Self-Approval & Performance Based Love
Everything changed when I know longer gave two fucks for your approval. I was shown that it is on me to meet my own needs; to wake up each morning in approval of myself. If my aim is to go outside the door following the shadow of the of the rainbow to find the elusive gold of approval I will always come up short. To come up short, means to be in a forever chase for something outside myself. Now lets say I do receive your approval, it will never be enough because I am still driving by the insatiable wanting machine. It's function is to want. To want again and again and again.
It is on you to make your life worthwhile and meaningful. That is consistently found within. Not, without. If my desire is rooted in your syllables of approval I am in bondage to you. Rather than being free through self approval. It is on me to meet my own needs. The incessant chase for your shower of approval - in my case - stemmed from "Tell me I am being a good son". Which all spun from "performance based Love". Every step was a performance. I was in bondage to your view of me. If I performed well, I won. If I didn't, I lost. No one was doing this to me but me. I was placing an unconscious curriculum upon my self everyday. Unreasonable demands upon myself that I was doomed to never fulfill. We can also cast this curriculum upon God. Performing for His Love, His Grace, Approval etc. Now if that be my God then I am under the scrutiny of judgement. I have found through bitter experience that this is not my God!
What's the solution? First, we have to accept that this curriculum is within our makeup. Awareness is always the first step. Then I had to purposefully challenge this false belief. I had to purposefully NOT perform. All the unreasonable demands I put upon my shoulders had to be slowly thrown off. Here's an example: "I am going to get up at 5am. I will pray. I will meditate for 30 min. I will then write in reflection for 30 min. Then I will workout. Then I will have won and I need to have won before I step out my door for the day or else I will have a shit day and might was well give up. And I definitely should not expect to have closeness to God this day."
Hell of a curriculum to start each morning with right? Sound like an unreasonable demand? It fucking was. In reality I would hit my snooze 17 fucking times, wake up 20 min before I'd have to be to work. Best I had was to pray and get ready for work. How did I change this? I accepted the FACT that in that moment of life I was not a morning person. Nor disciplined in meditation. And I worked out at night. I had to radically accept who I was in this moment of my life and it had to be okay with me; I had to claim God's Love throughout the whole thing. Thus, I set my alarm for 30min before I had to get to work instead of hitting snooze 17 times.
Everything began to change! This was a false belief I had to burn to the ground. You can pray all you want. If you don't begin to move in an uncommon way you will never experience an uncommon result. I don't know about you? But all I ever wanted was an uncommon life. I always want to be in the business of creating the NEW. This is God. Thus, I found self approval via radical self acceptance. I saw the burden of performance. Now, we take that script and apply it to other areas of life that need uncommon results. In my eyes the most important take away is "no one was doing this to me but me".
