Psychology of Self Love

By D. Shafer ~

As I move further away from my Christian beliefs and feel the freedom to question the unquestionable persona that was presented to me as God, I seem to stumble across what I call real and better truth. As I deconstruct the inner ideas about life that were forced upon me by the belief system I was conditioned in, I can see myself more realistically, and I discover that many of the dysfunctional thoughts and behaviors I exhibited were from a dysfunctional family in a dysfunctional world reinforced by a dysfunctional religion. As I face down the monster of criticism, judgment, anger, hate, and punishment (all the main qualities of an overbearing controlling dictator who cannot tolerate dissention) I find myself feeling more free and even more loved and loving.

After leaving Christianity I could admit that my inner emotional complex was a mess. In the church I could not be honest when trying to appear to be without sin and avoid the resulting disgrace, so impossible to heal.

Since embracing psychology and the intelligent approach of studying, observing, cataloging, and reverse engineering my own system of emotions, I am discovering a person in me that I really like, value, and embrace. I didn't find a god or Christians that could do that for me. Even though there are scriptures that seem to indicate that is what the invisible god wants, the fact that this invisible god is invisible and silent seems to say that I am on my own, so I might as well figure out how best to love myself and find happiness in a world where I have been abandoned. I am discovering the science of emotions and strategies of self love and relying less on magical thinking that some loving being will intervene and make it all good if I wait long enough. I waited 45 years and that bus never came. How sad that is...

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