Just like Me : An Invitation to Self Love
Pema Chodron, the legendary Buddhist spiritual teacher has a practice she calls “just like me.”
Whenever she observes people in her daily life she says to herself “just like me” to remind herself that every person is just like her in some way. It’s a powerful practice of compassion and a reminder of our shared humanity.
This practice has shown me the power that words can have as a pointer back to ourselves.
My mind can be very judgmental at times. As I have deepened my meditation practice I have developed a better ability to just observe the judgments my mind makes rather than believing them. In the past I would follow and buy into the judgments which only led to more suffering internally and more disconnection from myself and others.
We have the ability to see everything in our life as invitations and these judgments became invitations for me to a deeper level of self love.
Seeing the Shadow-Self
Learning about Western psychology’s concept of a shadow self led to a transformational realization within me. The shadow is a concept that points to the part of ourselves that we don’t like and don’t want to acknowledge so we disown it. We suppress certain parts of ourselves and they become our “shadow” because they are still within us but we just refuse to see them. One of the mechanisms of the shadow is that we project our shadow out onto the world as a way to not own it within ourselves.
I started to see that the aspects I was most judgmental about in others were the aspects in myself that I didn’t love and didn’t want to acknowledge. There was a direct correlation between how much I didn’t want to own and love certain parts of myself and how much I found my mind judging anything out in the world that represented those parts of me. I quietly judged people who were very fearful because I didn’t want to own the parts of myself that were fearful at times. I was judgmental towards people that seemed lost in life because I didn’t want to acknowledge there are times that I feel lost. I found my mind fixating on the unconscious behaviors of others because I didn’t want to admit to myself how much of my behavior and thinking was still unconscious.
Healing through Self-Love
This brought a profound liberation from my judgmental thinking because I could see that it all came down to self love. The more I made peace with myself and loved all parts of me the less judgmental I became. The more I brought my shadow into the light the more I was able to love myself and love anyone who I separated myself from. When I made an “other” out of someone and judged them I was really fracturing myself and making an “other” out of myself. Judgment and hatred is directly related to how much someone feels whole within themselves.
Now when I observe my mind making any negative judgment about someone now I just repeat the words “just like me.” These words are a pointer and a beautiful reminder to come back to myself and make peace with whatever is within me that I have not fully loved yet.
If I see someone who is being extremely stubborn and ideological and I feel anger rising up within me I repeat “just like me” and feel into the times that my mind has been lost in the complexities of this human experience and grasped for any ideological certainty to ease that discomfort. I give that part of me love.
If I see someone who is acting unconsciously towards others I remind myself of when I am swept up by my emotions and thoughts and act unconsciously from them rather than observing them and taking action from a centered place. I give the unconscious parts of me love.
Everyone is My Mirror
Every single person is pointing me back to myself in some way. No matter who the person is and what they are doing the invitation is always into more self love. The challenge is to take the invitation when it arises rather than being sucked into the judgments and mind stories. This is why a mantra such as “just like me” can be so powerful.
Three words can be enough to remind us to take that invitation.
Three words can be enough to remind us to take the path to more self love.
Three words can be enough to remind us to take the path to forgiveness, both for others and ourselves.
When we forgive others we are forgiving ourselves. When we forgive ourselves we are forgiving others.
This is the power of the mirror.
Forgiveness is making peace with the fact that we all are navigating this experience to the best of our ability. In order to make peace with how others are navigating their life you first have to make peace with all the ways that you are navigating yours.
What in your life is inviting you into more self love?
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