how to take responsibility for oneself

[Leoa]

I've been taking more responsibility for myself everyday, leaving behind the 'victum' mindset. However, I end up beating myself up. And then I beat myself up some more for being unloving to myself.
So my question is, how do you take full responsibiliy for your life, and it's problems, without hurting yourself.

[uberinquisitive]

I have struggled with this myself.

What helps me:

1. Realize that, at the time, I was doing the very best I could, with the limited resources/knowledge I had at the time.

2. The past is perfect as it is. Especially the painful parts. If I didn't have the pain, I wouldn't have the motivation to change from victim to empowered woman.

3. The part of myself that is unloving...that is not really me. It's my ego speaking. My ego is not me. It's pretending to the Wizard of Oz, but it's just the man behind the curtain. I am not my thoughts. I am something bigger than my thoughts.

4. The past is done. Things change. Life is not black-white, all-or-nothing. I may have been unloving to myself in the past, but that doesn't mean all is lost. It simply means I was unloving in the past. But I have the now, which will build a different story. And even if I'm unloving now, I can always change it in the future. There is no pressure.

[awakentransform]

Responsibility is not the same thing as blame. Responsibility is empowerment. It is a way to take back your own power. The power of love is the strongest of all, but don't expect to immediately be where you want to be. Think of it as a muscle that you are developing.

(This is adapted from "A Course in Miracles") Why not set a short time aside each day and decide, "Just for this hour, I will be loving and accepting of myself." It is much easier to try for a short period each day than to expect to be always loving and accepting of yourself. Then as that becomes easy, you can make it a longer period. Before you know it, it will be your habit. The key is that you will be focusing on the positive rather than the negative.

We all have both positive and negative. We simply need to train ourselves to focus on the positive within.

[Alison Jenkins]

I treat myself in the way I would my best friend. If I wouldn't say things to my best friend then I don't say it to myself. I've made many changes in my life during my recovery but this is one of the best things I have done

Alison

[z1freeride]

Why do you beat yourself up?

[Brutha]

Reality isn't that bad that you have to beat up yourself. Reality is beautiful

[z1freeride]

Originally Posted by Brutha

Reality isn't that bad that you have to beat up yourself. Reality is beautiful

Perhaps fantasy is still present. I know that's when I would "beat" myself up. I used to fantasize about how I wanted to be. And since my (then) present reality was so far from that, negative emotions easily occurred.

I learned to let go of unrealistic expectations for myself and just focus on improving competence. Well, I'm still working on that... but it's such a better way to go....