Words are magic potions that generate biochemical reactions in our brain and impact the body.
One of the commandments dictates: " you shall love your neighbor as yourself ." In a first reading or interpretation, we could deduce that the focus is on how much capacity we have to love other people; However, if we sit in silent meditation with this very profound phrase and allow its truth to emerge in our hearts, little by little we begin to feel that the importance lies in the love that we can develop towards ourselves.
You can't give what you don't have, this is a truism. How can you start from the premise that the important thing is to love others without first having the ability to love yourself? It is impossible to love if you don't start by valuing the way you love yourself. However, the path to loving ourselves does not happen overnight.
I often tell my patients or students to experiment with speaking to others as they speak to themselves in the mirror every morning.
Surely it would be disastrous to spend the day telling others that they are never good enough at what they do, that they have not managed to achieve their goals, that they are lazy, stupid, fat, that they are not doing anything useful with their lives, that there is always someone doing much better,...
Can you imagine treating someone like this every day? Do you know the impact these words would have on his nervous system? In your mental health? In your self-esteem? In your body?
Words are magic potions that generate biochemical reactions in our brain and impact the body. That is why in all traditions of spiritual search, words, sounds or mantras have so much relevance. Words are very powerful.
In most cases, people maintain a negative dialogue with themselves throughout the day. It is rare to find someone first thing in the morning who has a thought of deep gratitude for the day that is beginning; It is rare that we take the time to appreciate each part of our body, be grateful for our abilities, recognize ourselves as unique and unrepeatable beings, and it is even stranger that someone, faced with their mistakes or failures, says to themselves: "it is part of learning, I forgive myself and I love myself".
When we say that peace begins within us, it actually begins with the language we use with ourselves.
Each word has an effect on you, on your body and therefore on the frequency that you project through your electromagnetic field . Being beings of peace, beings of love, beings of sweetness, begins in the way we treat each other, in the ability we have to appreciate the people we are today.
"You will love your neighbor as yourself" takes on another meaning when we understand that this love must be born in us, accompany us, define us.
I will love the other as I am capable of loving myself today.
I will accept the other as I am able to accept my mistakes and weaknesses today.
I will be able to open myself to compassion towards other people to the extent that I am able to open myself to compassion and forgiveness towards myself.
Today I will love myself better, I will talk to myself better, I will treat myself better,... Aware that to the extent that I train my mind and my body to do it, I will be able to do it for others.