Doing fine

I'm doing fine, these days. I am picking less and less. I don't like where my mind goes when I pick. It's not possible for me to pick and to feel at peace. Picking puts me into a scrunched up, stressed out, aggressive kind of mind frame. I don't want anything to do with that. And better, when I don't pick, I see my skin heal, and it's nice. I want to have clear, smooth skin. I want to be healthy. Health starts from the inside out. Mind first, body next. Then environment, including people. Get your mind right and keep it right. That's important.

Being Kind to Yourself

Self-improvement never ends but it's best not to be too aggressive about it. It can become an obsession and a source of beating up on yourself just like anything else. I pick my skin less, now, but I still do pick, sometimes. I'd like not to, but I'd like not to in a way that's kind to me. Honestly, what I believe has helped me the most with picking less over the years is just that - trying to be kinder to myself. I never understood what it meant to love yourself before. It sounded stupid. I don't like it when people talk about what they "deserve," for instance. However, I think there are things that we do that make us feel good, and things we do that don't, and I'd rather feel good, if I have the choice. Recently I've been paying more attention to my feelings and giving myself permission to make decisions that protect my well-being. I've realized I am actually extremely sensitive to external stimuli, including people. It has been tough for me to let myself remove myself from situations and people that and who don't have a positive influence on me. I have it ingrained in me - be tough, life is struggle, sacrifice your own needs and feelings for the sake of other's. If you can't deal with a situation or a particular person - it's your fault. Figure it out. I've realized though that me approaching things in this way has had little benefit. I'm just not that kind of warrior. My battles are not outside; they are within. I've made a good deal of progress in the past several years in becoming more patient and calm. However, I'm still a LONG way from being able to stay or insert myself in an adverse situation and to be unaffected. And you know what? That's okay. I am who I am, and I can strive to be better and to do better, but today, this is where I'm at. Today, I am a person who, after a stressful day, with lots on her mind, sometimes ends up picking at the blackheads on her forehead and her nose and chin. Sometimes I even end up picking at bumps on my arms or my legs, though that is increasingly rare. It's okay. Doing these things does not make me a bad person, and though I may not have the self-control I wish I had with regards to this, I have self-control in other areas. Perhaps my self-control is being exhausted on other things! Perhaps what I really need is just to relax, to do things I enjoy. I am always learning. My skin may be deteriorating, my body may be getting old, but I'm learning.

Momentum

There's no stopping progress. Once your skin starts healing it feels and looks so good compared to how it used to that there's no way to go back. Trust me. I have made peace with my skin as it is. Thank God I'm still relatively young so my skin regenerates at a decent rate. Not like it did when I was a teenager, but it's fine. I do not want to waste a single additional moment of my life stressing out about my skin or the way I treat it. Letting this go is sweet freedom.

Good news, I'm over it

Well yes, basically the title says it all. It's been a few days now since I said - Ok, that's it - I'm done! And I really am done. My skin is healing. Face faster than limbs, but it's all a matter of time. I may have scars forever. I don't care. Scars, freckles, wrinkles, blackheads, pimples. I do not care. Skin is not perfect, not if you're alive, but take care of it and it'll do its job. I'll try to write another update in some days or weeks. Time to relax...

Who You Really Are

So, I say that if you're picking you're out of alignment with who you are. You are resisting or avoiding something. The key is to find out what. It may be many things! Over the past three years I've changed dramatically. I've been through experiences that have each highlighted aspects of my personality that were no longer serving me. Lacking self-confidence. Feeling conflicted about my spirituality. Needing external validation. Trying to meet other people's standards. Giving myself too much of a hard time. Not trusting my intuition. Being overly critical and argumentative. Avoiding conflict. Feeling uncomfortable in my body. My goodness. Coming to grips with all of these things has been exhausting! And I still have further to go; this process is ongoing. However, every day, with every realization I have and every change that I go through - I feel more and more like who I really am. It's like layers and layers of junk are getting cleared away. Whereas before I felt at peace sometimes, rarely, now it's more often, and soon I'm positive it will become my default mode.

Do It for Yourself

This is a hard post, because I feel we've almost been programmed to want to make other people happy. It's like our parents were so scared of us becoming selfish and self-absorbed that they pushed us too far to the other extreme. Of course the irony is that if you consciously neglect the self, it will assert its needs subconsciously, which can play out in all sorts of messed up ways, including manipulation. It is much, much better to be aware of your wants and to be open about them than to find yourself trying to get them in roundabout ways. Anyway, I digress. When I first wanted to stop picking, I thought it would be most effective to do it for someone else. A number of people I've known and have cared about have wanted me to stop. Trying to stop for any of them didn't work, though. The thing is, I believe the essential problem - the root of picking, what sustains the habit over years - is a lack of self-love. The only person you can and should do it for is yourself. Because it's what you want and need and because it's good for you - you'll stop. The benefits for anyone else are only secondary. Do it for you.

I Would Rather Be...

When I feel myself getting pulled towards picking, I say to myself: "I would rather be..." Reading. Cooking. Showering. Going for a walk.  (Fill in the blank). Hurting myself is pretty much the last thing I feel like doing. And that's the now. I can apply it to tomorrow, also. I would rather be well-rested and to be one day further along in the healing process, than to be dead-tired and to have to starting over from Day Zero (again).