Follow it thru: What's Self-Love Got to do With It?

By Heather Andrews

What’s self-love got to do with it?

The answer is—well, everything! The love and worth you have for yourself sets the foundation for the types of relationships you have. What you believe, is what will be achievable in your life.

Your self-love and worth will help you to hold yourself accountable in your life, bus

• Language: English
• Publisher: Follow it thru
• Release date: Aug 22, 2018
• ISBN: 9781513638690

Book preview

Chapter 1

Self-Love is Your Choice

By Heather Andrews

Why is it that in today’s world we can talk about the bad things that happen to us and people comment on social media with empathy, embrace the negativity and root you on? Or better yet, agree and support you as you blame the situation or person for the bad day you are having?

Are you sitting there shaking your head in agreeance or thinking I am crazy?

I will agree with you on the crazy part, but it is a result of living a solid happy life on my terms. I support others in their dreams as they go out and create a different story for themselves. I refuse to live a life that is full of excuses and blame.

I have always been a self-confident career woman, but my sense of self-worth has climbed mountains and plummeted to the sea floor more times than I can count. I have played the empowered female, the victim, and the blame game. I have ventured down the road of being the biggest cheerleader at my pity parties to being in shock at someone giving me a compliment in my high-end managerial role on a job well done.

I was a people pleaser but viewed it as being a mentor to others. It did not matter what I sacrificed; whether it be family time, date nights, holidays, or self-care. Until recently, something or someone always came before me and my needs.

As I sat in my managerial office, I thought I had reached my full potential until I retired as I was highly esteemed, respected, and well known by my peers and industry.

I had it all. I was living the corporate dream. My identity was my titles: mother, wife and whatever else came my way, depending on what I was doing. The more I did, the more important I felt. I’m sure you’ll be able to relate to that. It played havoc with my life without me realizing it because I refused to look and see where I was at in my constant ‘doing’. I was stressed out, and it affected my relationships. I was not fully present for myself or for the people that loved me.

It looked all well and good, but even in my best moments in my job I second guessed myself that I was doing everything ‘right’ by other people’s rules and expectations. I was trying to please everyone—to make everyone happy.

You can only carry a load like that for so long before you begin to crack, feel empty and start to resent everyone around you—including yourself.

I have told the story of me leaving my managerial role many times because it was such a life-changing event for me. It set the foundation for everything I have built with my mind, heart, and soul. I share my story again and again because I know people can relate to a job restructuring. People say, It was just a job you will find another. True, but when your job is all you worked for—when you are dying inside because you feel worthless, wondering how you will feed your family—that statement becomes nothing but bull crap.

It has taken me two and a half years to arrive at a place where I trust my intuition and can live a full, happy life.

I stand tall in my vision and my values, and I am proud of what I created. My social media feeds are some of the happiest out there because I have bottomed out and come back. I do whatever it takes because I am passionate, worthy, deserving and committed to my clients, co-authors, and even people I have not connected with yet. We are rising and changing the future for women, men and children for generations to come.

People tell me I am inspiring, and I am humbled. I am here to serve you by pouring my heart and soul into helping you share your story. I want to release people from their past and help them understand that they have a choice.

That word is powerful. CHOICE. It is the game changer! The day I got my walking papers from my job, even though I felt powerless, I knew I had a choice. When I left my dysfunctional marriage at twenty-four and got on a plane to Saudi Arabia, I had a choice. When my husband was deployed to Afghanistan, leaving me to solo parent three children, I hit my emotional wall and gained 30 lbs…I still had a choice.

When my dad died, and my mom was alone, I knew I had a choice. When I lost my job, I knew I had a choice.

The only time in my life when I did not choose well was when I chose to believe I was not worthy and good enough.

I chose to believe I was not pretty enough, not sexy enough, and not good enough because I was not skinny like a beautiful family member was who told me I was fat as a kid. It is amazing that I can remember that even though it happened so many years ago.

I have lived my life always wanting to be skinnier than I am. In the past, I based my worthiness on my waist size. It is crazy. Now, as I approach my forty-eighth birthday, I am the strongest, healthiest, and happiest I have ever been.

Why do we let ourselves believe we are not worthy? Why do we live in fear of what others will think, and how we will be judged if we fail? All this does is create internal conflict.

We live a conflicted life with what we hear, what we read, see, the upbringing we have had and the stories we tell ourselves and when we look in the mirror. We are conflicted with ourselves with what we see.

In a recent webinar, a mentor of mine said there were five types of conflict:

• Man vs. man

• Man vs. society

• Man vs. technology

• Man vs. self

• Man vs. nature

In this chapter, I will refer to man as human.

Human vs. Human

This one comes down to our interactions and connections with other people.

We have a choice on how we react to other people, the roles they play in our lives, and the impact they have in our lives. It goes back to what I said earlier about looking outside of ourselves for our self-worth versus looking inward and knowing in our hearts that we are unique individuals.

Once you recognize that you can either chose to believe what other people tell you or you can believe in your intuition and what’s in your heart, what you receive in this world will change.

There is choice, but communication is key to translating what your choices are to those that are impacted.

When it comes to human vs. human, conflict occurs because people aren’t always equipped to have difficult conversations with a win-win in mind. Words can hurt and cause harm if we allow them, especially if we are taking our cues from the external environment to measure our own self-worth.

I remember I attended a class in my leadership certification. The teacher mentioned that only 3% of society knew how to effectively handle conflict. Why is this not taught to our children outside the home? We would all be more empowered if we knew how to show up effectively by playing nice and really listening to what other people have to say. It’s a lot easier to love yourself when you feel empowered.

Aha moment: I choose my words, so I am partly responsible for how they affect others.

Human vs. Society

Society is a tricky place. Social media is everywhere, and we must apply boundaries to our usage of it if we don’t want it to consume us.

We are bombarded with photoshopped images telling us how we ‘should’ look. I remember thinking that if I looked like the women in these images, I would be happy. I know I was not alone in my beliefs.

In my first marriage, I believed that being in a subpar relationship was better than being alone, but I was alone anyway. We slept in the same bed at night, but we did not love or communicate with each other.

It also takes me back to when my husband deployed to Afghanistan, and my kids were in activities seven days a week. I was so fricking tired, and I had reached my max. I showed up to work in a bad mood—negative and full of blame. I made excuses for not eating healthy, I deserved my French fries. I was not holding myself accountable, and that is when I made a choice. I decided to cancel some activities and take back my life. It was one of the most empowering choices I ever made, and you know what, no one said a word to me. No one judged me and called me a failure as a parent.

Aha moment: No one cared because they were too busy dealing with their own chaos.

Human vs. Technology

Technology changes faster than we can keep up. It has connected us globally and having information at our fingertips is so powerful. We can build business teams online and communicate with friends near and far. We can see pictures of kids growing and talk face to face with our relatives in distant countries.

It keeps us close to what is happening in the world, and it can bring people together when they have a common goal.

The downside is we have become available twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. Constantly being accessible and ‘plugged in’ can be very stressful and detrimental to self-love. Unless you turn off your device, you can always be found/contacted.

We like to be constantly busy because it makes us feel important and wanted. We often affiliate our self-worth to our little hand-held devices or computers. It is a symbol of self-gratification, if you want to call it that.

I am just as guilty of this at times, so now I have built boundaries around my devices and access them only when I need to, not because I have to. I made a choice to take control.

I have used technology to create automation in my life and business—so I can have a life.

Tony Robbins said, "Your cell phone is for your convenience, not