Mojo Monday ~ Loving Yourself

Dr. Margaret Paul holds a Ph.D. in psychology and is a relationship expert, public speaker, seminar leader, consultant, facilitator, and artist. She has appeared on many radio and TV shows, including the Oprah show. She has successfully worked with thousands of individuals, couples and business relationships and taught classes and seminars for over 42 years.

Dr. Paul’s books have been distributed around the world and have been translated into many languages.

Dr. Margaret Paul and Dr. Erika Chopich

 After practicing traditional psychotherapy for 17 years, Margaret was discouraged by the results – both for her clients and herself. She had spent years trying to heal from her own dysfunctional and abusive background, but found herself still suffering with anxiety and relationship problems. She started to seek a process that works fast, deep, creates permanent change, loving relationships, inner peace, and joy. In 1984, she met and became friends with Dr. Erika Chopich, and together they created the Inner Bonding® process. They have been evolving this incredibly powerful healing process for the last 26 years.

 Margaret shares that the number one problem in relationships is self-abandonment.  She explains how common it is for people to enter into a relationship with the belief that this other person is going to love them and will make them feel good, and make them happy.  They also often have high hopes that this other person will make them feel worthy and lovable.  The result of such expectations is that both people end of feeling very disappointed.  What often follows is that each person then wants to make their past, their partner, God and other things responsible for their unhappiness.  According to Dr. Paul and Dr. Chopich the key is to learn how not to abandon yourself and how to deeply love yourself.  They are very clear that if you do not love yourself you will not be able to love another in a healthy manner. 

When you heal the core shame of believing that you are not good enough, and create the vital connections which bring joy to life, you also heal self-abandonment. When you heal self-abandonment, you also heal problems with spouses, partners, friends, kids, family, co-workers, aloneness, emptiness, anxiety, depression and addictions.

Have you tried everything to feel good about yourself but you still experience feelings of unworthiness and inadequacy?

Do you turn to various addictions because you don't know any other way of managing your painful feelings?

Self-abandonment, which comes from core shame, is the underlying cause of all these problems. Self-abandonment is the cause of disconnection from self, loved ones and Spirit. The practice of Inner Bonding develops the deep self-worth that creates inner peace, joy and loving relationships

Dr. Paul has written a series of books, has a series of DVD's and the on-line program called Inner Bonding®.  Her books are as follows:

•Do I Have To Give Up Me to Be Loved By You?

•Do I Have To Give Up Me to Be Loved By You?…The Workbook

•Healing Your Aloneness

•The Healing Your Aloneness Workbook

•Inner Bonding

•Do I Have To Give Up Me to Be Loved By My Kids?

•Do I Have To Give Up Me To Be Loved By God?

 Here is an article by Dr Margaret Paul called When You Love Yourself, You Let Others Off the Hook

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Do you believe that loving yourself is selfish? Discover why this is not true!

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Frequently, when I start to work with a new client, they believe that loving their self is selfish. Nothing could be further from the truth. A more accurate definition of selfish is expecting others to give themselves up and do for you what you can and need to be doing for yourself.

Letting Others Off The Hook

How are others let off the hook when you love yourself? Let us count the ways!

• Others don’t need to read your mind when you are meeting many of your own needs, and asking outright when there is something you need help with.

• Others don’t need to hold back, be careful, or walk on eggshells when you are taking care of your own feelings.

• Others can receive great joy in giving to you when they don’t feel obligated.

• Others can speak their truth when they know that you are open to learning and wanting to grow. They can be honest when they know that you will deal with your own feelings rather than blame them.

• Others are free to take loving care of themselves when they know you are doing the same, and that you support them in their highest good as part of being loving to yourself.

• Others can be spontaneous with you, knowing that if they ‘make a mistake’ you will take responsibility for your own feelings about it.

• Others feel free to be with you because they want to, not because they feel they have to.

• In a primary relationship, your partner will likely feel attracted to you when you are coming from your power rather than from your fear. If your partner feels obligated to have sex with you because you have made him or her responsible for your happiness and sense of worth, your partner is likely to feel resistant to sex with you.

• Laughter, fun and play flow spontaneously when neither person feels responsible for the other’s feelings, or feels obligated to spend time, give approval or have sex.

• Each person feels free to pursue their passion and purpose, knowing that their partner is taking care of themselves and not waiting for the other person to make them happy.

Loving partnerships are about learning, growing, and sharing love and companionship. They are not about taking responsibility for making the other person feel happy, safe, secure or validated. Paradoxically, when you fully take on the responsibility of making yourself feel happy, safe, secure and validated, a loving relationship supports and enhances these wonderful feelings. But when you expect your partner to do this for you, then your self-abandonment creates your misery, insecurity and lack of self-worth. As long as you are abandoning yourself and expecting your partner to do for you what only you can do for yourself, your partner’s love will never be enough to give you the happiness, safety, security and sense of worth that you seek.

Loving Yourself Means….

• Attending, moment-by-moment, to your own feelings, so that you know immediately when you are abandoning yourself with self-judgment, addictions, staying in your head, or making someone else responsible for you.

• Compassionately opening to learning about your own fears and beliefs that may be causing your self-abandonment, and open to learning about what it means to be present and loving to yourself in the face of life’s challenges.

• Exploring your limiting beliefs and resulting behavior that may be causing your painful feelings.

• Opening to your higher self for information about the truth regarding your beliefs, and the loving action toward yourself.

• Taking loving action in your own behalf, based on truth rather than on false, limiting beliefs.

• Evaluating how you feel as a result of taking loving care of yourself.