Self Help Tips - What Does Self Help Really Mean?Posted by McNally Dowd on April 26th, 2021 In modern day usage, self-help really identifies a process concerning people's own personal development or self growth. The good side of this is that it results in people trying to become aware of who and what they're, and pursuing avenues that will help them become more rounded and happy people. The downside of the is twofold. Firstly there is such a wealth of literature available, along with seminars, groups etc, that there surely is almost too much information available. Therefore for people to really make good choices in what constitutes self-help for them could be incredibly difficult. Often it is just a procedure for simply ploughing through stuff and utilizing a gut instinct to determine whether it will be of great benefit to you or not. The other, more subtle downside of modern day self-help literature is that it's constantly telling people they must improve to become OK. This is usually a pivotal selling point for some literature and seminars etc. In lots of ways this is usually a very damaging approach, because it is actually the opposite of what helps people grow, which is a level of unconditional self-acceptance. The self-help industry is not any different in many ways to other industries. It really is continually telling people what they need to do and how they need to do it in order to be who they would like to be. There is a plenty of valuable information within this literature, together with an awful level of drivel, depending on your point of view! There is a truism to the saying, that self growth is really about self acceptance not about self improvement. This might initially seem a bit of a contradiction but it isn't. If someone can truly accept themselves as they are, not as they think they should be, then actually they will feel an even of emotional security and safety that will allow them to heal whatever it is that is blocking them and subsequently change. If people feel a perpetual need to change and become different as a way to feel a level of self acceptance, or acceptance by other people, then life becomes a permanent treadmill that they can never log off. This treadmill will need them further away from the person they are, and will make it less likely they will ever really change. People will be continually attempting to become acceptable, largely on the basis of what other people think about them. Real freedom and security comes from within, and core to that is a level of unconditional self acceptance or unconditional love. Unconditional love is a phrase often used, and is worth considering as a basis for several types of self-help work. Perhaps the most important thing to discover is that unconditional does indeed mean unconditional. When applied to habits to track , this basically means being willing to accept who you are, unconditionally, whether you prefer it or not. Only this degree of self acceptance will really free people to be able to create a level of self-awareness, free from judgement about themselves, and subsequently be at peace with themselves and other people. A word about judgement - judging oneself or other people can be an absolute death wish when it comes to self acceptance. Judging other people is normally a reflection, in a few ways, of judging oneself. Self judgement will educate you on to disown your own emotions and feelings as not being real, either because they're not so pleasant feelings, or as you do not want to have them. Either way it means it is impossible so that you can accept yourself when you are because you do not desire to be this way. Self acceptance means unconditional love of self. This can be a gut level feeling of realising that it's okay to be you who ever you are. Once and when you have that, you are truly free to love yourself along with other people.Like it? Share it! More by this author |