Dear Girija:

“I am not expecting you to say something that will immediately help me drop the disgust and fall in love with myself” – if only I had such power, no one does. It is possible though for you to form the intent to love yourself, as in thinking and treating yourself with love. Similar to if you were a mother of a young girl, forming the intent to treat her in loving ways, in the words you utter and actions you take.

“I’ve never had a boyfriend…. For me it feels like I am being realistic with my assessment when I think about finding love” (Feb 14 & 15, 2022)

“I have never been in a relationship” (March 3, 2019).

No boyfriend ever, no relationship ever… so, assessing your chances of finding love is like you never having stepped into the cold water of the ocean on a very hot day, yet you assess your chances of finding pleasure in feeling the cold water against your body and the weightless feeling of going up and down with the waves.

“I am being unusually brave, but I believe I can follow through because I have maintained my schedule in terms of diet and exercise. I am going to move out of my parents’ home and move to a new city where I will try dating… I don’t like this sulky version of myself. So, I am going to be positive and just have fun with it” –

– (1) Congratulations for having maintained your schedule in terms of diet and exercise!

(2) I hope that you maintain this brave, positive attitude through the ups and downs. You will have to manage and overcome an attitude you held for so long, such as you described back in March 2019: “I am powerless, people are too strong, harsh even cruel. No one stops to see where another is coming from. So, I am stuck being down and weak while everyone else bombards me with their expectations“.

I have no expectations of you moving out of your parents’ home, etc. I wish you would, but I don’t expect that you will. Maybe you will, maybe you won’t. Again, Yoda’s profound words come to my mind: “Do or do not, there is no try”.

anita