#eh i drafted this but i'm just gonna post it. whatever it's my stupid blog

[bright-eyed]

I saw a post that was like "self-improvement is great but ultimately you have to accept yourself/some days you won't have the energy to read or exercise or eat healthy or whatever but you're still enough" and it got me thinking about how there's a fundamental difference between self-improvement motivated by a desire to be seen as an "improved" version of yourself in the eyes of others/for the sake of being "successful" within society, and self-improvement which is motivated by self-love. Self-improvement motivated from self-love (accepting who you are as whole even in your "unimproved" state -- to the point of not even using that sort of language) is determined, fluid, adaptable, and resilient, at least as long as that core is there. This sort of self-improvement would probably naturally focus more on things that the person actually finds joy and fulfillment in, this "improvement" really being less about changing undesirable qualities of the self and more about changing the conditions and habits of one's life so as to experience the most meaning and joy as oneself.

So like for example this sort of person might be trying to read more because they know they truly enjoy it as a process and an experience and they find meaning in it, and getting out of reading has been an act of self-abandonment, not because they feel like they have to meet certain reading goals in order to qualify as "well-read" or "intelligent" in the eyes of others, or because other people like reading so they should too. If that self-loving person doesn't actually like reading, they would only try to "improve" their reading if there were some other extraneous reason for their needing to read, like maybe it being required they read certain materials for their career, and in that way forcing themselves to do something they don't enjoy could still be motivated by self-love as it's centered around the belief that they deserve and have the ability to succeed, and they can endure challenges for the sake of their future self whom they also love.

Then I think the problem with a lot of self-improvement advice out there is obviously that you can't teach self-love, meaning all the advice is inevitably geared towards people who are trying to hit reading goals or learn other languages or exercise more or eat healthier in order to be validated by others in ways they can't validate themselves, and also usually in order to achieve some perfect life where they can escape the problems they currently have. While the loving self-improvement is fluid and resilient, this sort is hard and punishing and untenable, even if you find something that works for a short time. And after that short time it often becomes really draining and miserable for people, and then they start asking themselves why they're even doing this, and then they give up, and then they dislike themselves for giving up, and then the problem gets worse. Some people are able to keep it up for a long time, and those people can become our gurus, but that sort of self-improvement can become its own form of self-abandonment and punishment.

I don't have a proposed magical solution to this because that would be me doing exactly what those self-improvement gurus are doing, which is hurting people, but I think maybe people should get to know themselves and ask themselves some basic questions. "Why do I want this?" "Why do I feel like I need to do this?" "What would happen if I did this or that?" "Does accomplishing this goal actually represent achieving an idealized version of myself where I am loved or perfected somehow?" "What do I actually love and how do I make it a bigger part of my life?" Etc.

I feel like a good litmus test is if a goal is part of an escape fantasy then whether or not it is a meaningful or innate desire probably needs to be called into question. Also paying attention to how you feel in the moment as you're trying to engage in certain behaviors can help. People can struggle with accomplishing habits for a wide range of reasons, and struggling does not inherently mean that you don't actually like the thing and should give up, but when doing something that's meaningful to you (it's at least my opinion that) even the challenge should be mingled with some kind of satisfaction or excitement. And as usual just the slow work of learning to accept yourself and be honest about your feelings, strengths, weaknesses, desires, hatreds, passions. "Love yourself" is such a tedious dictum that it actually sorta pisses me off but unfortunately that's where we're at so. Try that idk

#kennapost #eh i drafted this but i'm just gonna post it. whatever it's my stupid blog