Ten Ways To Love Ourselves

~ Day Seven ~
Ten Ways To Love Ourselves

~ Dear Friends on our Journey ~

DAY ONE

~ ~ STOP ALL CRITICISM ~ ~

CRITICISM NEVER CHANGES A THING.
REFUSE TO CRITICIZE YOURSELF.
ACCEPT YOURSELF EXACTLY AS YOU ARE.
EVERYBODY CHANGES.
WHEN YOU CRITICIZE YOURSELF,
YOUR CHANGES ARE NEGATIVE.
WHEN YOU APPROVE OF YOURSELF,
YOUR CHANGES ARE POSITIVE

DAY TWO

~ ~ DON'T SCARE YOURSELF ~ ~

DON'T SCARE YOURSELF.
STOP TERRORIZING YOURSELF
WITH YOUR THOUGHTS.
IT'S A DREADFUL WAY TO LIVE!
FIND A MENTAL IMAGE THAT GIVES YOU PLEASURE
( MINE IS A WATERFALL),
AND IMMEDIATLEY SWITCH YOUR SCARY THOUGHT
TO A PLEASURABLE THOUGHT.

DAY THREE

~ ~ BE GENTLE AND KIND AND PATIENT ~ ~

BE GENTLE WITH YOURSELF.
BE KIND TO YOURSELF.
BE PATIENT WITH YOURSELF
AS YOU LEARN THE NEW WAYS OF THINKING.
TREAT YOURSELF AS YOU WOULD
SOMEONE YOU REALLY, REALLY LOVED.

DAY FOUR

~ ~ BE KIND TO YOUR MIND ~ ~

SELF HATRED IS ONLY HATING
YOUR OWN THOUGHTS.
DON'T HATE YOURSELF
FOR HAVING BAD THOUGHTS.
GENTLY CHANGE YOUR THOUGHTS.

DAY FIVE

~ ~ PRAISE YOURSELF~ ~

CRITICISM BREAKS DOWN THE INNER SPIRIT.
PRAISE BUILDS IT UP.
PRAISE YOURSELF AS MUCH AS YOU CAN.
TELL YOURSELF HOW WELL YOU ARE DOING
WITH EACH AND EVERY LITTLE THING.

DAY SIX

~ ~ SUPPORT YOURSELF ~ ~

FIND WAYS TO SUPPORT YOURSELF.
REACH OUT TO FRIENDS AND
ALLOW THEM TO HELP YOU.
IT IS BEING STRONG
TO ASK FOR HELP
WHEN YOU NEED IT.

DAY Seven

~ ~ BE LOVING TO YOUR NEGATIVES ~ ~

ACKNOWLEDGE THAT
YOU CREATED THEM
TO FULFILL A NEED.
NOW YOU ARE FINDING NEW,
POSITIVE WAYS
TO FULFILL THOSE NEEDS.
SO, LOVINGLY RELEASE
THE OLD NEGATIVE PATTERNS.

My name is Mari and I am a compulsive overeater and am trying my best to learn new skills to enable me to love myself more. We have discussed the six ways shown above and today are going to talk about the seventh.

Be Loving To Your Negatives is the seventh exercise that we can do to love ourselves. It should be very obvious to all of us as compulsive overeaters what our biggest negative that we must overcome is. There was a time when we created something for ourselves that we needed to do in order to fulfill a need we had. We needed to feel safe. So what did we do?

We created the biggest negative of all. We began to stuff our feelings. We felt anger .... se so ate. We felt hurt ... so we ate. We felt we had been verbally abused ... so we ate. We were physically abused ... so we ate. We were taunted ... so we ate. We were rejected ... so we ate. And on and on.

These negative patterns became more than just patterns. They became a lifestyle. And we had physical proof of it. We became overweight. And then because of the physical manifestation of our new lifestyle, a whole new set of negatives found their way into our lives.

I am going to try to think of all my negative behaviors other than overeating. I have learned to change my eating patterns ... my overeating. Now I must learn to change all my other negative behaviors.

I acknowledge that I had a need at some point in my life to create each and every one of my character defects and flaws. But now it is time for me to release them and substitute new and better behaviors.

Dear God,
As I release these
old and destructive behaviors ...
Let me do so lovingly. It was not
my fault that I needed them at one time
in my life.

Love,
Mari
Marisok@aol.com
The Recovery Group