Now by no means am I saying lock your children up and keep them isolated until they love themselves, however I do think encouraging our children and future children to nurture and affirm themselves ( my personal favourite is getting my younger cousins to repeat positive affirmations about themselves in the mirror). That somehow if I act this way they’ll like me, without even asking ourselves the most important question, do I like me ? The answer usually is yes, but our own validation is played down because receiving from others is seen as more valuable. The approval and validation from others is usually at the forefront of these early relationships however this can set us up to be reliant upon other people. That insatiable need can only be filled by ourselves & ourselves first. This reliance quickly merges into codependency & before you know it, you’re an anxious 20 something year old still seeking external approval. This early manipulation can become rooted and before we know it, we’re conditioned to believe we ‘need’ others & to get this ‘need’ met it’s about moulding ourselves to the expectations of others.

I now challenge this, and thank god ! As kids we learn to be a certain way because that’s what gets other people to like us, never mind what we like or who we are, but it is at this age we learn to contort ourselves into being what we think others want of us. This primal relationship with ourselves is the mirror and foundation for all the other relationships In our lives, yet we are taught having friends or external affirmation is the goal. Never are we taught to first befriend ourselves & be our own best friend / cheerleader & companion, the emphasis is always placed externally. It’s drummed into us that our worth & affirmation is always at the mercy of others. As children being in the school playground doing all we can to get noticed & tailoring our behaviour to be liked. From a young age we are socialised and conditioned to always seek externally for things, love, affirmation, friendship.

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