[MUSIC PLAYING]
Namaste, everybody.
Lisa A. Romano here, the
Breakthrough Life Coach,
and today I'm gonna
teach you all about why
it is brave to love the self.
Many of us who don't
know how to love the self
don't recognize that
anytime we self-care or we
act in the name of self-love,
that this is actually
a huge act of bravery.
And today I'm gonna prove
to you why loving yourself
is actually one of the most
bravest things you could do.
It is brave to love yourself
because, if you come
from the type of background
where you never felt loved
and you are learning to
give yourself something
that you never had, that
is a huge act of bravery.
If you've come from an alcoholic
home or a narcissistic home,
or if you've been pushed around
in the foster care system,
if you've experienced
some type of abuse
in your background or
childhood emotional neglect,
and today you are acting on
learning to love yourself,
you're actually learning
to love yourself,
this is absolutely
an act of bravery.
You're saying to the
world, in spite of me never
feeling loved, in spite of me
never feeling worthy of love,
today I'm going to love myself.
And, yes, that is
an act of bravery.
In spite of possibly
spending decades,
decades feeling unworthy,
today I'm going to self-care.
Remember, self-care is
self-love in action.
And even though, in
spite of possibly feeling
for decades that I was
unworthy of love, today
I'm going to self-care.
Today I'm going to act
on loving myself in spite
of never feeling loved.
Yes, that is brave.
It's brave because most people
are waiting for someone else
to make them feel
worthy of love.
Most people don't even
realize that they're
waiting for permission from
the outside to love the self
or to feel worthy of the self.
So if you are somebody who is
going out there in the world
and you're learning to take care
of yourself and love yourself,
yes, this is an act of bravery.
You aren't somebody who
is waiting for someone
to rescue you anymore.
You aren't someone
who is waiting
for the knight on the
white horse to show up.
Or you are longer
the type of person
who is looking for other people
to fix and to take care of
and to work out this
rescuer dynamic with.
No.
You are learning to say,
I am enough to self-care,
and I'm not waiting for
someone else outside of me
to give me permission
to do that or to make
me feel like, because
someone else loves me,
then I must be worthy.
No.
I'm learning to love
myself because I am enough.
You are saying to the world
and to your inner self, enough.
No more waiting.
No more waiting for this
person or that person
to love me enough.
No more waiting for
the right circumstance.
No more waiting till I weigh
enough to think I'm enough.
No more waiting till my
hair grows a certain length
to feel enough.
No more waiting to feel
better before I can take
care of myself or love myself.
No more waiting for
anyone outside of me
to give me permission to say,
yes, Lisa, you are worthy
and you have the right
to take care of yourself.
If you are that person.
If you're saying, no
more, enough waiting,
and you're learning
to love yourself,
yes, that is an act of bravery.
It is brave to love the
self and to self-care
because most people
worry about what
other people think about them.
Think about it.
When you say you love yourself,
what you are implying,
you might not realize it,
but what you are implying is,
I accept myself.
I accept my flaws.
I accept that, when I was below
the veil of consciousness,
I said and I did things
that I wish I didn't do,
that I would have never
done if I was highly aware
or I had a healthier
sense of self.
I did things I wasn't proud of.
I said things I wasn't
proud of, right?
I have that.
Absolutely.
I have that in my head.
But when you learn
to love yourself,
you're embracing
those aspects of you,
those lower personality
aspects of you.
They're not your
true self anyway.
Those were things
that you went through
as part of your evolutionary
journey as a soul
here on planet Earth.
Right?
So when you are learning
to love yourself
and you're learning
to accept yourself,
you're learning to
accept your flaws
in spite of what other people
might think about your flaws.
You're learning that the person
whose opinion matters the most
has always been yours.
It is like you are saying
to yourself, I see you.
I know that you've
made mistakes.
I know that you've
bumped up against walls.
I know that you've said
and you've done things
and you've felt things that
you're not that proud of,
and I love you anyway.
Yes, loving yourself in
spite of all of the things
that you know about yourself
that you wish no one would ever
know or you hope no
one else finds out
about, you are the person
who knows your deepest,
darkest secrets.
If you are somebody who is
learning to love yourself,
that means you're
embracing the shadow self.
And, yes, that is an
act of absolute bravery.
It is brave to learn to
love the self because most
people, whether they're
aware of it or not,
are living in a
state of reactivity
to what is happening
in the evil world
or they're living in reactivity
to what is happening outside
of them and how other
people treat them,
waiting for permission,
like I said earlier.
But there is this sense
that, when we are not
loving ourselves, we are
in a state of attachment
to the outer world.
And so if you are
learning to address that,
yes, that's an act of bravery.
When you love the
self, you're learning
to care less about what's
happening outside of you.
You're shushing the outside.
You're reducing mental chatter.
You're turning to
the God-self within.
You are learning to
find inner peace.
What other people say is no
longer bothering you that much.
You know that is not where
your true power lies anyway
because you're learning
to love the self.
You're learning to
see value in the self.
You're not begging people to
hang out with you anymore.
It is brave to love the self,
because when you love the self,
you're letting go of
these egoic attachments.
You're saying, I am enough.
And this goes against what
most people want to do.
Most people want to cling.
They don't realize
it, but they're
clinging to whatever's
happening at work.
They cling to what their mother
said or what their sister said.
They cling to what's
happening in politics,
or they cling to
something outside of them
that their ego
attaches to and that
makes them feel alive because
the ego is tied to survival.
And so when you're
learning to love the self
and you begin to let go of what
other people think about you,
then you are living a
brave life because you're
learning to care more about
what you think about you.
You're going against the
grain, and that is brave.
It's like you're saying to the
world, yes, I used to cling.
Yes, I used to worry.
Yes, I used to react.
Yes, I used to
try to manipulate.
Yes, I used to try to control.
Yes, I fell apart when
people didn't agree with me.
Yes, yes, yes, yes,
yes, but no more.
I know that I am enough,
and I know that I
must seek my own validation.
And, yes, you letting go of
other people's validation,
you letting go of accepting
when people don't validate you,
that is absolutely brave.
Many of us have been taught
that, if you take care
of yourself, you're selfish.
If you put yourself
first, you're selfish.
I know that I came from
that lineage for sure.
And I watched my mother
neglect herself my entire life.
And what did I do
when I got older?
I neglected myself.
What did I do every time I
bought myself a $15 blouse?
I felt guilty.
What did I do when
I needed deodorant?
I waited until there
was no deodorant left,
hardly any deodorant left,
and I was scraping my armpits
with the cap because I didn't
feel like I had a right
to go out and buy deodorant
until I absolutely
had no, zero, deodorant left.
Literally, that's how I grew up.
And so learning to love
myself, yes, that was brave.
Coming from the
type of background
that I came from where,
you are not enough.
Who do you think you are?
Who do you think you
are for wanting that?
Who do you think you
are for saying that?
Who do you think you are, right?
I grew up with that.
And so I learned to be small.
And loving myself, even though
that is the key to everything,
love is the key to
everything, no, I
didn't feel comfortable
loving myself.
In fact, it felt completely
uncomfortable to learn
to love myself.
But I forced myself to do it.
And, yes, it was
brave for someone
like me to learn
to love herself.
Many of us have not
been taught, literally,
we have been brainwashed
and conditioned
to feel like we don't have
rights like everybody else.
Right?
I know that I used to
look up to people like--
well, just think about
people in high positions,
whether it's a pop star or
a television talk show host
or whatever.
It's just this idea that
there was this hierarchy
that there were the
haves and the have nots,
and I was a have not.
I have not.
I was a have not,
have not, have not.
I was not allowed to have this.
I was not allowed to think that.
I was not allowed to have this
experience or that experience.
And this was an
undercurrent in my life,
and I never even realized
it until I started
doing my work
through codependency
and recovering from CPTSD
and narcissistic abuse.
It was like, oh my
god, the heavens opened
and I began to understand
what was wrong.
And so when you come from
a traumatic background,
or you may not even
realize that you
may have been conditioned to
not even feel worthy of taking
care of the self.
People who take care of
themselves naturally,
they have this innate
sense of value,
an innate sense of worth, that
people like me, and maybe like
you, didn't have.
And even though that's not our
fault, if we don't address it,
we can't fix it.
So oftentimes, I coach
people, and even myself,
I have felt in my
life where I was
an extension of someone else.
I was put on this earth
to carry the shoes,
or I was put on this earth
to put the toothpaste
on the toothbrush, you know?
I was an extension.
I wasn't meant to be out
there in front of my life.
I wasn't meant to have a
dream manifest through me.
That was for the other people.
Those were for the haves.
And, yes.
So when you're learning
to love yourself,
and you're seeing those
things so clearly,
and you are gaining some
momentum on the inside,
it's like the choo choo
train going up the hill,
I think I can, I think I can, I
think I can, that was my life.
It was little shifts,
incremental shifts,
over a long period of
time through commitment
and through dedication
and through knowing that I
did have intrinsic value.
I do have value
because I am here.
I am as valid as a star
in the sky, as you are.
I am an extension of
divinity, as you are.
And when that hit
me, when I realized
that I am as important
as anything and anyone
in the eyes of source or God--
call him Snuffleupagus for all I
care, or call him or her or it,
I don't care.
Source!-- but in
the eyes of source
I was just as valid
as anybody else, that
definitely helped
me shift the way
I saw myself in terms of value.
When we are learning
to put ourselves first,
it's like we're saying
to our inner self
and to the world, look, I
know that I have lived my life
feeling like an extension.
I have not accepted my
divine God-given power,
and I have played it small,
and I have lived in fear,
and I have given permission
over myself to other people,
but no more.
I am not going to believe
in conditioning anymore.
I'm not going to
believe what people
say about me being a woman.
I'm not going to
believe what people
say about me being a man.
I'm not going to believe what
people say about my heritage,
or whatever.
I'm going to be myself.
I'm going to create
my own program.
I'm going to interface
with the matrix
based on what I want to
believe about me because that's
my God-given right as
a creator incarnate.
That's right.
And it's your right too.
I'm going to start
listening to my own self,
designing my own blueprint.
I am going to start living
out loud in my life,
and I'm going to love myself
and take care of myself,
because that is my
God-given right.
You bet your butt that's brave.
So self-care and self-love
can be very triggering
because what we are doing
is, we are pulling away
from the outer
world, and that can
trigger all sorts of abandonment
trauma, attachment trauma,
and even threaten our
sense of survival.
Humans are born to connect.
And so when we start
retreating into the self,
it can trigger our
physical, very innate need
that's tied to the root
chakra for survival
because we are born to feel
connected to other people.
We want to experience
bonding with others.
When we start loving
the self and saying,
I'm not looking to the outside
world for my sustenance
anymore, I'm not looking
to the outside world
to fulfill me anymore,
it can trigger
all sorts of clingy,
co-dependent, reactive behavior
in us, and it's
something to be aware of.
When we stop waiting for other
people to give us permission,
to feel good enough or to be
good enough or to be ourselves
and to step out
front, when we stop
waiting for someone
to say, yes, you
have a right to
follow a dream, we
dive right into the belly of
a human being's primal fear
for the need to connect.
Letting go of needing other
people to take care of us
or to validate us so
that we can finally
learn it's our responsibility
to love the self,
we let go of thinking
there's a rescue boat coming.
There's no rescue boat coming.
When we let go and
we stop worrying
about what other
people think about us,
it's like we're cutting this
lifeline to the outer world
and we're saying,
nope, I've got this.
I'm going to learn
to love myself.
And it is extremely brave
because there's no proof
that you're going to be able to
actually feel enough and feel
connected.
The only way to prove
this to yourself,
and to prove what I'm saying
happens, is by experiencing it.
If anybody would have
told me 20, 25 years ago,
Lisa, if you want
to be happy, let go.
Accept what people
say about you.
Let them smear you.
Let them lie.
Let them make up stories.
Let them twist the story.
Let your parents think
what they want about you.
Let people judge you.
Stop fighting to get
people to acknowledge you.
Stop trying to fix other people.
If somebody would've told
me 20 or 25 years ago
that the way to be happy
and the way to inner peace
was through the divine self,
that it was through letting
go, that it was
detaching that was key,
that it was learning
to feel my own feelings
and to honor myself
and to see myself.
If somebody would have told
me that 20 or 25 years ago,
I might have panicked.
Because clinging
and co-dependent
behavior and acquiescing
were the ways
in which my brain, my
dysfunctional brain,
and as a result of my
childhood programming,
taught me was what
I should be doing.
And here I was learning
to confront that and say,
no, no, no, no, no.
That's exactly why you're
going in the wrong direction.
And my body knew it, right?
All these bumps in the
road, all this resistance,
all these bad relationships,
all these bumps
on my body and
hives and migraines
and asthma, and lions and
tigers and bears, oh my.
All of this stuff
that was showing up
was just evidence I was
going in the wrong direction,
but I didn't know how
to go any other way.
So learning to love yourself in
spite of childhood programming
that teaches you to
cling and teaches you
that you're not
enough, yes, dear one,
that is very, very brave.
If you are learning
to love the self,
especially if you
have never felt
loved, especially if you
have never felt connected
to another human being.
If you are letting
go and you are
accepting that it's not your
place to get people to love you
or to convince people
that you love them
or that they love you.
If you're letting that go,
dear one, I want you to know,
that is an extremely,
extremely brave act.
You don't need permission
from anybody else
out there to put yourself
first, even though you
might feel like you do.
I hope this video has helped
you understand that you don't.
The universe is waiting
for your command.
The universe is waiting
for you to awaken.
The universe is waiting for you
to realize that within you you
have always been enough and
it was only faulty childhood
programming, or
faulty programming,
negative core
beliefs, that had you
going in the wrong direction
on your search for true love.
You are the love you seek.
My name is Lisa A. Romano.
I'm the Breakthrough Life Coach
and the creator of The 12 Week
Breakthrough Coaching
Program that's
helping people heal from
codependency and narcissistic
abuse, that really helps
them unplug from the old
and plug into something new so
that they can create abundance
and love and attract inner
peace into their life.
It's absolutely amazing.
I'm also a meditation teacher on
Insight Timer and a bestselling
author.
If you'd like to know more
about me and my membership site,
you could check out my website
at www.lisaaromano.com.
And if you click any
of the links below,
you could actually
listen to one of my books
for free on Audible.com.
Namaste, everybody.
Bye for now.
