Embracing Self-Respect: Key Lessons Learned

Welcome to Authentic Living with Linda
I’m Linda Codlin

Welcome, My Friends.

The end of the year is upon us.
So much has been happening in my private life that I have been working my way through.
Okay, for some context.
We moved into our new home, in a new town, incidentally where we don’t know anybody.
About three weeks after moving day, we were unpacking happily, when hubby went to pick up his jersey and his back couldn’t hold him up.
An ambulance ride to the nearest hospital. We were expecting an xray, some drugs and home to recouperate.
This was not to be.
5 weeks later, after so many things happened, scans, xrays, pneumonia, and a blood cancer diagnosis, and beginning treatment, we were finally allowed to go home. On the proviso we come back every Moday for more Chemotherapy injections and daily Chemotherapy medications.
We are three weeks at home and still in the middle of this wild ride.

You may have noticed I have not shared anything but the facts, the emotions are still pretty raw and are still being processed.

Life is short, and we don’t know what the future will hold.
At the end of 2024, it is time to look in the rear-view mirror.
How well did you travel this year?
Are you able to be proud of yourself, and how you handled every situation that came your way?

When we are faced with life and death, we kind of get a new perspective on what is important.
When I look back over the year there are a lot of things I didn’t accomplish that were on my goal list.
However as a woman I have grown.
My word of the year for 2024 was respect.
I have learned to respect just how fragile we really are, for all our contraptions, for all our trying to control the Universe, we are very fragile human-beings.

Three lessons I have learned about respect this year.

1. To respect other people and their view-point of life is to let them be themselves, even when I don’t like it, even when I think I know better, and especially when there is no visible change on the horizon.
2. Rspecting yourself is about setting boundaries, (The Red Velvet Rope Policy) around yourself.
   Standing up, (not combatively) but firmly stating what your standards are, stating what will happen if your boundaries are not adhered to, (Your actions, for you. It’s not about them, it’s about you.) Then following through on these standards and maintaining your boundary. (This I think is the hardest part.)
3. Self-respect is showing up for yourself.
   This is doing what you say you’re going to, even when (especially when,) you don’t feel like it.
   Self-respect is the standards I set for myself, they don’t involve other people.
   It’s things like getting up in the morning to journal, when I would rather stay in bed.
   Self-respect really is the most important part of respect, when you respect yourself enough to have standards and to stand by them, you move yourself out of the way of a lot of harm. Just because you’re not in the energy of accepting anything that happens as what you are worthy of.

With our hospital stay, I was feeling peaceful because I knew there was nothing I could do about the diagnosis, all I could do was focus on the next thing in front of me, and that was, the next medical procedure, finding information so I could ask relevant questions and understand what was actually happening.

What is in front of you at the moment that requires you to respect yourself?
How did you demonstrate self-respect in your decisions and actions over the last year?
What would you like to do differently this year?

When did you feel the most proud of yourself last year?
How can you recreate these situations for this year?

What situations did you feel you compromised your self-respect last year?
Why were these situations particularly difficult to honour yourself?
How can you forward plan for similar situations this year to give yourself a head start on feeling confident to handle the situation?

So, overall this year I feel I learned to respect myself more, to respect my loved ones more, and to respect what I can’t change.

Until Next time:
I have 15 questions for you to ask yourself around Self-respect.

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xoxox Linda.

If you are looking make some major changes this year, get in touch at authenticlivingwithlinda@gmail.com so we can make a time to have a chat.

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As a certified Life Coach, I help you to help yourself, so you can create a well lived life your way. 

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