I Am Who I Am, and I Love Me
From the moment we emerge into this world, our perceptions begin to develop. Every tiny bit of input that we receive helps to make us who we are. If we're lucky, we live in a world where we are loved, supported, encouraged. Much more often however, somewhere down the road of life, we are hurt either physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually, or all of these ways. Our senses are what bring things into our mind, and these perceptions of what we sense become a part of us. Let's start by taking a look at the senses.
Sight: One of our first things we notice as a child about differences is simply whether we're a boy or a girl. From this grow ideas about what is pretty, handsome, etc. Much of this part of our perception is shared among our immediate family, and our childhood friends or siblings. So much of our society is focused on how a person looks. Once we start noticing the difference in other people, we relate that to our own physical appearance and how we feel about that. A child whose parents make fun of someone who is overweight develops a perception that overweight is ugly. Now what if that child grows up to be overweight? Too tall? Too short? Too thin?
Hearing: Everything we hear is also stored in our subconscious mind. Everyone has a different tone of voice, dialect, accent or pronunciation of words. The words we hear also affect us tremendously. Children who are told they are stupid, or can't do anything right will grow up feeling that way. If we're told we are smart and special and loved, we will feel that, too. We should think about every single word that comes out of our mouth. This isn't true just for children, but for other adults, as well. We may say something off-color that triggers a bad memory that the person had as a child.
Smell: Even our sense of smell stores memories in our mind. One of the best memories of my childhood is my grandmother's biscuits. Even to this day if I feel bad, I bake. There's nothing more therapeutic for me. This is probably why aromatherapy works so well with people. There are also bad scents that trigger memories for us or make us respond negatively.
Taste: We grow up with comfort foods. If we need affection and love, we chose something soft and sweet. If we are angry or anxious, we may chose something salty or crunchy. The more we feel one way or another develops poor eating patterns in our lives, and creates an unhealthy body. This creates a cycle of feeling bad about ourselves, over-eating or under-eating, and possible eating disorders.
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