By Allyson Milne

@T=Having written about the art of forgiveness, it dawned on me that while I had expanded on the freedom you will experience forgiving others, I had not touched on the significance of being able to forgive yourself.
We are so busy focusing our attention on others that we put ourselves on the backburner, thinking we will get around to “focusing on me” later.
The sad truth is that our “later” never seems to come and we end up neglecting ourselves, creating insecurities and false paradigms. We end up with emptiness and spend much time searching for the perfect someone in the hopes they will fill the void. What we really need to do is build a relationship with ourselves to fill that space.
Forgive yourself. The act of forgiveness can be difficult, even daunting, because it makes us face our inner fears. It seems we have a tug of war between the voice in our head which is continually sabotaging any attempts we may have at treating ourselves gently and the intuitive part of us that knows we are worth forgiveness, kindness and abundance.
Most of our insecurities boil down to lack of self worth. When we are in the “I am not worthy” zone, we are not capable of being kind to ourselves and do not feel we deserve any kind of forgiveness or leeway. Unfortunately, it is human nature to self-sabotage, and we do it so well. We have been programmed into believing that loving ourselves is a bad thing and others will see us as conceited.
There is a big difference between thinking you are better than others and seeing that part of yourself that behaves and shines with love and light, and knows you deserve of all things that are good. It is only through the process of self-worth that we can be of any value to ourselves or anyone else.
When you don't love yourself, you are telling the universe that you are undeserving of any love or positive outcomes that have the same vibration match as love.
So how do we tap into that part of ourselves that allows us to see the true splendor of who we really are?
Be kind and positive: Nurture yourself. Think kindly and positively about yourself, accept your flaws and know that you can change. Look in the mirror and fall in love with yourself. Give yourself positive affirmations and show gratitude for all that is good in your life.
Trust yourself: have confidence in your abilities. Know you have the ability to make changes for yourself.
Forgive yourself: we all make mistakes. If you have been carrying emotional hurt from a childhood trauma, learn to forgive yourself and know it is not your fault.
Find your inner truth: loving yourself requires you to acknowledge and be truthful about your feelings. Do not bury negative emotions. Acknowledge what you feel.
Grow spiritually. When you spend time growing spiritually, loving yourself is automatic. You become more peaceful, connected, kind, loving and compassionate.
Relax, have fun and learn to see the beauty around you.
Eliminate self-criticism: do you continuously berate yourself over the tiniest thing? Make every effort to stop.
(Source: iol.co.za)