Nobody's Perfect

Nobody’s Perfect.
I’ve spent much of my life trying to fix my various flaws.

One of my life’s dynamics has been thinking
that if I could fix everything that’s wrong with me
it would make everything else around me okay too.

Finally, insight came that instead of focusing on fixing my flaws,
I need to Accept them…even love them.

For a long time, I thought that if I Accepted the things I felt were wrong with me,
I’d never be able to change them.
But really, love is what leads to real healing and transformation,
and ultimately it is the only thing that can actually create changes in us

 In truth, all of what each of us perceives as personal “flaws”
is a subjective value judgment, based on our own interpretations
our own perspectives.

We can obsess about certain aspects of our bodies:
on our appearance; on our personalities; on our lives or work circumstances,
and judge them to be “bad” or “flawed”.

But in truth,
they are what they are.
We are the ones who place the “bad” meaning or interpretation on them.
It is very human to experience a sense of feeling flawed
in certain aspects of our lives and at particular times in life.
There's nothing wrong with us for feeling that way.

However, feeling flawed can rob us of our energy,
our passion, our happiness, our confidence and our lives.

It's one of the most painful ways we can allow our egos to run us,
and it can have devastating consequences if we aren’t conscious of it.

Here are some ideas about how to move from feeling flawed
to a place of acceptance, peace and love.

Acknowledge what's true for you, personally. The first step is telling the truth.
Trying to avoid, run from or pretend our flaws don’t exist doesn’t work..
Admit and express the underlying emotions. If we can identify,
acknowledge and ultimately express the true emotions we feel about
these perceived flaws, we can create a real sense of freedom for ourselves.

Forgive ourselves. Self-forgiveness is something that some people
don't have much experience with. Many of us have been trained
to be hard on ourselves, and to believe that forgiveness must come
from someone or something outside of us.
However when we are able to forgive ourselves,
we create the space for real change and healing to take place.

Appreciate. To appreciate means to recognize the value of something.
Sometimes dealing with our personal flaws teaches us a great deal about ourselves.
When we learn to appreciate and be grateful for what our difficulties have taught us,
we can move away from self-pity,
because It's impossible to experience gratitude and victimhood simultaneously.

Love. The ultimate antidote for all suffering is love.
Our ability to bring love to our flaws, to care for them with kindness
and compassion …like we would care for a child, a pet or a loved one,…
is what will ultimately cause the transformation we're looking for to take place.
When we love our flaws, we create an environment where we're either able
to make the kinds of specific behavior changes we truly want,
or able to learn to love and accept ourselves,
whether any change in the “flaw” takes place or not.

All of these things are much easier said than done.

Admitting the truth to ourselves, expressing our real emotions,
forgiving ourselves, appreciating our flaws, and loving all aspects of ourselves,
both the positive and the negative, gives us the opportunity to actually transcend our flaws.

Doing this takes a great deal of intention, support, compassion and patience.
It’s easier to take a pill, to get busy and distracted, to whine and complain, or to
pretend things are fine or continue with the other avoidance techniques we are good at.
But this is the way to can genuinely heal ourselves and end our cycle of suffering.