My journey into self-examination actually began with Oprah. No, not just the show.
Oprah, herself.
I visited a taping of her show in Chicago before the show ended. After they filmed the television show which was Gayle King and Oprah traveling across the country, they filmed an extra segment for her radio show. During the segment, Oprah took questions from the audience.
My heart was beating a mile a minute and my stomach was in knots as I tried to get the nerves I needed to ask a question. When it felt like the questions were about to stop, my hand shot up in the air.
I was sitting right next to the stage and directly behind Ms. Winfrey’s chair. She swiveled in her chair to look me right in the eye. It felt like my brain left my body and I was on auto-pilot.
I asked, “I feel like I am good at giving advice to other people and seeing their issues, but I have a hard time seeing my own.”
Oprah answered me very bluntly, “Because you don’t want to.”
To be honest, I felt fire run through my body. It was a mixture of anger and embarrassment. I was very self-aware of the lights, the eyes on me and I felt stripped bare, even of my skin. I wanted to defend myself, but tears sprang from my eyes and slid down my cheeks.
Her voice softened and she said, “Why are you crying?”
I shook my head. I didn’t know why. But, something about thinking that I didn’t want to help myself hurt my feelings.
Oprah continued, “You have to want to be able to see your own problems. It’s not easy.” She told me I had to make a conscious effort to see it.
I sat down with the heavy realization that I didn’t want to see my own issues and she had seen right through me.
As the segment ended, Oprah thanked the audience and as she left the stage, she connected eyes with me. She put her hand over her heart and shot me a sympathetic look.
It’s a moment I will never forget, because of the Oprah of it all.
But, also because it jump-started my diving into the dark parts of myself and not being as afraid of what I find.
It does require me to be somewhat fearless. It’s like going into the basement that you have neglected for years and going through a bunch of stuff that you caged and buried down there.
Some of it is harmless, like finding an old teddy bear. But, others have teeth and are angry at being locked up in the dark while you were out living your life and pretending they don’t exist.
It starts with one word, Why?
When you find yourself doing something that you know is going to create a problem, you have to ask yourself, Why?
Why am I doing this?
Why am I doing it when I have witnessed proof that it causes problems?
If you find yourself blaming other people, repeat the process until you can only deal with your own motivations and intentions.
If you feel an, “I don’t know” or your finger is now pointing at yourself, the next question to ask is, “what?”
What am I trying to gain?
What am I trying to avoid?
What happened in my past that made me believe this behavior was acceptable?
What would I do differently if emotions weren’t fueling this situation?
What would I tell a friend in this situation?
The next step is:
Give Yourself Compassion
One would probably think the instinct would be to be nice to yourself, but it’s quite the opposite. Often, we are harder on ourselves than we are on others. We let them off the hook for mistakes that we beat up on ourselves for.
The next step is to clue into that voice and listen to it.
Are you judging you?
Is the voice abusive and is it possible that it’s a critical voice of other people instead of your own?
What would happen if you gave yourself the same compassion you give others?
Is being mean to yourself actually motivating you?
Can you allow yourself to look at everything you have been through and connect why you should stop being hard on yourself?
There is no final step in being introspective.
I view it as an onion with multi-layers. You have to be willing to keep pulling back each layer and examining what is beneath it. And, you start the process all over until you feel comfortable.
The goal of introspection is to interview yourself until you can become your best friend and your biggest cheerleader. It’s understanding all the ways you don’t support or betray yourself.
Because, when you stop judging and abandoning yourself, you develop a self-love that gives you inner peace because you stop needing people to change to make you feel better. You stop abandoning yourself for love on the outside.
And, you are able to stop chasing approval because you are self-approved.