Embrace All of Who You Are
This is no easy task. Some people struggle to own the “light” parts of themselves: their power, love, joy, generosity, compassion and kindness. Others struggle to own the “darker” parts: anger, hatred, judgement, ignorance, contempt, selfishness, despair and disgust.
What we reject in ourselves is usually something that has been rejected in us by others in the past. We learn to judge in others what others have judged. There are also times when we take privileges for granted in our families and communities. Other people–“outsiders”–are judged. We’re not them and they’re not us. We belong and others don’t. We may live our lives refusing to take ownership for our judgments and privileges as a way of preserving unearned rights to unequally shared privileges. This is the case with racism, sexism, heterosexism, classism, ageism, and ethnocentrism.
Sometimes, our reactions to judgment may boomerang to the other extreme. When that happens, we identify ourselves exclusively with what others have judged in us, internalizing others mistaken views of us. We deny our “light” or judge it as weak. We learn to hate our own humanity, kindness, capacity for love, or generosity.
We end up blocking the full range of who we are.
Assuming a Compassionate Stance
When you acknowledge and admit to moments of vulnerability, anger, grief, hatred, jealousy, ignorance, shame and inadequacy, you’re embarking on a difficult and important process.
You’re “taking ownership.”
When you recognize that you’re being judgmental, are motivated by selfishness, are lost in a sense of your own entitlement, are doing something out of vindictiveness, or are pretending you care more than you do, you’re at a crossroads.
You can judge yourself. You can defend yourself. You can blame someone.
Or you can remain curious.
You can assume a tender, compassionate stance toward yourself. You can use what you notice as a way of accepting and embracing who you are unconditionally. You can hold the light and the dark that lives within you with compassion.
When you take ownership of something you judge or find intolerable in yourself or others, you’re dissolving a block that separates you from others and the world.
