Dear Anita,

It’s great to read back from you too! And thank you for clarifying the buddhist teachings as well, my knowledge is quite superficial at the moment only really garnering knowledge from youtube/google searches.

And yes I believe you’re correct, my parents put a lot of value on studies/achieving/succeeding and even when I would get good marks I would be happy with me, they would sometimes be upset if it was not up to their standards (particularly my mother) – i love my parents though and I understand where they were coming from, but yes it seems like there has been some unintended consequences on my mental health later down the road…

And yes I believe you are correct, the fact that I have only conditional love myself has very likely stemmed from my childhood and parental figures (something I never really considered) – and oh that’s also very interesting I would love to hear more about your experiences with body dysmorphia and OCD as well (or was it also related to your tall height which you mentioned previously?)

Ah, when you say healing on tiny buddha,  is that providing help and guidance to others? (i.e. giving to others helps your own mental health). Also that is great that you’re feeling less afraid, I hope this feeling becomes more regular for you. And thank you for sharing the meditation aspect as well – (I’ve been trying to meditate more frequently but find it so hard to slow down and do nothing). Sometimes I believe these negative thoughts of ours cant be ‘out-thunk’ and just need to exercise/meditate/see people.

Shoob