My Happy Self

It was late in the evening, my wine bottle was empty, and I was lying on the tiled floor in a foetal position, sobbing my heart out. My whole body ached with the pain of emptiness and sorrow. I wasn’t sure how I was going to go on living. I hated my life, I hated my body and I felt like a total failure. I also felt so alone, like I had no-one to turn to. Most of us grow up being teased about our differences, feeling pressured by parents, peer groups and social media ‘norms’. We are surrounded by other people’s definition of beauty, success and perfection. As a result, we feel like no matter how hard we try, we never seem to measure up, leading to insecurity and low self-esteem. This reflects in different areas of our lives, such as broken relationships, fake friendships and an unhealthy lifestyle. But what if I was to tell you that there is a simple process to build your self-esteem? Imagine having the resilience to face life’s challenges and setbacks with confidence, to build healthier relationships with others without the need to seek validation, to have the motivation and determination to achieve your goals, and to feel a greater sense of well-being with less anxiety, depression and loneliness. In this book, I will explain where negative self-beliefs stem from, why we tend to hang on to them and how they can be changed into more empowering beliefs. I am going to show you how to build your self-esteem by learning to love yourself for who you are and for what you have achieved. I will walk you through each of the 7 steps, until you have mastered everything necessary in the art of self-love. You see, on that night, many years ago, I realised that I had to become my own rescuer, no-one could do it for me. I had to take responsibility for creating the path that led to where I was. Blaming other people and unfortunate events was not going to help me improve my situation. I wanted to learn how to get out of my pit of despair and turn my life around. Learning how to love myself was such an eye-opening experience, and it became my dream to share this knowledge with others who also wanted to bring about transformational change in their life. Using my experience as a training designer and a life coach, I have written this book to include lots of clarifying explanations, thought provoking questions and engaging activities to help you learn more about who you are and why you deserve to love yourself. If you allow it, this book has the power to transform your life too. But be prepared, the 7-step process is simple but not necessarily easy. Creating changes on a conscious and subconscious level can be challenging and may even be confronting. But together we will work through each step and if you stick with it, the results will be well worth it. Enjoy your journey!