Your eyes can be open or closed here.
And go ahead and for the next minute settle into some breathing in,
Up through the body,
And then out,
Down through the body.
So again,
In,
Up,
And then out,
Down.
And I'll leave a little space for that here.
And so I believe that we all come into this world as total and complete masterpieces.
There's nothing that a baby needs to do or show someone in order to be acceptable or to be worthy of love.
But unfortunately,
As we go through life,
Experiences happen and we learn that there are certain conditions that we need to meet in order to receive love,
In order to receive acceptance.
And so we build these layers upon layers of what I call the false self.
This is the thing that we developed in order to survive and adapt in our environment.
And so instead of the true self being something that we finally achieve in the future at some point,
It could just be a process of unlearning.
Learning some of the things that you learned in order to survive,
In order to adapt.
And through unlearning those things,
Letting go of those strategies,
Allowing yourself more freedom.
And this might be the most important thing,
Allowing yourself to be seen less and less through the layers of the false self.
Because if you have all of these layers of false self that is protecting you,
Maybe from being vulnerable,
From being rejected,
You're inherently blocking yourself from being accepted for who you are.
Because you have these layers of the false self built up around you.
And so while it's scary,
It's the only way to receive real,
True connection and acceptance and love that that inner child version of you so strongly desires and needs.
And you might say,
Well,
I don't know what my less false self would even be like.
I've been this way for so long.
And yeah,
I think that's right.
I think that's inherently right.
In embracing the less false self,
You'll have to begin to do things that feel uncertain and uncomfortable for that reason.
You'll have to start taking some risks.
So just for a few moments,
Reflect on what areas of your life are most dominated by the false self.
Just think for a moment about which parts of your life feel the most false,
And then why it is that those experiences or interactions feel that way.
Okay,
And with those in mind,
I'd like you to switch now into thinking about how it would look different for you to let go of the false self in those situations,
In those experiences,
Those interactions.
How might it be different?
What would you be doing different?
How would you be acting?
How might you be feeling?
Alright,
Now after having visualized what it might be like to let go of the false self,
At least a little bit,
In these situations,
Think now again about what at the core is holding you back from doing this,
From being this way,
Or maybe embracing a little bit less of the false self.
What is really stopping you?
So it's my suspicion that,
Likely for most of us,
There's likely some element of an inner critic,
An inner critic that comes up and maybe gets louder and louder in these situations,
And that inner critic is maybe there to protect us from whatever feared outcome we expect might happen,
Or maybe just protect us from the unknown,
We don't know what's going to happen.
And so I'd like you to try to tap in now to your own inner critic.
What parts of yourself are you most critical of?
So for me,
I can tell you that my inner critic gets louder around feeling maybe awkward in social situations,
Or feeling like I might not be able to articulate myself in the best way in the moment,
And other people might think that I'm weird or not as smart as I think that I am.
Might also come up in thinking that I'm lazy sometimes,
Or feeling like I should be working harder or doing something better.
These are some situations in which my inner critic comes alive.
So think for a moment about where your inner critic is the loudest.
So this is a space where I think it can be really helpful to think of our inner critic as like an internalized parent figure that plays this role of kind of overseeing our life and treating our inner child in a way that is harsh and critical.
And we've internalized this critic from the various experiences in our life in order to protect us in some way.
But maybe we can start to shift,
You know,
As we talked before about developing compassion for our strong feelings for that inner child that's calling out for us.
And in these situations,
We can see ourselves with this inner critic as responding to our child selves in this very harsh and critical way that doesn't actually help or care for or attune to the child's needs.
But that actually makes the child feel worse about itself and close in on itself.
So I'd like you to for a moment really allow this inner critic to embody you.
Let it come up and have a full voice,
The side of you that comes up and is highly critical of you at times.
What does it say?
What kind of tone of voice does it have?
What does it sound like?
How does it feel?
And I'd like you to imagine it speaking to the younger child version of yourself.
So picture yourself as a child in front of you and embody this inner critic and imagine yourself talking directly to the inner child in the same tone that the critic comes up in.
Why can't you just do this better?
Why are you so stupid?
Or whatever it is.
Imagine your inner critic talking to your own inner child in whatever way that it comes up for you.
And now I would like you to see if you can switch into a stance of caring and compassion for the inner child.
Having called up this inner critic voice and having spoken the things that it usually says directly to the inner child,
Now maybe in that same role,
Having said these things and felt this way,
Switching into a position of caring and of understanding.
Now you can be the caring and loving and accepting parent for your own inner child.
And so in the same encounter,
Show that version of yourself,
Love and compassion and acceptance now in whatever way that might come up for you.
And you might even tell that version of yourself in your mind directly,
I love you.
I accept you completely.
You don't have to change at all.
You've been through some tough things in your life,
But I'm here for you.
I know sometimes I might be hard on you,
But ultimately I really care about you.
And I accept you and I love you.
And you might notice any resistance that's coming up for you.
Resistance to fully embracing these statements or this way of relating to yourself.
And that's okay too.
Just become aware of this.
This might be an area for curiosity,
But particularly in the realm of noticing what layers of false self have been built up to protect us.
And then the different ways that we might be able to gradually let go of those layers of false self and embrace something that is more authentic and more real and more alive and allows us more of a chance to show less of our false self.
And then by doing that,
Have that rare chance of being really seen and understood and accepted for who we really are.
That's my hope,
My underlying effort in therapy for me and the client to be gradually revealing our less false selves to each other and then for the client to be able to extend that to their life.
And I hope that despite not being in person in the same room together,
That you've gotten some sense of that in here with me.
And that you can start to take more and more risks in your daily life of peeling back the layers of this false self and showing the world what only you uniquely can express.
Not attempting to live up to some standard or do what other people are doing,
But to express that unique creative energy that only you have.
And I wish you well in experimenting with that,
Maybe today,
This week,
Moving forward.
Have a great day.
