Looking in the mirror and discovering the real you - Part 1 of 3

Finding Your True Self

To maintain your self-esteem and feel better about yourself, you must discover who you are—not who you were told you are, not the character you adopted to suit your parents, but the true you. Many people do not recognise themselves. They know who their parents say they are and pretend to be, but they don't know who they indeed are.

Nobody has any idea who you are. You are the only person who can determine who your genuine self is. Your parents' incorrect labelling, confused views, and negative projections have formed a false picture, which you must now remove. Instead, you must uncover and build your actual self. Discover your true self because many of you have no idea who you are other than what you see in your parents' mirror. After smashing this mirror, you discover that a new picture does not quickly appear. You'll have to go deeper within yourself to locate your actual reflection.

People who have been ignored or abandoned sometimes have a hazy sense of their identities. It's as if they pass past a mirror and see an image of themselves that quickly vanishes. Many people are always looking for clues about who they are. They frequently suffer with such a sense of insignificance that they believe they could literally disappear.

But there is someone there, no matter how brief the vision or insignificant you believe you are. You may have to delve deeper into the debris of your parents' judgements and expectations to find it, or you may have to gaze further into the mirror to discover yourself. Still, with enough attention and patience, you will eventually uncover the true you. This blog will focus on assisting you in creating a thorough self-portrait. We will begin by having you examine your own behaviour and make a list of your personality qualities. I urge you to be aware of your feelings, mainly what makes you angry, fearful, humiliated, or sad. Finally, we will concentrate on assisting you in discovering your essence or inner self—something distinct from your bodily and even emotional existence.

Self-discovery necessitates self-awareness—or paying constant attention to oneself. To properly pay attention to oneself for the goals of self-discovery, one must adopt a neutral position. When you examine yourself, you take in anything you notice about yourself with neutrality, attention, and curiosity. Still, you do not pass judgement on what you see.

Some people are unaware of their genuine identities because they are conflicted, like my client Joanne (not her real name): "I'm not sure who I truly am. It is always evolving. I believe I'm one thing one moment and then act completely otherwise the next." Although we all alter based on who we are with and what we are doing, there must be some consistency and congruence with who we are at any given time. Finding that core of constancy may be challenging for someone like Joanne. She strove so hard to be decent that she evolved into a new version of herself with each person she was with. The tips below will assist you in taking a hard look at yourself and begin to determine who you are.

What Kind of Person Are You?

1.       For at least a week, pay close attention to yourself. (Pay attention to your actions, feelings, and thoughts.) Make a list of what you see and your insights about yourself. You might also use the following questions as a jumping-off point:

•         Do you feel uncomfortable being alone or conscious that you require alone time?

·         What do you like to do while you're alone?

•         When do you feel the most at ease?

·         When do you feel the least safe?

•         When do you feel most capable?

·         When do you feel the most inept?

•         How do you meet your needs (such as security, attention, or affection)?

•         Do you perform better in an organised or unstructured environment?

2.       Make a list of your personality characteristics. Here is a list from one of my clients: Honest, often to a fault. loyal, distrusting, a perfectionist, sensitive—get my emotions hurt quickly, a propensity to be self-absorbed, sincere, impulsive, obsessive, respectful of others' needs, talented, competent, bright, compassionate You can add to your list as you continue to study yourself.

3.       Take note of any inclinations you may have to disguise your genuine self from others or yourself, such as pretending to feel one thing while you genuinely think another. Take note of how you behave around people vs how you behave when you are alone.

4.       Create a self-description based on your observations and what you already know to be true about yourself. Include all elements of yourself, including your physical, social, intellectual, emotional, and spiritual sides, in your description. Whenever you see anything new about yourself, add it to your list. You will notice that you are thinking about and scrutinising yourself more than ever. You may uncover attributes in yourself that you were previously unaware of, or you may reconsider a previously held belief about yourself.

Reconnect with Yourself, Your Body, and Your Emotions

"What you know in your brain will not sustain you in situations of crisis... confidence comes from bodily awareness, knowing what you feel in the present," Marion Woodman correctly stated.

Paying attention to your body is the most effective way to recover your emotions—pain, rage, fear, guilt, shame, joy, and love. Even if you unknowingly suppress your feelings, your body will remember them. These are known as bodily memories. Your body recalls how you felt as a child when you were mistreated, scolded, rejected, or suffocated. Your body has a separate set of physical feelings for each emotion. It recalls the agony and wrath you felt as a youngster with rigidity, constrictions, and tightness.

Allow yourself to reconnect with your body, allowing it to express and release all of your childhood grief. There is a reason why your body aches, bleeds, itches, or tightens. It's attempting to communicate with you. It reminds you of the types of childhood trauma you went through. Pay attention to your body and its messages.

Paying attention to your emotions is one of the most effective methods of uncovering who you are. Indeed, some describe self-awareness as being aware of one's feelings and ideas about one's moods. When examining your emotions, I advise you to assume a neutral, non-reactive, non-judgmental position. Taking a tiny step back from your experience is beneficial to be conscious of what you are experiencing rather than becoming engrossed in it.

Unfortunately, for many people, emotions are terrifying. When their parents' feelings were too much for them, they were screamed at, shoved around, or smacked. They were mocked, reprimanded, or abandoned when they were furious or started crying. As a result, most prefer to conceal and repress their genuine emotions. Even those who appear excessively emotional, eruptive, or volatile frequently hide their most sensitive sentiments.

Furthermore, if you were ignored or mistreated as a youngster, you will be overwhelmed and governed by your emotions. Many individuals are so stressed that their emotions turn against them. Dysfunctional behaviours, such as violent or victimising tendencies, substance misuse, and suicide ideation, are frequently efforts to cope with unbearably unpleasant feelings. Many people attempt to manage their emotions by forcing themselves not to feel whatever they feel. This behaviour is a direct result of the emotionally invalidating environment in which they were raised, which mandated that people should smile when they are unhappy, be nice and not upset others when they are angry, and confess or beg forgiveness even when they do not believe they did anything wrong.

Because of these actions, you may have been taken aback by your own emotions or became overwhelmed as they accumulated. As a result, you may project your feelings onto others.

Another common consequence of childhood trauma is "psychic numbness" (stuck or frozen sensations). Children react to a terrible circumstance and shut off their feelings or detach. It's as if their brains wander and they become separated from their bodies. It takes time to learn to re-experience frozen sentiments. However, once these suppressed sentiments are released, they may assist you by offering essential knowledge that will allow you to make sensible judgments and take appropriate actions in your life. Reconnecting with your emotions may provide you with strength, bravery, and joy.

You must avoid categorising emotions as "good" or "bad" and instead view them as essential signals that may teach you about yourself, your situation, and your surroundings. You'll realise that your emotions may help you take better care of yourself and, as a result, boost your self-esteem.

Make a list of your emotions.

1. Make a list of some things that make you furious.

2. Describe some of the things that make you unhappy.

3. What makes you nervous?

4. What is it that makes you feel guilty?

5. What brings you happiness or joy?

6. What makes you happy or fulfilled?

Determine Your Emotions

People who were mistreated as children may struggle to define what emotion they are feeling at any particular time. This is because they may have had to suppress their feelings to survive childhood neglect, or they may have had to appear to feel something they didn't actually feel. But it's also because many people thought it was unsafe for anybody to know what they were experiencing. As a result, they grew up with mixed emotions they now struggle to recognise.

We all experience a wide range of emotions in a single day, and learning to recognise each can be challenging. As a result, it is better to concentrate on only a few critical feelings at first. Most specialists agree that there are eight core or fundamental emotions: anger, grief, joy, surprise, fear, disgust, guilt/shame, and curiosity (some also consider love a primary feeling). Because humans are born with the capacity or biological preparedness for certain emotions, they are termed fundamental emotions. All other emotions are classified as secondary or social since they are learnt and generally consist of a blend of real emotions. We will concentrate on five powerful emotions: fear, sorrow/sadness, rage, guilt/shame, and joy.

We frequently grow alienated from our primary emotions by diluting and renaming them. Many individuals, for example, will state they are nervous or worried rather than terrified. Many people will say they are weary instead of feeling sad (or even recognising they are unhappy). Many individuals would state they are indifferent or bored instead of being upset.

Several additional terms are routinely employed to describe our fundamental emotions to further complicate matters. The terms listed below are frequently used to convey the feeling of sorrow. Some terms express moderate grief, while others describe more extreme sadness. Unhappiness, pain, dismay, melancholy, gloom, sadness, sorrow, suffering, misery, despair, depression, agony, anguish, and hopelessness top the list for the most part. Using one of these terms instead of sad might be helpful since it indicates the amount of sadness you are experiencing. Agony and despair, for example, undoubtedly depict a more extreme sense of grief than sad. The main thing is that you should not let the description of your situation distract you from the reality that you are essentially experiencing melancholy.

There are additional terms that are closely linked to the emotion of sorrow. Still, they signify more than what we generally associate with sadness. Some examples are alienation, defeat, sadness, disappointment, discontent, displeasure, discomfort, insecurity, isolation, neglect, sympathy, and rejection.

You'll observe that these terms give the word melancholy a different tone, judgement value, or meaning. While these terms might assist in expressing a specific cause of your melancholy, they nonetheless reflect the essential experience of sadness.