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Posted on 17 September 2007
Wise Blogger Steve Hollinghurst said:

Happy to be me?

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I wonder how many people are really happy with themselves? The trouble is that there are so many voices suggesting we might have every reason not to be. saying we might be too fat or too thin, that our looks won't attract others unless we do somethign about them; that we aren't smart enough in the head or the wardrobe; that our pay packet, house or car are not up to the mark. This certainly can't be helping with our high rates of depression!

on a more profound level the increasing isolation from others modern life brings also denies us the human affirmation we all need to have a positive view of ourselves, contact with those special people who enjoy us for who we are and tell us we are 'OK'.

Spirituality ought to help here, shouldn't it? then why does it seem to make some people hate themselves even more? well here's the problem. On the one hand spiritual maturity is about change and growth, becoming the person we are meant to be, but that involves acknowledging the places we actually need to change. On the other we all need to be accepted for who we are, to be happy with ourselves. The two seem to be in conflict. do we have to choose between a spirituality that simply pats us on the back and lets us off with our worst failings; or one that makes us totally hate ourselves in the hope we might chnage? I've met people suffering from one or the other and neither seem positive.

I remember one day having one of those realisations that really changes your spiritual journey. i realised that God didn't just love me he actually liked me. I'd always had this impression that God loved me in spite of how awful I was, and just added this to a personal motive to beat myself up over how bad I was. But if God actually liked me! Well why not? My closest friends liked me, and they weren't deluded about my weak points, so why not God who knew me even better than they did?

i don't know about you, but i think i am far more likley to change and become the person i am called ot be at my best if the motovation is the love of those who like me as i am already, rather than out of a sense of being unhappy with myself.