When You Finally Stop Leaving Yourself | SFTS Ep14

Many of us learned to cope by leaving ourselves when things felt hard. In this reflection, I explore what changes when you stop running and start staying with your inner experience. We look at how trust rebuilds, how capacity expands, and how coming home to yourself quietly transforms everything else.

Transcript

Good morning, Good evening, Good afternoon, Wherever you may be, Whatever you may be doing, Hello, And welcome back to Stories from the Soul. Today I'm going to talk about something that I have experienced, Noticed, And believe is very important, Kind of look at what happens when you actually stop abandoning yourself. Most of your life you've been possibly leaving yourself, Not physically but emotionally. When things get hard, You emotionally leave. When things get uncomfortable, You override the feelings. And when things get painful, You distract yourself from the feelings. I've spoken previously about how I realized, For me, That the first and the most personal abandonment, Rejection, Was the abandoning of myself. But I ask, What happens when you finally decide and choose to stay? To stay with self, When you stop running from yourself and start returning to yourself? I have found that absolutely everything changes. Let me show you how. Let me paint you a picture of what self-abandonment looks like. You wake up anxious, But instead of being with that feeling, With that anxiety, Instead of asking, Engaging, Trying to understand what it needs, You override it. You push through, You caffeinate, You run, You have a drink, You scroll, You tell yourself you have to get it together. And someone, Someone hurts your feelings, Or when someone hurts your feelings, Instead of honoring that hurt, Instead of at that moment setting a boundary, A boundary with the other person, But also importantly, A boundary with yourself, You make excuses. You make excuses for them, You tell yourself you're being too sensitive. Oh, I've always been emotional. Maybe they're right. You abandon what you felt to keep the peace between you and that other person. And this is the pattern. You say yes, When you actually mean no, You say no when you might actually want to do it. You stay when you want to leave, You perform when you need to rest. And you've been doing this so often for such a long time that you don't even realize that it happens or that you're doing it anymore. You've forgotten what it feels like to stay with yourself. Today I ask what would happen if you remembered? What happens when you stop? What happens when you stop abandoning yourself? The first thing that happens is you start to notice. You start to notice the moment you're about to leave. You feel the anxiety rising and instead of immediately reaching for your phone or coffee or the next task, You pause. You listen, You engage, And you ask, What's happening right now? What am I feeling? What do I need? And at first, You might not have any answers. And that's probably the most likely, Because you've been running for so long you don't know what you're running from anymore. But learn to stay anyway. You don't fix it, You don't override it, You don't distract, You don't scroll, You don't cope, You just stay. And the next time it happens, You stay, And keep staying, And keep staying, And something starts to shift. Because for the first time in a long time, Maybe for the first time ever in your adult life, You're not leaving yourself when things get hard, You're actually staying. And in your staying, That changes absolutely everything. The second thing that happens is parts of you that have been wanting and waiting start to emerge. Because when you stop abandoning yourself, When you prove that you are willing to stay, The parts of you that have been running, The parts of you that you've been running from, Slowly with time and like any relationship start to trust you. The part that feels scared, The part that feels inadequate, The part that carries those old wounds, These parts that have been stuck in the shadows for so long, That have been locked away, Because every time they tried to get your attention, You left. You distracted yourself, You numbed, You scrolled, You exercised, You told them basically to be quiet, You ignored them, You rejected them, You abandoned them. But now, Now you're staying. And these parts start to come forward, Not to overwhelm you, Not to consume you, But to be finally seen. And when you can be with them, When you can listen to what they've been trying to tell you, You realize they're not the enemy. They're just parts of you that needed you and you finally showed up. You've taken the time to learn, To understand, To engage, To build a relationship. With these parts that have only ever been there with your best interest at heart, That these parts of you that have only ever been there to protect you. And then the third thing starts to happen and this is where it gets really interesting. Your relationships, Your external relationships start to change. Because when you understand that the original rejection, The original abandonment was with yourself and you start to mend that, You stop tolerating people who abandon you, You stop tolerating people who reject you, Not in a harsh way, Not in a punishing way, But you just, Your eyes have been opened, You just can't unsee it anymore. The relationships where you had to shrink to fit, They start to feel too small for you. The people who only wanted you when you were performing or when you satisfied or filled a hole in them, They start to fall and move away. The dynamics where you gave absolutely everything, Your all and actually received nothing. You can't do it anymore. Not because you're being difficult, Not because you're being selfish, But because you're putting self first and because you've tasted what it feels like to not abandon yourself, To put self first and to honor self. And once you do that, Once your eyes have been opened, You can't go back. So let me tell you what this actually looks like. What it looks like in real life when you stop abandoning yourself. What it looks like in real life when you stop abandoning yourself. Well, The first thing is you start trusting yourself, Not because you suddenly have all the answers, But because you've proven to yourself over and over again that you won't leave. And like an external relationship, It takes practice, It takes persistence, Perseverance. And over the course of time, That relationship strengthens, The trust deepens. And what's true of that external relationship is most definitely true of the internal relationship between yourself and the parts. So when things get hard, You stay. When things get uncomfortable, You don't run. And when things get painful, You turn towards instead of away. And that builds trust. So now, When you have a decision to make, When you're not sure what to do, You don't immediately look outside for the answer, You turn inward. You ask yourself questions like, How do I feel? What do I need? What feels true? What's my body telling me? And you trust what comes. The second thing is you stop performing. Because when you're abandoning yourself, When you're constantly overriding what you truly feel and what you want, You are performing. You're being who you think you need to be, To be loved, To be accepted, To be enough. But when you stop abandoning yourself, You stop needing to perform, You realize that you are enough. And people say it a lot, You are enough just exactly the way you are. And in stopping to need to perform, You're no longer looking outside for validation, You're no longer seeking completion externally. You are giving it to yourself, It's no longer outside, You realize that that solution is not external, It's internal. You're giving it to yourself, You're seeing yourself, You're hearing yourself, You're feeling yourself, You're valuing yourself. And when you do that, You don't need everyone else to do it for you. So you stop performing, You stop pretending, You stop shrinking, And you just show up as you are. And the third thing is your capacity expands. Because when you're abandoning yourself, When you're constantly running from discomfort, Your world actually gets smaller. You avoid situations that might trigger you, You avoid people who might challenge you. You avoid anything that might make you feel what you don't want to feel. But when you stop abandoning yourself, When you start creating that relationship with self, Becoming your best friend, When you prove that you can be with discomfort, Without leaving your capacity, Expands. You can hold more, You can be more with emotion, You can navigate more complexity, And you can stay present through more uncertainty. Not because you're stronger, But because you're no longer afraid of yourself. You're no longer afraid of being by yourself. Physically, You're no longer afraid of the silence. You know that whatever comes up, Whatever comes up, Whatever you feel, You can sit with it, You can be with it, And you won't abandon yourself, You'll stay. And the fourth thing, And perhaps the most important, You come home. Because all this time, All these years of abandoning yourself, You've been away from home. You've been out there, Performing, Proving, Seeking, Striving. Looking for something or someone outside of yourself to make you feel okay, To make you feel better, To make you feel loved, To make you feel understood, To make you feel seen, To make you feel heard. But as you build that trust, And when you stop abandoning yourself, You realize home was never out there. Home is here. Home is relationship that you have with yourself. And when you come home, When you finally stop running and just be here, Everything you were looking for was already here. So here's what I want you to know. You don't have to keep abandoning yourself. You don't have to keep running. You don't have to keep performing. You don't have to keep overriding what you feel and need. You can stop. And when you do, When you finally stay with yourself, You'll discover something you've been searching for your whole life. You'll discover self. Self with a capital S. And not the performed version, Not the acceptable version, Not the version that's trying to be enough to measure up. The real you. The one who's been waiting. The one who's been here all along. The one you've been actually running from. And you'll realize, In that moment, You'll realize that you were never alone. When you go through the issue, And when you go through this process, You start to trust the process. When you stop trying to go under, Around, Or over by coping, By distracting, And go through and get to the other side, You build that trust, You build that relationship. And you remember that you're never alone. It was never external. Always have had you. And importantly, This for me is the crux. You realize that you as your own best friend is not going anywhere. That's the relationship that will always be there. No matter what. As I've said in a previous talk, This too shall pass. Tomorrow's another day. All of that becomes a reality when you become your best friend. When you realize you just had to stop leaving. So, If you're listening to this right now and you're tired, If you're tired of abandoning yourself, If you're tired of running from yourself, I want you to hear this. You can come home. You can stop. You can stay. And you can be with yourself. And when you do, Everything changes. Not because life gets easier, But because you're no longer walking through it. Abandoned. You're home. You are home. And that changes everything. Thank you for listening. Thank you for returning. Thank you for showing up. Thank you for showing up for yourself. Now, If this conversation resonated with you, If you're ready to stop abandoning yourself and start staying, I'd like you to invite you to listen to another one of my podcasts. It's called The One Relationship That Determines Everything Else. Because what we talked about today, About stopping self-abandonment, That's really about rebuilding the most important relationship in your life. The relationship with self. So, If you want to understand why this relationship determines the quality of every other relationship you have, Find it, Click on it, And after you listen, Come back and leave me a comment. Let me know what's one thing that changes when or since you stopped abandoning yourself. I read everything and I love to hear what's shifting for you. And if you don't follow, Please do consider following. If you don't subscribe, Please do consider subscribing. I put out a new episode, Or try to, Every other week. I try to be real, Honest, Grounded, And to talk about coming home to yourself. Again, Thank you for being here, And I'll see you on the next one.