One of the hardest things to do is to go from being a secondary character in someone else's story to being the main character of your own.
Most people start out learning about life from their parents. As trusting children, we believe everything our parents say until maturity shows us that even they do not know everything. By the time that happens, we have entered social situations in which we yearn to be liked, accepted, and validated by our peers. If we grow up in religion, we are told from the start that we are not to trust ourselves, but need to rely on others who have more wisdom than us to tell us about life, the universe, and everything. The entire church hierarchical structure is predicated on this idea that someone with a divinity degree or who happens to stand behind a pulpit knows more about Yahweh than the person in the pews.
Both religious and secular society teach us to value productivity in some form, and we all begin to strive toward some goal that we think will prove our existence to be of worth. Success comes in various forms. For the religious, it is how many converts you can win to your gospel, how many churches you can build or support, or how much tithe you give toward the kingdom. For the secular, it may be a financially rewarding job, a legacy such as finishing a novel or discovering a scientific advancement, or simply raising happy and healthy children.
None of these goals are necessarily good or bad in themselves. It is using the things you may accomplish or the approval of other men to validate your existence that makes you a secondary character in the story of another man or an accomplishment.
Yahweh told me once that I do not move through space and time, but rather space and time move through me. Most people would find that hard to comprehend, but the point is this: You are not anchored in anyone or anything outside of you. If you are the main character in your own story, all that you see around you is anchored in you. This means your existence needs no external validation. You don't owe anyone anything.
The hard part about this is that sometimes it requires you to suffer great loss to learn it. You lose other people's approval and validation. Sometimes, you even lose relationship with them. You lose the feeling of safety that you had from anchoring in these things. You may feel like you're floating in a sea of instability until you learn to ground yourself in yourself.
And you may not think it's worth it to go through this process. You may not realize that YOU are worth it. Learning to love yourself is more important than pleasing others or accomplishing anything.
Learning to love yourself is more important than winning souls to your religion.
Learning to love yourself is more important than providing for your family.
Learning to love yourself is more important than making the next great scientific discovery.
Learning to love yourself is more important than leaving a legacy.
Learning to love yourself is more important than fulfilling a great purpose.
Learning to love yourself is more important than helping others.
Learning to love yourself is more important than being approved of by an authority figure.
Learning to love yourself is more important than being liked by your peers.
Learning to love yourself is more important than pretty much anything you were ever taught mattered.
If you're still reading and haven't clicked the X out of anger and disagreement, let me tell you that I'm not saying we shouldn't help others, provide for our families, be excellent in our jobs, or make new discoveries. What I am saying is that those things are secondary. You are first.
Instead of your existence being dependent upon another man's opinion of you or the things that you accomplish, those things are dependent on your existence. You are the main character, and all of those things are supporting characters.
This is what I used to call "right order." Yahweh also said to me once that Love is the foundation of all creation. Relationship is the anchor points of that foundation. And self-love is the cornerstone. All of these things you were taught were so important can only be accomplished in a healthy manner if they are secondary to your own self-love and self-worth.
This is true of everyone, so it's great to learn that in putting yourself in the first position, you are helping others. People who do not love themselves hurt others, often by attempting to receive the love they're lacking in themselves by taking it from other people. Sometimes they just hurt others because other people already love them, and they hurt themselves. By putting yourself first, you free others to put themselves first. Additionally, you are able to love others from the fullness of the love that you were able to give yourself. You have a stable foundation upon which to build relationships and which to build the world.
Until you become the main character of your own story, the foundation upon which you build will be shaky. The world built upon it may even have to be razed so that the foundation can be fixed and you can build something stable.
The beautiful and crazy things is, though, that this looks different for everyone. As individual expressions of Yahweh who tell the world that nobody can tell us what our expressions should look like except ourselves, we multiply the Love that is able to be demonstrated because each person's expression of Love is different.
You are an infinity of Love in the shape of a human being. Nobody else can tell you what your Love-expression should look like because it was given to YOU to be YOU. Meanwhile other people are able to be THEMSELVES and express Love in the way they think is best. When we become the main characters in our own stories, we have multiplied infinite Love by the exponent of... everyone.
Most people start out learning about life from their parents. As trusting children, we believe everything our parents say until maturity shows us that even they do not know everything. By the time that happens, we have entered social situations in which we yearn to be liked, accepted, and validated by our peers. If we grow up in religion, we are told from the start that we are not to trust ourselves, but need to rely on others who have more wisdom than us to tell us about life, the universe, and everything. The entire church hierarchical structure is predicated on this idea that someone with a divinity degree or who happens to stand behind a pulpit knows more about Yahweh than the person in the pews.
Both religious and secular society teach us to value productivity in some form, and we all begin to strive toward some goal that we think will prove our existence to be of worth. Success comes in various forms. For the religious, it is how many converts you can win to your gospel, how many churches you can build or support, or how much tithe you give toward the kingdom. For the secular, it may be a financially rewarding job, a legacy such as finishing a novel or discovering a scientific advancement, or simply raising happy and healthy children.
None of these goals are necessarily good or bad in themselves. It is using the things you may accomplish or the approval of other men to validate your existence that makes you a secondary character in the story of another man or an accomplishment.
Yahweh told me once that I do not move through space and time, but rather space and time move through me. Most people would find that hard to comprehend, but the point is this: You are not anchored in anyone or anything outside of you. If you are the main character in your own story, all that you see around you is anchored in you. This means your existence needs no external validation. You don't owe anyone anything.
The hard part about this is that sometimes it requires you to suffer great loss to learn it. You lose other people's approval and validation. Sometimes, you even lose relationship with them. You lose the feeling of safety that you had from anchoring in these things. You may feel like you're floating in a sea of instability until you learn to ground yourself in yourself.
And you may not think it's worth it to go through this process. You may not realize that YOU are worth it. Learning to love yourself is more important than pleasing others or accomplishing anything.
Learning to love yourself is more important than winning souls to your religion.
Learning to love yourself is more important than providing for your family.
Learning to love yourself is more important than making the next great scientific discovery.
Learning to love yourself is more important than leaving a legacy.
Learning to love yourself is more important than fulfilling a great purpose.
Learning to love yourself is more important than helping others.
Learning to love yourself is more important than being approved of by an authority figure.
Learning to love yourself is more important than being liked by your peers.
Learning to love yourself is more important than pretty much anything you were ever taught mattered.
If you're still reading and haven't clicked the X out of anger and disagreement, let me tell you that I'm not saying we shouldn't help others, provide for our families, be excellent in our jobs, or make new discoveries. What I am saying is that those things are secondary. You are first.
Instead of your existence being dependent upon another man's opinion of you or the things that you accomplish, those things are dependent on your existence. You are the main character, and all of those things are supporting characters.
This is what I used to call "right order." Yahweh also said to me once that Love is the foundation of all creation. Relationship is the anchor points of that foundation. And self-love is the cornerstone. All of these things you were taught were so important can only be accomplished in a healthy manner if they are secondary to your own self-love and self-worth.
This is true of everyone, so it's great to learn that in putting yourself in the first position, you are helping others. People who do not love themselves hurt others, often by attempting to receive the love they're lacking in themselves by taking it from other people. Sometimes they just hurt others because other people already love them, and they hurt themselves. By putting yourself first, you free others to put themselves first. Additionally, you are able to love others from the fullness of the love that you were able to give yourself. You have a stable foundation upon which to build relationships and which to build the world.
Until you become the main character of your own story, the foundation upon which you build will be shaky. The world built upon it may even have to be razed so that the foundation can be fixed and you can build something stable.
The beautiful and crazy things is, though, that this looks different for everyone. As individual expressions of Yahweh who tell the world that nobody can tell us what our expressions should look like except ourselves, we multiply the Love that is able to be demonstrated because each person's expression of Love is different.
You are an infinity of Love in the shape of a human being. Nobody else can tell you what your Love-expression should look like because it was given to YOU to be YOU. Meanwhile other people are able to be THEMSELVES and express Love in the way they think is best. When we become the main characters in our own stories, we have multiplied infinite Love by the exponent of... everyone.
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