Learn to love yourself
This is specifically for those of you who occasionally think about yourself as a loser, or a freak, or trash. Before I got rid of depression and when I was still sick, I often thought of myself as a piece of garbage. This kind of negative thoughts should be removed immediately, as they are extremely harmful to your mental health. Thankfully, there are many ways to accomplish this, and you can find one method in the video below.
It is no wonder that depression can be a tough condition when some depression sufferers regard themselves as worth less than mud on the ground.
Self-hatred and self-contempt are some of the things you may endure while trying to get rid of depression altogether, or at least trying to get much, much better. Not everyone who suffers from depression looks at themselves with condemnation, but I think many sufferers do.
But fortunately, this is something you can eliminate, and gradually get rid of altogether. And it starts with a realization: We are all human beings, and we are all imperfect. In other words: We all make mistakes. I do not have words enough to describe how many mistakes I have made myself. How many blunders I have caused, how many stupid things I have said, how many bad choices I have made.
Wonderful things can happen if you acknowledge this, acknowledge to your deepest core that it is human to make mistakes. And disregard the voice in your head that tells you only you do stupid things. Acknowledge that that voice is a liar and do not listen to it. This is step 1 in the process to become kinder to yourself.
Step 2 is to forgive yourself for all the somewhat stupid things you have done (which we all do all the time). Step 2 is inseparably linked to step 1. If it is human to make mistakes, it is completely illogical that it applies to you more than others. If you can forgive other people for the foolish and pointless things they do, the same rules must apply to you.
Would it not have been a lovely place to live in, a place where we lower the limits and raise the ceiling and say it’s perfectly okay to screw up, make bad decisions and ridiculous choices? A place where you can drop your shoulders and relax more. Not giving a damn!
We should all be striving for an internal world like this. And you can take your world a big step forward in that direction by taking responsibility and giving yourself much more room for error.
Another element of this is to stop comparing yourself with others, and rather compare yourself with yourself.
The final step in this process is to gradually go from self-loathing to showing compassion and perhaps even love towards yourself. The jump from contempt to self-love does not happen overnight. But devoting time to it will help you to better and more accept yourself for who and what you are, the good and the bad.
One of the techniques you can use to achieve this is the Metta-meditation, as described in Step 14 of the program in 14 Steps to Happiness, and which you can learn by watching the video below. The Buddhists have used this kind of meditation for hundreds of years. And I do not think they would have used it if it did not work. You can start with this process right here and now. Take a deep breath and say to yourself: I am okay. I am just a human like everyone else. I do the best I can, with what I have at my disposal. I can forgive myself. I can better fully accept myself for who I am. And eventually I can even love myself.