Saturday 24 September

Pepetoe.

Nowadays, it’s easy to get carried away with the pressures of the worlds: we compare and criticise, discourage and despise. We do these things to ourselves more than we do to each other.

I believe we think too highly of what others may think of us. I’d even go as far as saying that we think everyone cares about us and what we do every single second of the day, like everyone is watching us as though we are the main character in a movie. Putting it like this, it sounds silly right? We are all guilty of it. That’s ok. It’s nothing to feel bad about. This is just another progression of the human mind in a society filled with uncertainty and change within the realm of psychology and the mind., as we are beginning to learn more about how our brain functions.

The fear of failure comes in here. We often fall to the cycle of negative thinking when we believe we have done something wrong, or perhaps not to the standards of the people around us. We fear being cast out of our circle when we mess up. Again, this is just what we have made up in our minds – we think everyone’s watching us and commenting on us. To an extent this is correct, but oftentimes this is forgotten the next day by your peers and means little to any of them but yourself. So, why does it matter?

What is so important to remember is that the only person who is judging us is ourselves. We apply this pressure to ourselves. It’s ridiculous. We do it to impress others, but moreover we do it to impress ourselves and live up to the stupidly high standards we have constructed for ourselves.

Let down the walls to yourself and allow yourself to exist. Give yourself permission to make mistakes, because mistakes are lessons and without them we’d never grow and evolve. We’d be stuck in our same ways, same mindset. How boring does that sound? Don’t be so hard on yourself. You are doing the best you can. Use that for when you feel like you have messed up ‘big-time’, like you have had a massively unproductive week or relapsed into old ways. You haven’t failed, you just need a little bit more support and kindness today. For the little niggles and little mistakes, like forgetting your laptop at home for work or making your friend coffee with dairy milk when you know they’re lactose-intolerant (I don’t know, just giving little examples here to show you it doesn’t matter in the long term!), remember that the only person ‘judging’ you for that is yourself. You might tell yourself “oh you stupid git”. Why? You did nothing wrong on a big scale. Even if you have, it’s a mistake, it’s a hiccup or obstacle in your way that\s 100% solvable.

In a long roundabout way, I am trying to tell you that we are so hard on ourselves all the time. Learn to give yourself space and be kind to yourself. Prioritise the relationship you have with yourself – this is something that I cannot reiterate enough (I go on about it in every single blog post – it is SO important, ok?). Replace that hatred or self-pity or annoyance at yourself for love and gentleness.

Have nothing but love, patience and kindness for yourself ❤