As a hypnotherapist, I challenge people to change their thoughts to change their destiny. I believe the whole purpose of this incarnation is to learn to love ourselves first, and then to extend that love to others. Until we really learn to fully love ourselves, we put on a protective shield because we do not feel safe in the world. We create self-imposed limitations to love. The good news is that we can free ourselves from our self-limitations. We can change our mind about how we see the world by getting in touch with our inner spirit. At the core of our being we are love, so there is no need to search for it, just acknowledge it.

It is our inner critic, bombarding us with negative messages, which blocks our receptivity to love. Most of these messages we heard and accepted about ourselves date back to our early childhood. Our negative thought patterns may have come from parents, siblings, peers, relatives, authority figures or others who played a major role in our lives. Young and vulnerable, we made the decision to accept their restrictive messages as truth. Remember, those who gave us limiting information were dealing with their own negative internal messages. I believe that these people all did the best they could, even if it wasn't good enough! We cannot change the past, but we can consciously make the decision to let go of our own limiting beliefs. It is a choice. Louise Hay, author of You Can Heal Your Life, states, " No matter what the problem, the main issue to work on is loving the self. This is the "magic wand" that dissolves problems."

We seem to adopt personas or masks to "fit" in the world, gaining recognition or trying to please others at our own expense. As we grow, we become aware of "spoken or unspoken" expectations that others have imposed on us. Failing to meet these expectations, we take on the feelings of inferiority and unworthiness. To blame others for our unhappiness only takes away from our own power, viewing ourselves as victims. To free ourselves from these restraints, we can learn to love and accept all parts of ourselves, claiming responsibility for what we think, feel and do. We may even begin to look at our experiences as gifts. We might ask ourselves how our experiences helped us to evolve. We then become masters rather than victims.

I believe that once we are willing to take responsibility for our own lives, getting in touch with our joy and our passion, our life is transformed. The journey begins by getting in touch with the Divine part of us, our inner connection. We just need a little willingness to get in touch with our feelings and to love ourselves without judgment for what we are experiencing. We don't need to change ourselves to love ourselves. We can love ourselves with all of our feelings of inadequacy and perceived limitations. I don't believe we can love ourselves with our mind, the intellectual part, but rather with our heart. I invite you to participate in the following exercise to get in touch with your inner spirit.

Move into the heart area and take a few long, deep breaths.

Imagine a beautiful pink light surrounding the area of your heart.

Feel your Divine connection, that spark of the Light within each of us. Fill yourself with it.

Allow yourself to move into the awareness of this calm, peaceful feeling.

Get in touch with your feelings. Let go of any resistance to allowing all of your feelings. When you take responsibility for your feelings, accepting them, you take charge of yourself.

Send this loving tranquility to each part of you that needs it (the part that is feeling angry, unloved, judgmental, confused, scared, anxious, misrepresented, grief, insecure, etc.). Breathe that love into your being. Know that you are not alone in this transformative work. Ask for help.

I invite you to make these statements:

• I know that all of my feelings are okay. I let go of my resistance to them.
• I willingly release all things that no longer serve me in a healthy way.
• I love myself for who I am right now, and for who I am becoming.
• I am willing to give and receive love, knowing that I am a loving and lovable person.

Breathe that truth into the core of your being. This is allowing personal transformation.

Happiness does not lie outside of ourselves. It is getting in touch with who and what we are at the core of our being. We see our life as a journey with many choices. To experience freedom and happiness, we need to allow ourselves to have all of our feelings and to be okay with them. Surrendering to our feelings, allowing them to wash over us without judgment, brings credence to our experiences. If we deny or ignore our feelings, they will come back to us in another form until we have dealt with them. Learning to love all parts of ourselves expands our capacity to love others with their problems and limitations. Loving ourselves fully cancels out the fear to love others.

And so I invite you to direct love and tenderness toward yourself this week. Allow yourself to feel the emotions that are stirred through just living life. Feel the emotions, surrendering to them without judgment. Love yourself for who you are and what you are feeling in that moment. As you breathe in self-love, you will find a blissful, freeing state. Allowing the feeling without judgment transmutes the emotion. When we love ourselves fully, we are in the Oneness. In that place, we experience that happiness lies within us.

Tags: Happiness