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  You cannot have a positive life and a negative mind.

  —JOYCE MEYER, Charismatic Christian minister and author

  Every time you say something cruel or unkind to yourself, you are wounding yourself, whether you are aware of it or not. Think how you feel when you receive a compliment. It’s not always easy to let in positive messages, but think how good you feel when you do. Remember that burst of confidence. Now compare that with how you feel when you’re criticized.

  Just as you can’t expect to lose weight if you live on a diet of fast food and sugar, you can’t expect to live a peaceful and happy life if you’re living on the mental equivalent of an unhealthy diet.

  What’s more, we often unwittingly pass on these internal messages to others—particularly our children (if we have any). So the abuse we give ourselves gets handed down through the generations—unless we make a conscious decision to intervene.

  I love my children more than anything in the world. They are the most important part of my life, and when I’m with them, I am happiest—and yet I find parenting hard. I do my very best to carve out as much time as possible to be present and active with them, but I’m not entirely sure that my nerves are built for the noise, the intensity, and the constant requirements to be selfless and to remain calm. It takes everything in me not to nag them to quiet down and stop everything childish, which would obviously be devastating for their childhoods!

  I see other mothers who seem to find it less of a struggle. Perhaps they have grown up in bigger families or have tougher nerve endings. I have worked extremely hard to practice patience and to pause when necessary before reacting, but, on the other hand, I also have to remember to forgive myself. So, for instance, even when I do the “right thing” and get down on the floor to play Legos, my kids can sense that it’s not the easiest thing for me. I will do it, and I will stay there and engage, but somehow it’s a struggle, even if I’m pretending it’s not, and consequently they can tell. But it has taken me years and years not to feel guilty, to accept that I have limitations in that area, and that I really am doing the best that I can. When I accept and forgive my own weaknesses, then I can be lighter in the moment because I’m not trying too hard to be perfect, and in the end, my kids benefit too.

  —GA

  There is growing scientific evidence to suggest that negative attitudes can distort our experience of reality. Just as the placebo effect has been shown to produce improvements in patients’ health, there’s now evidence of a nocebo effect: patients who were told they would experience negative side effects from a treatment may experience them even if they were given nothing more than a sugar pill. An analysis of several patient studies found that when people were told that they would experience negative side effects from the powerful chemotherapy drugs, four in five complained of nausea and hair loss—even though in reality they’d been infused not with anticancer agents but with a harmless saline solution.1

  It is often what we believe about a situation, rather than the truth, that influences our responses.

  * * *

  Exercise: A New Script

  * * *

  This exercise is to help you start reprogramming the propaganda machine in your head.

  Pick one of the negative messages that you tell yourself. Write it down so you can see it for what it is: mean, unkind, negative, unhelpful. The problem is, your brain usually doesn’t see it that way. Your brain thinks it is protecting you by conveying that message. So, one step at a time, you are going to have to retrain your brain. Later on, we’ll work with specific tailor-made affirmations (see Exercise 1, “What’s Your Story?”), but for now, let’s use a message as an antidote that fits almost every situation.

  Underneath the sentence you have written, write this: “My name is [_________]. I am a good and kind person. I do not need to please everyone. I do enough. I am enough.”2

  Now cross out your original sentence, and then say out loud the new message you have given yourself. Every time you notice a negative thought coming into your head, repeat your new message until the negative thought has gone.

  Each morning and each evening for the next fourteen days, when you brush your teeth, look in the mirror and say your message out loud to yourself three times. Look yourself in the eyes and say it tenderly, as you would to someone you care about. Are you cringing? If so, that’s good: it means you’re hitting a live nerve. Morning and night, eyeball to eyeball in the mirror, three times. Try it. You’ve nothing to lose but a bit of pride, and everything to gain!

  How will you ever know whether there’s a better way unless you try?

  * * *

  This technique for reprogramming our internal message machine can feel incredibly awkward when we begin. “What if someone hears me talking to myself?” It’s ironic that so many of us have no problem with bombarding ourselves with negative messages but then feel embarrassed by the prospect of giving ourselves kind, positive, and encouraging ones.

  You’ll be amazed at how changing the way you talk to yourself will make a difference in your life. For a start, you’ll begin to enjoy your own company more. After all, who wants to spend time alone with someone who’s going to be mean or moan all the time? But more importantly, it starts to change how you actually feel about yourself. Having positive thoughts coursing through your mind can’t help but lift your spirits—and your attitude.

  And then, of course, the magic multiplying effect of this exercise starts to kick in. As you feel better about yourself, your perception of the world around you starts to shift, and your relationships start to improve miraculously. And this is just the beginning of the process. Please don’t take our word for this: try it out for yourself. The changes may be almost imperceptible at first, but they will accumulate. So much more good is yet to come.

  TIP: Write your message on a Post-it note and, if you feel comfortable to, stick it on your bathroom mirror. Otherwise keep it somewhere you’ll see it often to remind yourself that you are in the process of learning a vital, life-transforming new habit.

  I’ve found a great benefit in creating an internal intolerance toward self-criticism. Granted, it isn’t foolproof and is a work in progress, but it works more often than not. The second a negative thought even reaches the periphery of my mind, I try to banish it—kind of like Dr. Evil’s “Shhh” in the Austin Powers movies—humor really helps! If I were to let the thought develop, it might look like: “If only I looked like so-and-so” or “If only I was right for that job, but I’m not, so I’m just not going to try.” It doesn’t matter how big or small the thought: I let it go before it gets beyond “if.” For me, just the act of refusing to let a negative thought into my consciousness is liberating.

  I spent years doing the opposite and letting the negativity sit there and grow until it led to further self-deprecating thoughts and inaction. Suddenly I’d find that it was twenty minutes later, and I’d forgotten to wish my colleague happy birthday, follow up on something important, or sign up for a class or activity that would have been enjoyable or even life changing, because of self-obsessing and essentially self-harming.

  —GA

  One day my teenage son, who had exams fast approaching, came to me and said he felt ill. “Push through it,” I told him. “Just get one more hour in.” His face fell as he dragged himself back to his desk, and as he went, I realized I was passing on exactly the lesson I’d learned in childhood: “Don’t stop, ever. Even if you’re ill, you’ve got to keep working or you won’t amount to anything.”

  I’d carried that same message into my working life as a journalist, and it had eventually resulted in my burning out. And yet here I was all those years later—despite having worked on myself—passing on exactly the same harmful message to my son.

  I boiled the kettle, made him a mug of honey and hot lemon, and insisted he close his books and lie down on the sofa and relax instead. The relief and gratitude that swept across his poor, tired face reminded me that knowing how to be kind to himself w
ould carry him further in life than any uplift in his grades that the extra hour’s study might have given him.

  —JN

  Reflection

  Imagine how much happier we would be, how much freer to be our true individual selves, if we didn’t have the weight of gender expectations.

  —CHIMAMANDA NGOZI ADICHIE, Nigerian writer

  If I don’t take care of myself, I can start thinking I am only my job or someone’s wife or mother. Or I can think I am my body weight, my looks, or my brain. Before long, I’m telling myself I’m fat or lazy or dumb or hopeless.

  And then I remember the truth: that who I am is not dependent on any things I own, have, or do. That I exist beneath and beyond the facts of my life—that I’m a spiritual being on a human quest.

  Action. Today I will be kind to myself.

  Affirmation. This is who I am, and I feel glad to be me.

  Essential Practice 3

  RESPONSIBILITY: Taking Care of Ourselves

  When I was around eighteen, I looked in the mirror and said, “You’re either going to love yourself or hate yourself.” And I decided to love myself. That changed a lot of things.

  —QUEEN LATIFAH, rapper, actress, talk-show host

  As women, we often find it far easier to give love than to receive it. Culturally, we’re encouraged to be selfless, putting others’ needs before our own. It can feel more comfortable to love our friends, partners, and children than ourselves. Being kind to yourself can even feel indulgent, greedy, and selfish. But it isn’t. It’s vital.

  Our bodies need love just as much as our hearts and minds—and if they don’t get it, they often start filling the deficit by looking for it elsewhere. Perhaps in a partner who’s not good for us, in endless box sets, or tubs of Häagen-Dazs. Or maybe it’ll play out at work, where we crave a disproportionate amount of recognition, or online, as we develop a low-level shopping addiction.

  Ignoring our needs can become habitual. Sometimes we don’t even realize we’re doing it, and we may not even see it as a problem. Maybe we’re comfortable living small—or, at least, we tell ourselves we are. We may give ourselves just enough to get by so there are no crises, but we never actually reach our full potential.

  Some of us shove our wants and needs down deep inside so that we can be nice. Or maybe we call it being realistic. If we don’t “want,” we can’t be disappointed when we don’t “get,” our subconscious reasoning goes. But our needs are still there, gnawing away at us from beneath layers of self-protection. The problem is, we risk sabotaging the good that awaits us if we don’t attend to them.

  * * *

  Exercise: Befriend Yourself

  * * *

  This exercise will help you identify the things you may be missing in life.

  Have your journal handy. Then take five breaths in and out to center yourself. Now imagine that a close female friend—someone you really love—is having a tough time. You invite her to stay over for a few days, and to prepare for her arrival, you make a list of things you could do to make her feel loved and cared for. Perhaps you’ll run her a hot bubble bath at the end of each day to help her unwind. Maybe you’ll take her to a movie, or walk through the park to your favorite coffee shop. Or perhaps you’ll download a comedy that you know will make her laugh or create a special playlist for her to listen to.

  Make your own list—put at least ten things on it. Notice what happens to your energy as you write each item. Let yourself imagine how happy and cared for she’ll feel. Now circle the three things that you think would be most fun and uplifting for her to do.

  Okay, here’s your assignment: do those three things for yourself. Take out your diary and schedule them in. Notice any resistance—in particular the voice that tells you, “This is silly” or “You’re too busy/tired/broke.” From now on, you’re going to cherish yourself as you would someone you love deeply. If you’ve got time to do more than three, then go for it. And don’t forget to enjoy yourself—this exercise is about allowing yourself to have fun.

  * * *

  The list you’ve just made is a great resource. You can turn to it when the going gets tough. Add to it whenever you think of something else you’d enjoy, and use it whenever you feel needy or depleted. As a rule of thumb, schedule a minimum of one fun or nurturing experience every week. More if you’re able.

  As you do the work laid out in this book, one of your aims will be to treat yourself as if you were your own best friend. If you find yourself about to do something that might cause you harm, ask, “Would I do this to someone I love?” If you find you’re berating yourself for a mistake, ask, “Would I talk like this to someone I loved?” If you find your “comfort” through eating or by spending money you haven’t got, ask yourself, “Would I want someone I loved to do that to herself?” It takes time to establish new behaviors, but do your very best to be aware of and interrupt any negative habitual responses as often as you can.

  Don’t blame or shame yourself. Have compassion and use your list to come up with kinder ways of comforting yourself. Some may find this harder than others; some may even find it excruciating. But it’s really important that the love starts with you, and that you start embracing all aspects of yourself from here on out to the best of your ability. It may seem like a mountain to climb today, but we’re all in this together, and there will be hundreds if not thousands of women on the same path to extend a helping hand.

  Precious Vessels

  Caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare.

  —AUDRE LORDE (1934–1992), writer and feminist

  Our bodies house all that is vital to our existence, yet we judge them and abuse them, and allow others to as well. Eating disorders and rates of self-harm among women continue to escalate, and even those of us who stop short of obviously harmful behaviors often struggle with how we see ourselves.

  Billions of dollars are spent each year trying to convince us that our lives would be better if we changed the way we looked. We may think of ourselves as independent-minded feminists, but, on average, we spend more time and money on trying to look good than ever before. Even the women’s magazines that profess to elevate our independence and confidence frequently encourage us to compare and improve our bodies, boosting sales by stoking our fear that we’re not good enough as we are.

  It’s not surprising that so many of us struggle with how we see ourselves and, by extension, how we treat ourselves.

  Criticizing our physical form can also be a way of avoiding our real feelings. It can be easier to hate our bodies than to admit we’re feeling sad or lonely or let down. Plus, if we can blame our body for our situation, we have an element of control—and a scapegoat. Our subconscious thinking goes, “My body is to blame. And there’s something I can do about it: I can starve it or overexercise it or ignore it.”

  How we treat our bodies is an indicator of our emotional and spiritual state. If we’re not comfortable in our own skin, it means we have internal work to do and emotional wounds to heal. Our ultimate goal is to inhabit our bodies and selves with ease, joy, and grace.

  As a result of walking this path, we will come to see our bodies as unique and precious vessels rather than objects to criticize and compare. But for the Principles to work their magic, you first need to get some basics in place.

  Think of what happens to a toddler who doesn’t get enough food or sleep: tantrums. We may be older and more sophisticated, but our bodies have the same needs, and our emotions will be affected if those needs are not met.

  It can be humbling to discover that quite often when our emotions are out of control it’s not because of the complexity of the issues we’re facing but because we’ve been ignoring a simple physical need, such as keeping our blood sugar level steady.

  TIP: HALT is an acronym for:

  Hungry

  Angry

  Lonely

  Tired

  Used widely in twelve-step fellowsh
ips, these are free groups set up to help people in addiction or affected by it. (See page 46.) Whenever we’re hungry, angry, lonely, or tired, we’re in danger of our emotions getting out of control and tipping us off balance. So if you notice yourself feeling one or more of those four, HALT and attend to it, fast.

  The Four Essentials to Self-Care

  There are four essential areas that we often neglect or let slide when it comes to our physical well-being. If you want to get the benefit from all that WE’s Principles have to offer, commit to taking care of yourself in each of them in turn.

  Food

  It’s only human to want to be desired, and so most of us at some point cave in to the toxic messages of the beauty and diet industries and play with our intake of food. The extent to which we do this will depend upon our self-esteem, our conditioning, and how addictive our personality is.

  If you find it difficult to regulate your food intake, or if your weight tends to yo-yo, fuelling self-hatred, we recommend following an eating plan for the duration of this work.

  Structure and boundaries around what we consume free us up to think about more important things and keep us from exacerbating the natural highs and lows of our emotional and hormonal circuits.

  There’s nothing faddish about it; it’s boringly sensible, which is why it works. Three moderate-sized meals a day, eaten at regular intervals (between four to six hours apart), with one snack either midafternoon or before bed. If you’re not sure what moderate means, ask someone else to serve your portion, and make sure it contains protein, which sustains your energy and doesn’t give you the ups and downs that sugary foods and high-carbohydrate foods do.