The Truth About Self Love

What we need to do is remember who we are, and when

women come on the journey with me of unlocking who they really

are, they come back to this place of remembrance of

remembering the love that they are. So little kids don't need

self love because they're present in the moment and

they're they're witnessing the world through the eyes of love,

they are love. They are love. They're pure love. That's who we

are. I don't care who has anything else to say. That is

the truth of who we all are. And most people lost their way and

are in their saboteur and are in their internal suffering. Are

they maybe they're creating external suffering? We've all

lost our way because we were taught that love is connected to

performing, that love is connected to doing good, that

love is connected to being good for other people.

Hello, beautiful soul, Kate Harlow tuning in live from

Nairobi, Kenya. I am home. Can you feel it in the frequency of

my voice? I sure can. Yeah, I feel incredibly grounded and

peaceful, and so happy to be home. I and of course, home is

inside of me. One of the heroines reminded me that of

that on my trip. I just posted something and I said something

about home, and she said, "Your home's in your heart, which is

true. Home is inside of me, but there are places in the world

when we are following our own inner compass and you know,

living from our heart and souls. There are places in the world

that just feel like home, and Greece is one of those places

for me. I did have a two-day stopover-not even two days. I

had a day and a half stopover in Athens, just to break up the

long flight to Nairobi from Vancouver. It's literally the

opposite side of the planet, so I broke it up with a few days in

Athens and got to see all my peeps and got to bask in the

magic of being in my old neighborhood where everybody

knows my name and they're always glad I came. How wild to live

somewhere, you know. I think in North America, in Canada, I used

to go to this Vancouver. I'll say I don't know if this is. I'm

sure small towns are different, but in Vancouver, I'd go to the

same coffee shop every day, and nobody would know my name, you

know. Like they don't care. It's busy. They're in a hurry.

They're not, you know, and not everyone. Not, and this is not

coming from judgment, more observation. But in Greece, that

was one of the things that was so special about living in

Greece. I was in the city, in Athens, in a busy city, but in

my suburb Pagrati. You know, I everyone knows me, and still,

you know the the dry cleaner knows me, the coffee shop owners

know me, and all the staff. Gosh, everyone, my organic

grocery store. I just stopped everywhere I stopped. They were

like, "Kate, Kelly, manna, you're back! And everyone's so

excited, and it's so beautiful. So definitely, definitely,

Greece is one of those places that feels like home for me, and

I think always will. And but it's so amazing to be back in

Kenya, and I feel like I've barely had jet lag because I've

just been so happy to be here and present and grounded and

just rooted in nature. And it's so spacious here. And there's

just something about the frequency of Africa. Okay, I'll

just say Kenya. I've never been anywhere else in Africa. I'll

let you know. I'm going to Egypt next year. I'll let you know how

that feels. But the frequency of Africa that just feels like

home. So, anyways, you get the point. I'm home, and I got to

watch the movie Out of Africa for the first time, which is

wild because my neighborhood, my suburb, is named after Karen

Blixen, who the movie Out of Africa is based on, Meryl Streep

plays her. Robert Redford Redford plays the her romantic

opposite in the movie, and it was such a beautiful movie, and

it was so trippy to watch because it was filmed at her

actual house in this suburb that's now called Karen, and

I've been to her house.

Like I went to the Karen Blixen Museum with my mom and dad

because it's something they wanted to do when they were

here, and she was really here, like she was in Kenya, you know,

really honoring the people who who own the land that she ended

up moving on to, and she built a school for them, and she started

a growing coffee here, and it's just a really beautiful story.

And so, the Karen Blixen Museum is her house with actually her

stuff. It's so wild. And so then I watched the movie with Meryl

Streep, and is like, oh my god, that's my neighborhood. And I

was crying on the plane watching the movie because I could feel

the frequency of Africa. And I mean, it was even more spacious

back then. But it's just such a special part of the world. I

wish for everyone to come here. It's yeah, it's just it's

changed my life in ways beyond um beyond what I could even

comprehend. So there's my Africa plug, and Out of Africa is a

great movie. It was. Beautiful, really nice to finally see it. I

can't believe it was on my flight. It was on one of my four

flights home because I stopped in Greece, so I think it was the

flight to Greece. And I had such a magical moment. I upgraded my

seat to premium economy like the day before, and it ended up

being premium economy in the front row. And so I was like,

okay, that's perfect. So worth the upgrade. And I sit down, and

this woman comes and sits next to me. I could feel her

frequency too, and I was like, "What? I just start talking to

her right away because I just loved her energy, and I said,

"What are you going to Greece for? Because I was on my way to

Athens for my little stopover, visiting my friends, and she

said, "Oh, I'm leading a retreat. And next thing you

know, we're we're in a vortex for like three hours. It made

the flight so much shorter, but we're in a vortex for like three

hours, going on and on and on about like all the

synchronicities. We know the same similar people. She's from

Toronto and lives in California, and we still have you know

similar people. So much synchronicity and so much, so

many parrot like our parrot lives are quite parallel. She

and her partner are about to move to Costa Rica. She's like

totally nomadic. This is a somatic healer, you know. Does

retreats, all all the things, retreats internationally. So

that was magical and fun, and yeah, many magical moments to

get here. And now here I am, back in my love, back with my

love, Kenya. So, in how fitting for today's episode, I just felt

really inspired. I was listening to there's a spoken word, or I

don't know if it's spoken word or you know, like Alan Watts,

like all those they they have all those YouTube videos with

with different people that they have their teachings to music.

This guy's name is Berg. I think I've talked about him before. I

don't know if it's his name or it's just his like stage name,

but it's B U R G, or is it Bergs? It's either Berg or

Bergs. But if you look up Berg's playlist, and it's like all

different wisdom from him. I was listening to one about love

today, you know, and just I I was really feeling. I've been

having the conversation lately with some of the heroines that

I'm working with, some of my clients, and with friends about

self love and really sitting with this notion of self love

and why I remember when my and if you've listened to this

podcast forever, you've heard me share this story before. But my

best friend years ago, when I absolutely loathed myself,

because Regina, my saboteur, was in charge. Right, I was

listening to my conditioned voice in my head, believing it

to be me, and the little girl inside was screaming and

terrified and anxious and and you know feeling horrible all

the time.

And at that time, I I just hated myself, and I I compared myself

to every woman, and I constantly like was just in this perpetual

story in my mind that everyone was better than me, everyone was

ahead of me, everyone around me had something I didn't have, and

I was in suffering all day long, every day, and you know I'd have

fun, I'd have fun moments, I'd be traveling for work and

traveling with my friends and hanging out and having

adventures and doing you know beautiful things. I was always

surrounded by really beautiful people, and my best friend Andy

said to me, "Kate, like you just need to you just need some self

love. And I remember I'd never heard that term before. I was

like 27, and this is like pre-Instagram, so there was not

a lot of talk. It was still new on the radar. There wasn't.

There was no TikTok. There, there was YouTube, but you know,

it was new concept still. And I was like, "What does that even

mean? Like, I think I'd heard it before, but I just was like,

sounded like she was speaking Greek before I knew any Greek

words. She was speaking Greek to me, and I was like, "What does

that even mean? Like, I hate myself. How how can I just like

find self love? Like, what does that even mean? And I remember

at the time like trying positive affirmations and trying to just

pretend I loved myself, and it just didn't work. And I remember

just like the suffering, and then it became another thing

that I was failing at, and another thing to punish myself

about. And I was in such agony all the time in my relationship

with myself. And so I was listening to this Berg thing

this morning, and he was talking about love, and you know, he he

was talking about the programming and the and it just

reminded me of like where did where do we go wrong because the

reality is we don't need to learn how to love ourselves

although that is a practice and we'll talk about that. What we

need to do is remember who we are and when women come on the

journey with me of awakening the heroine within and becoming

their divine lover and divine mother and divine mentor and

guide and all the healing that occurs on the this journey of

unlocking who they really are, they come back to this place of

remembrance of remembering the love that. They are so little

kids don't need self love because they're present in the

moment and they're they're witnessing the world through the

eyes of love. They are love. They are love. They're pure

love. That's who we are. I don't care who has anything else to

say. That is the truth of who we all are. And have we? Most

people lost their way and are in their saboteur and are in their

internal suffering. Are they maybe they're creating external

suffering? We've all lost our way because we were taught that

love is connected to performing, that love is connected to doing

good, that love is connected to being good for other people.

That love is connected to how whether we're good enough at

sports, at you know music, at dancing. Like little kids are

being judged for their performance, and as a child, we

are equating that with love. I will get more love from mummy

and daddy if I get A's at school, I will get more love

from them. If I perform well in this dance competition, I will

get more love from my peers at school. If I behave how they

want me to, if I'm a good girl like my teacher wants me to,

like the whole world around us when we're growing up, and all

these systems that that pull us away from the truth of who we

are teach us and teach that conditioned part of ourselves,

which I call your saboteur, that love is conditional and love

needs to be earned. Right, that you need to sacrifice yourself

for love, that you need to look a certain way for love, that you

need to be a certain way for love, that you need to be

perfect for love, that your life needs to look a certain way for

love, right?

Even the and then on top of that, the fairy tales, like or

gosh, Bridgerton, you know, that's a great example of a

modern version. It's like these women are walking around these

balls waiting to be chosen, right? It used to be Cinderella

walking around the ball waiting to be chosen, right? She has to

be the most beautiful, interesting woman in the room in

order to be good enough for love. So we're taught that love

is this thing we have to achieve. This is is this thing

we have to we have to get. We have to earn, and that's just

your small conditioned self, right? That is the programming,

and if you are still living from the programming, you're still

doing things to try and get love from the world around you.

You're wanting to be chosen by a man to feel like you are

lovable, worthy, and good enough, even though your

lovability and your worthiness and your good enoughness, your

your infinite enoughness, will never be found in an external

source, right? You might feel it temporarily, but it's a

self-fulfilling prophecy because then that little girl is never

going to stop looking for the next thing to give her more

validation and more, more approval and more confirmation

that she is love or lovable. But the reality is, love is who you

are. So in my experience, you know, and I'd say it's

interesting because when I first started my own thing, I was

like, I think I'm meant to teach women about self love, and

essentially that's what I do. I am a teacher of love, and and I

really teach women how to love themselves and how to become the

love that they are, and yet I don't call it that because

people don't quite understand the they they don't understand

the importance of it. But if you are not rooted in the love that

you are, you will never stop suffering. Your whole life will

be made up of stories of fantasy stories and like empty promises

to your little girl inside that like once I have this thing,

once we get there, once we move, once we get the new job, once we

get the promotion, once we get the guy, once we get married,

once we have kids, once we, once we, once we, then we will feel

like we matter and like we're good enough. And and if your

small self and your saboteurs in charge. That's the fake promise

that you're making to yourself over and over and over again. If

you're still living in that paradigm, right? And and now

that you're on this journey with me in some capacity, you might

not be working with me behind the scenes, which is an option

always. Reach out to me if you want to know what that journey

looks like. But even by being a new truth, new truther-is that

what we're called? Even by being a heroine from listening to the

new truth, you are on this journey of reclaiming who you

are. And I always say to the women I work with, like the good

news is that that infinite source of love that you've been

seeking in all the wrong places. The good news is, is it's inside

of you and it never left. It's always been there. You just have

to learn to build a relationship with it. You have to learn to

let that part of you lead. And a huge, like really, the first

step of that journey is getting to know your small self first,

so that your heroine inside that sovereign woman, that pure

infinite love. That you are can start to heal and repair and

love that little girl who's looking for love in all the

wrong places, and that's the part of the journey that's like

self love-you doing something to create love within. But I also

want you to know simultaneously: yes, we can learn how to love

ourselves and how to treat ourselves with love. That's a

huge part of the journey. But eventually, you'll get to a

place where you're just living from love, and it's just who you

are and how you see the world. And when we are love, when we're

living in that place, you have so much more capacity. You have

so much more compassion and understanding for other people.

It doesn't mean you're going to hang out with toxic behaviors,

and you know, spend all your time around people that are

violent or aggressive or manipulative or anything. But

but you'll have understanding and compassion, right? It's like

the saboteur small self wants to look through the lens of good

and bad and right and wrong and the bad guy and the good guy and

you know, which only keeps us in captivity. It only keeps us

suffering because there's nowhere to go from there. You

can't change other people, nor is it your job even to judge

other people. It's like everyone gets to do their life how they

want to do it. And when you really get that your life is

your own, and you're the only one, you know that fantasy fairy

tale love story leaves us believing on some level one day

we'll be rescued from our financial woes, from our you

know insecurities, from our self doubt, from our one day some

prince somewhere is going to come rescue us, and we'll all

live happily ever after. Movie ends and the beginning of the

relationship, right? That's the story we've been fed. So, on

some unconscious level, the little girl in you is waiting to

be rescued. But until you take responsibility for how your life

looks, for what part of you is leading your life, for how

you're treating yourself, for what you're tolerating, for what

where you're abandoning yourself, not listening, like,

and if you don't start to clean up, and obviously this is

literally the new truth. Like every episode is about this, and

everyone I interview, everything is all about. It's an inside

job, right? Until you start to take 100% responsibility for

what is your life, your inner world, and your outer world,

nothing will change. Nothing will change because you've been

set up to believe someone's going to come rescue you one

day, and in the meantime, just call yourself a victim, blame

the world around you. There's all these circumstances. You

will always have your mind will always find reasons and places

and people to blame for your pain, and you will never

experience true love from that place. And I and I'm okay. I

meant self love, but also romantic love, because we can't

fully receive love until we're we're living from love, until

we're rooted in love, until we're devoted to love, until

we're create until we've created a life of love. When you are

letting your small self lead is the opposite of love, right?

Because with that, perform for love, do a good job for love, be

a good girl for love that you learned when you were little.

With with that came a punishment system, and if you don't, you

will be punished. You'll go to your room, you'll go to the

principal's office, you'll get your allowance taken away.

You'll you won't get the car when you graduate because you

didn't get the grades you were supposed to get. Blah blah blah

blah blah. So there's punishment, right? In a worst

case scenario, people are shaming, abusing, you know,

emotionally abusing, physically abusing you for not doing the

thing that you were supposed to do. So what happens is, or not

looking how you're supposed to look, or not behaving how you're

supposed to behave, right? So, so we think like, okay, if I

just behave like this, if I just lose 10 pounds, if I just you

know stop aging, if I just do all these things to get the guy,

to get the love, to get the thing, and then I'm gonna feel

some love inside, then I'll love myself. If I just achieve, if I

have a life purpose. If I just start to do figure out who I am

and what my gifts are, then I'll love myself. It's like loving

yourself. You do not need. It's not about. It's not about the

the the identity of who you are. Like that's all a facade. Loving

yourself is living in the present moment and actually

experiencing life for what it is and truly being present, living

from love-that's it. Receiving life-that's love. But the

punishment system that lives inside of pretty much every

woman on planet Earth, so till she does some deep self

exploration, self recovery, self healing, self love journey, of

course, with guides and mentors.

Usually, we can't do it alone, but you can try. But we always

have blind spots. But until that time, that punishment system,

because love was externalized, and we were taught we had to be

a certain way to get love, we then create that punishment

system inside, right? And so, there's all these women when I

work with them who who I've who've talked about this idea of

self love and how they've tried everything to love themselves

and they still hate themselves. And it's like you don't hate

yourself, you are love, and you don't judge yourself, you don't

judge other people. You just are. It's neutral. There's

nothing. You're not in a story when you're home. You're not in

a story, and so the punishment system is the part of you that

berates you and tells you you need to be different than you

are in order to have X, Y, Z, in order to be lovable, worthy, and

good enough, right? So that's the the part of you that's like,

okay, you just got to lose 10 pounds and then go on the dating

sites. You just gotta go, you know, fix your face a little

bit, and then go on the dating sites, or and then go for the

job interview. Gotta go shopping and buy a bunch of new clothes,

and then go to the job interview. It's like I gotta

change who I am in order to feel a certain way, and that's the

self fulfilling prophecy, right? The judgment towards myself that

I'm not enough as I am right now. I need to change something,

and then I will be enough. And it's a self-fulfilling prophecy

because it's never enough, never, never. Did I sing this

recently? I know I sang a different song last week. My

friend sent me a text, Thespis. He loved it. I'm gonna have him

on the podcast soon. This is a shout out to you, my love.

Anyways, he loved last week's episode, but I he sent me a

message or message with the song "Unwritten" by Natasha

Bedingfield. I sang that one last week, but "Never Enough" is

from that movie, The Greatest Showman, and I think like it

summarizes small self, right? Nothing is ever enough. I don't

have enough money. I don't have enough time. I don't have enough

love. I don't have enough, you know. I don't have enough stuff,

right? It's a part of us that wants to watch another show. The

show is not enough. We need to watch the whole Netflix series

all in one all in one thing. We need to eat the whole bucket of

ice cream. We need to get more clothes, get more stuff for our

house, order more things on Amazon. It's never enough

because it's coming from the part of you that doesn't believe

she's enough, and she's trying to feel like she's enough by

getting the guy, getting the job, getting the stuff, getting

the Botox, getting the weight loss, getting, getting, getting,

right. So if that part of you is in charge, you cannot have love

from that place. You cannot feel the love that you are. You

cannot experience love. That's why self love is so hard for

people, because so many people are like, I want to love myself.

I'm gonna go get a healing session, another healing

session. Go to more therapy. Go to more therapy. Go to more

healing. Go to this. Go to this. Go to that. Go to this. Go to

that. But they're doing it from their small self, wanting to be

rescued. I'm gonna call an astrologer and find out like

when love is coming. I'm gonna do this thing from to try and

get this thing from outside of myself. Real love comes from

being the thing for yourself, rather than trying to get it

from outside of you. Doesn't mean you're not going to have

healers and therapists and psychics and whatever along the

journey with you, astrologers. You know, clothing that your

heroine might choose doesn't mean those things aren't going

to be part of the journey, but what part of you is leading the

journey, right? If it's brokenness, if it's if it's I'm

not good enough, I'm not worthy, I'm not lovable, and I'm trying

to get those things to feel better in thinking some way

that's going to make me love myself.

Like all the women have told me, they get Botox for self love and

confidence. Like you will never feel love. That's coming from

the outside in when it's coming from the outside in, it's

temporary. It's a moment. You might feel relief. You might

feel relief and the fantasy of love and the fantasy of beauty

and the fantasy of I've got it all. That there we go. I moved

into my new house. Now I've made it. I got the promotion. Now I'm

now I'm good. Now I'm confident. But it's a facade, right? It

when it breaks down, and five minutes later, or five months

later, and you're needing the next thing, right? You've got a

new story. Okay, got the guy. Now I need the ring, or now I

need to move in. Now I need the honeymoon. Now I need the kids.

That is the insatiable part, which means your small self is

trying to get the love, and it will never feel the love. It

can't, because you're not home. You cannot feel and receive love

until you're plugged into the infinite loving source that you

are, which is divine. Right? That's your heroine. That's the

sovereign woman inside. Is this infinite part of you that is

love that you were when you were a kid. Go watch a little kid and

witness the love that they are. Like, and it doesn't mean they

don't feel pain. Like that's the thing. Like they are the

literally the secret medicine. That's the secret sauce. Watch a

two-year-old, right? They'll feel their feelings till they're

done feeling their feelings, and then they're back to love, back

to presence, back to curiosity and wonder and awe, back to joy,

back to playfulness, back to to following what feels good.

That's who you are, right? They're not like, who am I? A

two-year-old's not like, am I good enough? Like, do I do I

need to do this? Painting better, so you love me. No,

two-year-olds are fucking celebrated for their paintings

for the most part, unless you grew up with monsters. Like most

people celebrate their two-year-olds' painting, but

once that two-year-old is nine and they're in school, they get

punished and not celebrated for their painting. They get

measured against their their fellow students. Their

comparison, right? That's where comparison comes from. They get

measured against their siblings, so now, oh, I have to be like

somebody else in order to be loved. In order to be loved,

right? The two-year-old isn't thinking about how they're being

perceived. They're not judging themselves or anyone else.

They're not thinking other people are wrong and they're

right, right? The two-year-old is just in the experience of

life and and love, in that infinite infinite fountain of

energy, of youthfulness, of wonder, of awe, of magnetism.

Right? They magnetize people to them because they're they're in

their hearts, just present in the moment. That's the core of

who you are. Now, your small self is always going to be

there. So this is not some like fantasy fake message where I'm

saying like your love and yours can be light and love all the

time. That's this is not fluffy love. I'm talking like honest

love. I'm talking like do you know how many courageous steps I

had to take in my life to follow my heart, to follow my truth, to

at no cost to not not not abandon myself no matter what,

that was the journey back home to loving myself and living from

love, and so it was a practice, right? It's a daily practice.

What part of me is leading? If you are in your mind listening

to the the voice in your head trying to make decisions from

that place and ignoring the gut clarity that's in your body,

your body doesn't have a manual. It doesn't have a script or

story as to why this is a no. It's just a no. And when you

learn to honor your noes and follow your yeses of your body,

you create love for yourself. You create safety within

yourself, right? We look for safety in partners. We look for

safety in relationships. We look for safety in jobs. Oh, I got a

corporate job because it's safe. Yeah, until you got laid off,

you know, during COVID when everything changed or whatever.

It's like it's safe. What does that even mean? Is that safe?

Is safe is it a prison if you hate your job and you you but

you got medical benefits or you're living in some illusion

that this is safe because you need to pay bills? Like there's

other ways for abundance to come your way, but it's not going to

come your way if you're living if you're believing the lie that

this thing outside of you is safe. This relationship, this

this place you live, whatever that is, that's not safe. Safety

is listening to your inner compass, and that's how you feel

safe inside when you walk through the world. No matter

where you go, you feel safe when you're living a life that is a

byproduct of following your inner compass. You feel safe.

You feel home. You feel love. You feel grounded. You feel

present. You feel grateful. That comes from choosing to follow

your compass. It doesn't mean you're not going to have painful

moments, right? When you start following your compass, and

everyone in your life is like, "What? No, actually, the heroine

said to me today on a call, she said, as she's started this

journey with me and like really starting to see all the places

where she's been saying yes and it's actually a no. She said

this morning, I've been actively encouraged my whole life by

everyone in my life to ignore my own no's, and she's like, and

it's still happening. And I'm noticing as I'm learning where

that true no is, which is in the body, and I'm starting to listen

to those that compass, that feeling, my inner guidance,

which is your soul, which is your heroine. She said, "I'm

seeing like other people challenging it, and I said,

"Yeah, that just means you're still not fully rooted in it

because the world around you stops challenging. No one

challenges me anymore because I'm just so rooted in my truth

that they know that energetically. I don't

communicate like I think I'm going to follow my truth. Do you

think I should follow my truth? Like it's like when you're new

to following your contest, there's going to be a small

self, a small part of you, like the little girl inside that's

still looking for validation, still wanting the world around

you to approve of: Am I going the right way? Am I doing the

right thing. Oh no! I'm going. I'm literally swimming in the

opposite direction to everyone I know. This is this right? Can

this be right? And the reality is, you're not supposed to be

swimming the same direction as everyone you know. But once you

start swimming in your direction, you'll start to

attract other fish who are also aligned with your path, who are

swimming in a similar direction that you get to play with and

swim with and enjoy. I've never said that. That's a new one for

you, new metaphor. But it's like becoming a mate to your own

soul, right? Instead of looking for your soulmate to feel love,

become a mate to your own soul, and your soul is simply that

compass. And it's so simple, right? It's. You you you don't

have to call me and be like Kate. Okay, my soul said that I

should do X Y and C because it's going to be really good for me,

and I'm going to blah blah blah. No, there's no story attached.

When you're following your soul, it's just like something lit up

inside me. Then right away, my mind, Sabenture mind, came up

with all the stories why I shouldn't do that thing, and so

I did it anyways. I loved up the part of me that needed some

support and love and guidance, and needed some boundaries. And

I said, "Hey, thank you so much for your opinion. I'm going to

take this step anyways. Thank you so much for trying to

protect me. I don't need your protection right now. I'm going

to do this thing anyways. And the more that you do that,

follow that compass inside, listen to those sparks, and also

honor the no's, right? When something is a no, it often

doesn't make logical sense.

Often, and the practice is to trust it, and then usually in

retrospect, you're like, oh, I didn't go to that place or do

that thing or go on that trip because actually I was meant to

go over here and meet that person and have that experience,

right? It's all part of leading you on the divine path, and you

only have to know the yes right now. You don't have to know the

yes and then the game plan for the next five years as to what

that yes is about. All you have to know is the yes right now and

take the step right now towards that yes. So self love Is it's

inherent in you to love yourself and to be love? And again, it's

not we're not no longer looking at ourselves objectively when

we're living from the truth of who we are. So you're not like,

who am I? Oh yeah, I'm Kate Harlow, this podcaster. Ooh,

I've never used that word before. I'm Kate Harlow, this

podcaster who lives in Africa, and like I help people heal

their hearts, and that's who I am. Like I don't need to talk

about who I am. And like when I was my small self becoming the

heroine, I did right. Like wow, I have gifts. Wow, I my small

self was surprised. Like wow, I'm doing a podcast and people

are actually liking it. Wow, this small self is always

surprised in the beginning because it's taught to believe

you suck and you're not good enough and you're not lovable

and worthy from the world around you. But when you're home, you

you you don't need reflections. You'll get tons. You'll get so

much reflection of being home, and recognition and and

opportunities. And you become magnetic when you're home, but

you don't need any of it anymore, right? You're not

looking for love, but love will come your way in the most

unexpected moments. But you're not looking for it because

you're satiated because you're home. So, self love, because we

it is our nature, but because we have been so conditioned and

programmed to be something so far away from the truth of who

we are. It's going to be a journey, and doesn't matter how

long. I mean, really, you're on the journey forever. But the

reality is, the journey, the love starts to lead and becomes

way more powerful. And then, when the small self comes up,

you know it so quickly when you've been on the journey for

longer. It's it's easier to alchemize and work through all

the feelings and all the stuff that arises when you're having a

moment or you're hijacked by your saboteur in some way. But

in the beginning, it's a it's a real it's a real devoted

practice to learn to live from love, to let the love lead, and

to make choices that are challenging, to make choices

that don't look like anyone else's, to start to talk to

yourself differently, to start you know even talking to the

world differently if you are constantly in judgment about

other people. Here's one of the gateways to self-love: is sit

with those judgments, sit in front of the mirror, whatever

you're judging in other people are simply reflections of

something in you. They might be reflections of a shut down part

of you. So let's say you're a selfless woman who's always

giving to everyone else, and you've been taught that that's a

very valuable thing in the world, and that you've been

taught that as a woman, that that's what you're supposed to

be-selfless, less of a self, you know. And then you get triggered

every time you're around someone who's selfish as fuck. Sit in

front of the mirror and talk to that person, and you'll see,

like, oh shit, I need to learn what they're doing. Doesn't mean

I'm going to become selfish and not care about other people. I'm

going to find my self-centeredness, which is

being centered in me and rooted in me and choosing me from my

heart, not from my saboteur. So, a fully selfish person, like a

narcissist, for example, they're not in their heart, right?

They're manipulation. It's like they're in the opposite side.

Self selflessness is also a form of manipulation because, like,

I'm gonna do all these things so you perceive me in a certain

way.

I'm gonna overfunction for you and deeply resent you deep down,

so that you love me, or say that you think I'm the best friend

that you have, or so that I have some value in your life, or so

that I feel like I'm good good enough and worthy and have a

place in the world. So it's like they're all manipulative, all

the all the patterns. But when you're triggered by a pattern,

it's usually because that person's patterns representing

the the patterns you need to play with. Those are the parts

of yourself you need to get comfortable with, so you can

find the place in the middle, which is not the pattern, which

is the alignment, right? If you are have been selfless for 40

years, well, my friend, you need to swing to the other side of

the pendulum and become selfish. And even if it's just like by

yourself, it's like become super selfish. Like, oh, I should.

When your little self-sacrifice or selfless part of shows up,

like, oh yeah, I should go to that birthday party because I

said I would. And that person's having a hard time right now.

And I don't want. What do I want? No, I don't want that. Not

fucking going. I'm gonna do what's right for me. Like play

with the energy of total self. Like what if I weren't to

consider anyone else's experience? Does it mean you're

gonna stay there? Your saboteur and little girl is gonna be

terrified that you're gonna stay in selfishness. You're not gonna

stay there. You're simply playing with the pendulum so you

can find that self-centered place in the middle where, of

course, you're considering other people's experience, but you're

not changing your own truth for theirs to to to over function

for their made up experience that you think that they need.

You are saying honoring your yeses and noes, living from your

compass, but also kindly and lovingly communicating that.

Thank you so much for the invitation. I won't be able to

make it, but I love you so much, and I trust you're gonna have

the best time, and I can't wait to see the pictures. Right? It's

like lovingly and kindly-that's considering the others'

experience, not abandoning yourself for their experience,

for the for the made up experience. You've made that up

in your head that them not being at your party is the end of the

world, or you not being at their party is the end of the world.

So you must sacrifice and abandon your own compass for

them, right? That was made up. So really, like loving yourself

is leaning into all of you, welcoming all your feelings, but

but moving through the moving underneath the stories. We get

so trapped in the stories about the feelings rather than just

letting yourself feel everything, but feel it, right?

Welcome all of it and get intimate with it. That's what I

do in the work I do with heroines. Is we're getting

intimate with all aspects of yourself. You're getting

intimate with your feelings, intimate with all these parts of

you that are judging the world around you and comparing and

beating yourself up and punishing yourself, and all the

exciting activities of the saboteur, creating drama, making

up meaning of things. Your saboteur is always actively

working to keep you internally suffering, because then you're

not going to be shining your light and living your best life,

because that to her is bad and wrong, right? You're not going

to be your most radiant, beautiful, confident, powerful,

bold, express self. Because you got shut down for being that

when you were three, so your saboteur is going to do

everything she can to keep you small in fear, suffering, and

the world around you is going to match what's happening still in

your saboteur. So if other people are shutting you down,

it's because you're shutting you down. If other people are

punishing punishing you, and you know manipulating you is because

you're doing it to yourself. It's all a reflection. So self

love is a journey where you're learning to change what part of

you is leading your life and to heal that relationship within

and to make choices from love. What would be the most loving

thing I can do for myself right now?

Right, my my fear based saboteur mind wants me to go to that

thing and abandon myself. But what would be the most loving

thing I can do for myself? And actually learning to treat

yourself with love, with devotion, with reverence,

investing in yourself, getting to know yourself, getting to

know your soul like it's a new friend, like like it's a new

lover. What do you love? What lights you up? What sparks you

getting? Like getting curious and actually honoring it like

you would for another, right? As women, we're so amazing to the

people in our lives, and usually, I mean, God, when I was

in my self-loathing period of my life, I was so amazing to my

friends from a sacrificing place, right? From a people

pleasing place, I wasn't rooted in any way, but I was the best

friend everyone ever had. And then resentful deep down, and

feeling unlovable, and feeling taken advantage of, blah blah

blah. But, but I was amazing to everyone else, and a total

asshole to myself. So if that's you, your saboteur is in charge,

right? Your conditioned self, which is a lie. All of those

these are lies about yourself. And there's a wounded little

girl underneath who needs your love, not a man's love, not

anyone else's love. The only true healing that your little

girl inside that has been pulled away from the magic of herself

and her own soul. The only true healing she can receive is from

you, from you showing up from her, for her, from you talking

differently to her, from you letting her feel her feelings

and express them and and move them, and and you holding the

container for her, but not jumping in the pit with her. You

being able. To see as the observer, like hi, baby girl, I

see you there. I know you're scared. Let me love you through

this. That's self love. Let me sit with you and be with you,

but not feed the story that's putting gasoline on the fire of

you hating yourself, or you being fearful, or you feeling

wrong and guilty and bad. And you know, like most of us are

just letting this saboteur. And you know, you don't know what

you don't know till you know, but most of us are just letting

the saboteur pour gasoline on the fire of this little girl

inside, and is creating more self harm. All in the name of

like, once I have the thing, then I'll feel the thing. No,

you won't. You're creating more self abuse. You're creating more

self hatred, more self loathing, more self suffering. This is a

time for you to repair. Self-love is repairing and

rebuilding your relationship with that wounded little girl,

so that you can remember who you are, which is love, which is

magic, which is expression, which is aliveness, which is

actually experiencing life. That's your soul, and when that

part is leading, you don't need anyone to give you anything. You

just are. It's so profound, my loves. It's such an amazing.

It's a journey. It's a journey. I've been on it for 20 years.

I've been on my journey for 45 years, but I've been on my

journey of coming back home to myself and learning to treat

myself with love for 20 years, and you know it took time, and

now I won't compromise myself if you pay me. Like there's no one

who could pay me enough money to go against my compass. It's not

an option. It's not an option. So, and there's always more

layers of love. Like I'm learning every day on my

journey, every every month, every year, there's more.

There's more. I think I shared in last week's episode that my

mom was like, "Wow, you're really different this year. And

it's like, "Yeah, because there's always more. I'm always

growing more. I'm always learning more. I'm always

meeting new parts of myself. I'm learning love in an even deeper

way. I'm experiencing more love in a more profound way because

I'm choosing to show up. I'm choosing to get honest with

myself and with other people, even when it's fucking

uncomfortable. And sometimes it's really uncomfortable, but

only to your small little human self, right?

Your soul is like, no, we're going our own way, and we know

that there's a magical, you know, endless gifts that come

from doing that, and that's why we're here. That's the whole

point of being here: is to be on your own magical adventure and

to experience what your here's your soul is here to experience,

including the overcoming, including the moments of

awakening, including the you know saying yes, saying yes when

it's a no for many years, and then one day being like,

"Enough. Leah said that on her episode a couple weeks ago.

Enough is enough. No more, right? No more. There comes a

day where you have to choose yourself, and when you live from

love, you devote your you create time for yourself. You don't

just say, "I have no time to meditate, and then spend hours

scrolling on your phone or watching TikTok or Netflix,

right? You actually devote yourself to yourself. Okay, I'm

going to sit down and watch this show. Wait, is this actually

love? Is this nourishing my soul? Does this feel good? Does

this show? Is this show actually feeling good, or is it feeding

more fear in my subconscious? Is it creating more angst? Is it? I

actually watched one episode. This was really interesting on

my one of my flights. I watched one episode of Sex in the City.

It was an old episode, Aiden Days, where she was getting back

to trying to get back together with Aiden. If you watch Sex in

the City, so it was like early one of the first few seasons,

and I watched one episode, and I thought I was going to watch.

There were three episodes on the thing, and I thought I was going

to watch all three, and I only watched one. And I was like, "Oh

my god, this show is so anxious! Like I had anxiety watching it

the whole time. And I was like, "Wow, no wonder we're all so

fucked up. Like not only do we have all these systems, school

systems, and family systems, and all that, but like watching

shows that are so dramatic and so anxiety provoking and so fear

based and so fantasy based, it is no wonder we're so far from

ourselves. So I turned it off and I ended up meditating on the

flight instead, and then fell fell asleep and had an amazing

sleep, and it's just like, isn't it interesting to see, like,

when you become the observer of your life, right? Become the

loving, compassionate, curious observer-not to punish yourself

for not doing your journey right, but to notice, like, oh,

interesting. Okay, made that choice, and I watched Netflix

all night last night, and then I felt horrible the next day, and

I didn't sleep well. Noted, you know that that's what I do with

wine. I even when I was home, I had I had wine maybe three

times, and I noted one time I had wine in the day, one glass,

and I felt fine. I didn't. Bad, whatever. But I mean, it's rare

that I would be having a glass of wine in the day. It was I

can't remember where where I was on my journey, but I noticed

when I had wine at night how tortured I was in my sleep and

how restless I was and how great. And it's like when you

become the observer and like, ah, okay, interesting. I don't

want wine before bed again. I don't want to have that that

experience. I don't want to create that suffering for

myself. Right? That self love is like is is decide is making new

choices, becoming the observer of all of your current habits

and choices, noticing how you feel before, during, and after.

Right? Noticing did did you feel nourished by that?

I I have a heroin sister I work with, and she talks about how

sometimes her saboteur will take over, and she'll choose the

Netflix route, and she'll zone out and disconnect and and

escape, and then she'll feel horrible the next day, and then

another another night she'll choose to meditate and to dance

and to write and connect and to to to to follow her soul and do

things that feel really nourishing, have a bubble bath,

and then she's like, "I sleep sleep so peacefully, I feel

amazing, and I wake up the next day so connected and present and

like calm. You know, it's like we think it's the world around

us that creates our suffering, but it's not. It's the world

inside of us, and it's who's leading. So get to know your

small self, and don't let her lead. Become the observer of

her. Become the loving parent of that little girl who's

underneath the saboteur, and start to let your soul take

over. Right. Start to choose to do the thing that's loving and

be the observer of the times you're not, and noticing how it

impacts you, and not punishing yourself for doing it, but just

being like, "Huh, okay. Do I want that experience again, or

do I want to create something better for myself? Do I want to

create something like if you you are your divine mama to the

little girl inside, what kind of life do you want her to have,

and how do you want her to feel? Do you want her to feel punished

and diminished and shamed and guilty and and wrong and bad and

not good enough, and not lovable, and seeking love in all

the wrong places, or do you want her to feel loved? So that that

there is a part of you that, like, whenever you feel resonant

with anything I say, that's that's your soul. Your soul

already knows everything, all of this, and knows how to live from

love. So that's the journey. No longer seeking love outside, or

no longer faking self-love, but actually changing our

relationship to ourselves and what part of us is leading, and

how you're treating your small self, and how and learning to

love that part, and then you start to live from love and live

from the heart and the soul and the compass, and you become

love, and you don't need it from outside. It's it's quite

extraordinary. You are love, my love. Just like every little

being that comes into the world. I just spent so much time with

my four year old niece. My God, is she ever love? She's four is

the best age. She's so talkative. She's so loving.

She's so sweet. She is so present. She's so connected.

She's so truthful. She's feels her feels. She's bold. She does.

You cannot tell her what to do. She's she's just the sweetest,

most divine being. That's who we are at the core. Every single

one of us. Every one of us, without a shadow of a doubt,

that is at the core of every being. Will everyone get back to

that place? No. Lots of people will spend their whole lives in

their protective mechanisms and patterns, thinking it's keeping

them safe in some way. But something else is possible for

you here. So hopefully, this episode landed, impacted your

heart in some way. You're worthy of a life of love, and from one

self hater to a true lover, a true lover. I don't even want to

say like I don't need to practice self love because I

live and breathe love towards myself and the world around me.

I treat myself and everyone with love, and if I have a moment

that I don't, I'm tending to those younger parts that need

some love and attention, so I can come back to my heart. The

heart doesn't need protection ever, but you need to honor and

live from it.

So it's a practice, and as always, you can reach out to me

if you want to explore how to go deeper, if you need some

mentorship and guidance on how to how to connect and how to

deepen your relationship with yourself in this way, share this

episode with every woman you know who needs to hear it, and I

love to hear from you reflections on episodes. If you

have questions, if you have requests for another episode,

let me know. I love you long time, and I'll see you next

week.