the love in yourself

Hard as it can be at times, it just not possible to always look to others for love, validation or confirmation of ourselves, sometimes that needed love is just not available in the outside world and that is when we most need to look within to our own hearts. But what I am also finding is that once we do find that love inside then there is a chance we will find someone who mirrors it back to us, often the relationships may mirror something needing healing in us.

I am constantly amazed by the love I find from certain others in my life now. There are those who cannot be there for me, they may care silently and not express it, or I may just not figure in their world but then there are others around me now who I am finding begin to mirror feelings of unconditional love for me and I am so grateful.

I am not sure if any of you believe in the concept of twin flames but it is said that there exists out there a second half of us who is able to give unconditional love in a bond that cannot be broken no matter what storms. Such a person may open us up to our own barriers and walls and I have had this experience over the past year. It is possible that soon we may be meeting and it may seem like a fantasy or wishful thinking to believe a connection you made more on a etheric level could be strong or real. But I honestly do believe it is true.

I am also part of the Facebook Twin Flame community and it seems that there are many others out there experiencing this kind of love or going through painful separations too from their beloveds where they are learning to keep loving anyway. In the end its only us who can block our hearts to love even when the loved one may not want to love in return it is possible to still keep a feeling of goodwill for the person alive in our hearts.

I am not stranger to painful invalidating relationships and often my own blockages towards true intimacy prevented deeper connections. I went through a very painful past relationship which ended just over 8 years ago and it is obvious to me now that this person who withheld a lot and criticised me too was really drawn to me so I could see the part my own self criticism played. He was actually mirroring the deeper negative voices inside myself. He was also not really capable of empathy

My need for constant attention (due to past unintegrated childhood wounds) also played a big part in making it hard to love myself fully and unconditionally. I remember my ex partner often saying to me he did not believe in such a thing as unconditional love but I saw the roots of that belief really lay in a very tormented childhood which blocked him on some level. In the end the pain of us not being able to fulfil each other broke the relationship apart and its taken years for all the critical things he said to me over the course of the 5 years of being together to not constantly be replaying over and over and over again in my mind. At times they still repeat and undermine me. Examining them in the past few years of therapy I also understand so many of them were untrue. I most surely had faults and flaws but the level of criticism I was dealing with was toxic.

I share a lot about my inner critic in this blog. I still battle this force, but luckily these days I am attracting more people who see the real me and don’t project negative shadow onto me. I continue to make steps forward and backward where self love is concerned and in my latest relationship forgiveness is given freely backwards and forwards. It truly is possible to learn to give and receive unconditional love once we realise our own blockages and the part internalised negative messages play.