes I hate myself.
And not facetiously or in jest.
Sometimes I legitimately hate myself. A boiling . . . popping . . . burning disdain oft-hidden behind a toothy smile punctuated by self-deprecating quips that feel as ill-placed and uncomfortable as I am in own skin.
Throughout 2023, the depth of my disdain consumed me because, for the first time in a decade, I was alone. And turns out, when left to my own devices, I’m a gah damn menace to society.
This year — I hurt everyone who’s ever shown me genuine love.
This year — I ruined relationships I’m not convinced I can repair.
This year — I broke promises and hearts . . . compromised integrity . . . and drank a lake’s worth of liquor, poetically deepening disdain.
When a chronic overachiever, or, someone with tremendous expectation on back and shoulder hits rock bottom, the impact is bone-shattering.
I won’t bemoan how I fell, why I fell, or where I fell from because it’s beside the point.
The point is when we’re rotten inside . . . lacking self-love and carrying the weight of unprocessed trauma — no level of success, achievement, or external validation can save us from ourselves. From the darkness that lurks, waiting for chink in armor.
We can’t outrun our shadow.
I used to blame my mother — for this.
My father — for this.
My partner(s). My upbringing. Ceaselessly victim, but framing it as empowerment — the reclaiming of strength that was taken away, under-appreciated, siphoned . . .
Truth is, I’m the only person who can control the relationship I have with myself.
But — and this is a strong but — we don’t live in a vacuum.
What happens to us has a profound impact on the relationship we have with ourselves.
It erodes and fractures.
The words of others become our internal voice, skipping like broken record. And because we’re wired for fear, it’s the limiting beliefs and warnings — not to be who you’re called to be — that stick.
It’s perhaps our worst design flaw, and I’d argue it’s the fundamental idea stopping the whole of us from being who we were born to be.
There’s no quick fix to this problem. No switch to flick. But there are habits we can adopt that‘ll help repair our relationship with ourselves.
In no particular order:
Presence
Making a legitimate effort to live in the present moment is a cheat code.
When we allow ourselves to be in our bodies and direct our attention toward what’s happening around us — our senses heighten and our minds clear.
Lamenting the past and worrying about the future are the main causes of anxiety. Period. It’s a fruitless pursuit because both the past and the future dwell solely in imagination.
The easiest way to bring presence into our lives is to limit social media and resist the need for constant distraction. We distract ourselves so we don’t have to hear ourselves . . . feel ourselves. And there’s no way we can process through our shit without facing it head-on.
Integrity
I struggle with this most.
I’m a chronic people-pleaser, an over-committer, conflict-resistant, and hypersensitive i.e. I flake on folks like I’m being paid to do so. My lack of integrity is my main source of self-loathing. Hence, being honest, no matter how difficult, and a man of my word has become my top priority.
Mindfulness
Mindfulness and presence walk hand in hand.
It’s awareness by another name. To bring mindfulness into my life, I monitor my internal voice and substitute negative thoughts with positive thoughts when necessary. Not in an effort to ignore what needs to be processed, but in effort to identify what thoughts are truly mine and which is mindless chatter I picked up somewhere along my journey. In addition, I journal regularly i.e. check in with myself, and have become very intentional about what I’m consuming.
For the past month, I‘ve limited how much I scroll and not only do I feel better, but I have so much more control over my emotions. But social media isn’t the only mindfulness killer; this includes what we consume comprehensively — negative people and discourse, negative TV shows, music —negative subject matter in general.
If we’re going to consume content as regularly as we do, it’s necessary we recharge ourselves with positive ideas.
Grace
I can be a bully.
I can lose sight of perspective. Lose sight of the fact that I’m a human thing having a human experience . . . and that a human experience comes with gunk, funk, and ick.
We’re all trying our best to figure out the right way to be. And the right way is unique to everyone’s individual experience. It’s paramount we’re soft on ourselves when necessary. Just as it’s paramount we’re tough on ourselves when necessary . . . ‘cause my mama ain’t raise no bish.
Transmutation
We wouldn’t have a poem, a song, a movie, a joke, a painting — a single piece of art if someone didn’t transmute their gunk, funk, and ick into something tangible.
Something they could share. Something we could see ourselves in. That’s its function. Without the downs and the failures, there’d be no lesson, and as a result, no growth.
We have to purge our pain and acknowledge our shadow.
Obviously, I’ve done a piss-poor job of sticking to these habits in the past, or I wouldn’t be writing this piece. But I’m aware and ready to change. And if you’re reading this, it means you’re also aware and ready to change.
That’s really all that matters.
I wish you the best of luck on your journey and that you hate yourself a little bit less this year.
Upward and Onward,
Daz
