"Real isn't how you are made," said the Skin Horse. "It's a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real."
"Does it hurt?" asked the Rabbit. "Sometimes," said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. "When you are Real you don't mind being hurt." “Does it happen all at once, like being wound up," he asked, "or bit by bit?" "It doesn't happen all at once," said the Skin Horse. "You become. It takes a long time. That's why it doesn't happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand." Margery Williams, The Velveteen Rabbit
Isn't that lovely? What a wonderful excerpt from the book, it really does sum up living authentically. It’s also very true; we don’t become real people until we have experienced pain, loss, real love, and what we thought was love. So no matter the source of love or hurt, we become real by acknowledging our true selves in every experience.
So the Skin Horse explains this by saying that people who break easily, have sharp edges, or have to be kept carefully, don’t often become real. Looking at this and applying it to life we can see what he means. If you break easily, everything becomes painful, every new negative experience builds on the last one, and we become so disconnected from our true selves, our dreams, our hopes that it becomes difficult to see clearly.
If you have coped with life by building a wall around yourself for protection, you may keep out the hurt, but you also keep out the chance of becoming real, and recognising real love when it comes. So your edges will be sharp, from a distance you seem okay, but get closer and those edges cut, the saddest thing is that it is you who will be cut the deepest.
If your response to life has been a desire to be carefully kept, (controlling your environment) then you are living a false life. Like living on a very small life raft in a very big ocean, you are very vulnerable to being thrown around by life’s ups and downs.
When we are hurting, we don’t see it at the time but it is the perfect time to take a long hard look at ourselves. To become real (authentic) we have to acknowledge every part of ourselves. The good parts and the not so pretty parts.
You can’t mend other people when they are broken, that’s a fact, an indisputable truth. No matter what you do for them, you cannot mend them. You can help them mend themselves, but they have to truly want to change or your energy and time will be wasted.
You can mend yourself though, with or without help, and the first step is to acknowledge that you are broken.
Just two questions, if you’re really smart you’ll be asking yourself both of them:
Why am I allowing these things to happen in my life?
Why am I treating other people this way?
That’s it right there, your biggest truth, your long hard gaze in the mirror: Two simple questions.
So how do you begin to mend yourself?
It starts with how much we love and value ourselves, those who've read all of my blogs will notice a common theme in that statement. What most people who read it won’t know - is that I have learnt all of these things the hard way by experience!
So right now I will be my authentic self, sharing the one simple fact that I know, if we don’t love, honour and respect ourselves truly, why should others?
Have you ever:
Put yourself last, feeling guilty for having needs
Beat yourself up for making mistakes
Had self-destructive behaviours that stemmed from low self-worth and attracted all manner of destructive people/events into your life
Talked yourself out of doing anything worthy, told yourself that you wouldn’t be good enough
Concentrate on all your perceived shortcomings far more than all the good things you’ve achieved
Develop some habits/strategies to feel loved, get attention
I have done all of the above, and probably a lot more too at various times in my life!
So how did I change? How did I become real?
I went through a most horrendous experience that left me vulnerable and scared, but at the same time something in me snapped and made me embrace everything I was, and everything I wasn’t.
I acknowledged my weak points and made a promise to myself to sort as many of them out as possible, and to love those flawed bits of me I really couldn’t change.
By accepting yourself fully, you begin the healing process, by looking at the dark side of ourselves, as well as the light parts (much more comfortable to look at) that is the route to becoming whole.
So I am not so different from you, except that I am writing about my flaws for the world to read, and I have to tell you – that feels ok, it feels right to acknowledge that I am not perfect. The reason that it feels right is that my foundation is now built on having the love and respect for myself that I deserve.
I don’t need everyone else to love me in order to love myself
I don’t need everyone else’s permission to be happy in order to feel happiness
I am happy being me, perfectly imperfect, and in living this way, I have attracted happiness in abundance into my life that I never thought possible..
So now you know, the whole reason for creating the village of Happyshire, is to help you find peace and happiness in your life too. To give you courage to change, to get out there and create the life you’d really like.
Live positively and value yourself, take chances, take risks...just do it!
The worst that can happen can turn out to be the best you ever could have imagined
Trust me, I know, for now that my hair has fallen out, I have scars, inside and outside, my joints ache... but I am real, and I am truly loved.
You can read the whole story of the Velveteen Rabbit here..
http://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/williams/rabbit/rabbit.html
This article was taken from my blog http://happy-shire.blogspot.co.uk/
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