Ep. 3: Ugh, Compliments. Am I Right?
An 11 minute and 53 second listen
What happens when you receive a compliment? Does your face melt off your skull? Or, maybe on a less dramatic level, it just doesn’t feel true. In this audio, you’ll receive two tips to help you begin to admire the unique qualities about you and why it’s so important that you start remembering who you are on a soul level.
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(0:01) Hey everyone, I'm Nanae. I'm an intuitive mental health therapist. I use my intuition to guide you (0:08) to mend your deepest emotional wounds in order to help align you to what your soul signed up for (0:14) in this lifetime.Welcome to my audio series called You're Here to Remember, where I share (0:21) my intuitive insights and the beautifully messy stories and lessons from my own life (0:26) to help you remember who you really are and what you're truly capable of. Today's audio (0:34) is a story and a roadmap to loving yourself. UGG compliments, am I right? Do you ever find (0:43) yourself cringing when someone compliments you? When they say something like, oh you're so good (0:49) at this, you're incredible at that.Do you feel yourself recoiling in agony or maybe it's not (0:56) that dramatic? Maybe you thank them and smile, but internally you can tell you just don't believe (1:04) them. Not that you think they're lying, but that you just can't take it in for yourself. (1:12) Logically, you know you're good at what you do, but the compliments from other people just don't (1:19) land.People might even get defensive if they can see you can't accept the compliment. (1:26) You may have been told once or twice, why can't you just take the compliment? (1:32) If you listened to my previous audio, you know what I'm about to say. When it feels like you (1:39) can't take in compliments, there's nothing wrong with you.You're not broken, even if you might (1:45) feel that way right now. And I'm saying right now deliberately, because I'm going to outline a (1:52) pathway for you that will help you feel more comfortable with compliments. We're going to (1:59) start with becoming more comfortable with seeing yourself in a positive light and saying nice (2:05) things to yourself.The ultimate goal being that you get to a place of unconditional love for (2:12) yourself. The secret isn't in making yourself be okay with being receiving compliments. I also (2:22) don't think it's necessary that you jump right into staring into your own eyes in the mirror (2:27) while telling yourself you love yourself.Yeah, I recoiled at that too. But hey, maybe you'll get (2:33) there. What if I told you the secret is to back it up a few steps at first.Maybe you even start (2:43) with the hesitation around being kinder to yourself. Maybe you start with getting to a place (2:50) where you feel safe enough to be kind to yourself. For now, the three steps are one, committing to (2:59) something different.Two, building up admiration for yourself. And three, moving into self-love. (3:09) I'll be covering the first two steps to help you on your way towards loving yourself.(3:17) I'm going to tell you a story about commitment. I have a wonderful group of intuitive friends. (3:25) They're incredibly encouraging and one of their many gifts is to see people who they really are (3:32) at their core.From day one, they've been lovingly vocal about how they see me. (3:40) When my intuition felt stuck or I was down on myself, they were there to try and build me up. (3:48) But when I heard those loving words directed to me, I would stiffen up.If you can imagine the (3:57) face emoji where the eyes and mouth are a straight line, yeah, that's how I used to feel. Like the (4:03) words would bounce off of me. I couldn't believe it myself, so why would I believe anyone else? (4:12) One day, I was listening to a voice message from one of them telling me what she sees in me, (4:18) who I am at my core, how she sees my potential and how much she loves me.And I'm sobbing (4:25) because why does she see all of this in me and I can't? Why do I want so badly to be seen as good (4:35) but I can't believe it myself? Why, when someone else says it, I still feel that emptiness within (4:42) me. Why can't I take this in? My ego was holding on so tightly to this old wiring because it knew (4:53) everything would change once I made this commitment to love myself. And ego is terrified (5:01) of change because change means uncertainty and uncertainty means there's a possibility of pain (5:08) and ego hates pain.So I was in this loop of rejecting love from others and unable to give (5:17) it to myself because at the time, it felt safer to remain closed than to receive. But that's when (5:26) I decided enough. I was done relying on others to lift me up because even when they did lovingly, (5:35) genuinely from their hearts, it was still short-lived in me because it didn't truly resonate (5:42) with me because I didn't hold that belief within myself.I decided that's it. I'm done playing (5:51) small. I'm over not believing people.I'm done holding so very tightly onto the belief (6:01) that I can't love myself. I'm done not seeing myself in a good light no more. (6:11) Step one, you're going to start with a commitment to yourself and it may not happen today or next (6:20) week.It might take many more moments of feeling that hollowness when people say kind and genuine (6:28) things to you. One day, you're going to decide no more. You're going to get to a place of being so (6:36) tired with how you've been operating that you decide you want something different moving (6:43) forward.But you have to get to that point yourself. There has to be that deep inner (6:51) commitment to change and if you don't have that, ego will win. So there has to be that commitment (6:58) moment that you're doing this for you because you deserve to feel more than this.(7:06) The first step is to get to that moment of commitment to yourself. The second step is to (7:13) start taking the tiniest of actions. For many of us, jumping into loving yourself or telling yourself (7:21) you love yourself feels too big of a leap.Your body is going to freak the F out. You need to (7:28) build a bridge to get to love. What if you started with admiration of the tiniest unique qualities (7:39) about you? Take a look at your hand.Palm up either hand and zoom in on your fingertips. (7:49) Notice your fingerprints. No one else has the same fingerprints as you.They're completely unique. (8:01) One out of eight billion. Just like you.You're one out of eight billion. And how about the lines (8:10) on your palm? Nobody else has these exact lines. When you get to a place of absolute knowing (8:22) that these are unique qualities about you, try for something with a little more impact.(8:29) For example, I have shorter and rounder thumbs. It's known as brachydactyly in the medical (8:38) community, but I call them Megan Fox thumbs. If you know, you know.I also have a small mole (8:45) on the tip top of my little round nose. And you can just imagine the amount of teasing I went (8:53) through in addition to being the Asian kid with immigrant parents in a rural community. (9:00) So spend some time reacquainting yourself with the unique combination of qualities of your body.(9:09) I often guide my clients to work through the shame around what makes them unique and stand (9:14) out. Things that made them feel like they didn't belong. To get to a place of pure admiration (9:21) and acceptance of these qualities.Once that feels comfortable, try expanding to non-physical (9:31) qualities about yourself. Not what you do, but who you are at your core. I guide my mental health (9:39) therapy clients in identifying what these are.In intuitive healing sessions, I can pull your (9:46) innate soul qualities using intuition. Once you're comfortable with admiring what's unique about you, (9:55) challenge yourself and show these qualities to others. Showing people who you really are (10:03) can be terrifying, but the more you show them, the more comfortable you become because that's (10:11) who you really are at your core.So it's more that you have fear around being seen for who you truly (10:20) are, right? When you can't take compliments, know there's nothing wrong with you. You're not (10:30) defective. Instead, you've likely been told starting very young that standing out and being proud of (10:38) yourself and celebrating your uniqueness makes other people feel bad, right? That it's not polite.(10:47) Maybe you were punished by your parents or society and your body is still wired to be terrified of (10:55) standing out. It's time to rewrite that script you've been running in the background for decades (11:03) to stay small and ultimately to reject yourself. Who does that serve? You have people that are (11:13) waiting for you to step into knowing what makes you unique.You have people on a soul level (11:22) who contracted with you to learn from you, be inspired by you. So on your own time, (11:31) you're remembering piece by piece that you are here to offer something new and brilliant (11:39) to the world and admiration and love for yourself is the key to get there. (11:48) Thank you for listening and I'll catch you in the next one.