For most of us comes a time after a breakup or divorce where we ask ourselves that one specific question, “Is there something wrong with me?”.
Unfortunately, this is one of the most destructive questions you could ask yourself.
If you decide to dwell upon this, then you are really damaging your self-esteem.
On top of this, we tend to look into our past for some more “evidence” that there really is something wrong with us. By doing THAT we start to take a really dangerous road.
For all of you out there who are suffering from a broken heart right now, I want to tell you this:
“There is NOTHING wrong with you!”
Period.
A few weeks ago I stumbled over an extraordinary book, which addresses this very topic. It’s called:
“There Is Nothing Wrong With You – Going Beyond Self-Hate” .
It’s written by Cheri Huber, a student and teacher of Zen for over 30 years. She is pretty famous for that subject as it turns out, and with good reason.
This book fascinated me the second I took it into my hands, because it looked so “weird” .
It uses a handwritten font and self-made graphics, but the more I read it, the more it made sense. It makes the whole book seem a lot more personal.
The book starts with a simple yet so powerful sentence:
“You have been taught
that there is something wrong with you
and that you are imperfect,
but there isn’t
and you’re not.”
This is so true.
We HAVE been told that there’s something wrong with us, intentionally or unintentionally. The first chapter explains in detail.
It’s called “Surviving Childhood: Establishing A Strong, Early Foundation for Self-Hate” and it really gave me something to think about. Haven't YOU heard one of the following from your parents:
“Don’t do that… Stop that… Put that down… Why don’t you ever listen… You shouldn’t feel that way… Will you ever learn… You should be ashamed of yourself… Are you ever going to get it… Just once, do something right… I had great hopes for you… You’ll do as you are told… You were born bad… What will the neighbours say… You’re trying to kill me… Eat it because children are starving…”
Shocking, isn’t it?
If you read my personal story, then you know I had plenty of those.
Now, I am a parent myself and I have to admit that I have also said one or two of those, (never the bad ones – I won’t repeat the mistakes of my father). Â It’s often an expression of frustration and helplessness, (if you have ever had to deal with two-year-olds, you’ll know what I mean).
But this is so wrong.
According to Cheri Huber, the average child learns to ignore it’s intuitive knowing to meet the needs of others, such as their parents. If the needs of these others aren’t met, the child grows up believing it is because they are bad.
This self-destructive thinking goes on until it leads to suffering in later years.
Society isn’t helping. Â On the contrary, it conditions the child to think in certain categories: beautiful, not beautiful, smart, not smart, fat, skinny, etc.
Society and parents want us to be perfect, and if we are not, we must feel bad and hate ourselves.
Must we?
Cheri Huber show us in her book that we must NOT be perfect, let alone hate ourselves if we aren’t.
She identifies Self-Hate with all it’s “Voices” and “Companions” , and shows a way out of our conditioning by shutting up those “voices” and retrieving our true self while developing unconditional love.
Retrieve our true self and develop unconditional love. That is basically the main goal in breakup recovery, (as I am teaching in my coachings).
Cheri introduces some ways to achieve that. She does that by using an old teaching technique.
Many problems that most people have are addressed by Cheri as a conversation between a “student” and his “guide” : The student asks and the guide answers. This way it is much easier to understand as the reader identifies with the student.
This is one of the best ways of teaching.
I can tell you that you will feel better after reading this little book. It teaches us the fundamental truth, a truth that many people out there must rediscover – especially after a breakup or divorce:
Your happiness lies within you, and does NOT come from your Ex.
This is something we have to remind ourselves of on a daily basis, because:
“Life is very short.
We do not have time to be frightened.
We do not have the luxury of allowing fear and hate to run our lives.”
Check it out: There Is Nothing Wrong With You.
Your friend,
Eddie Corbano
I have read the entire series of Cheri Huber’s books, starting with there’s is nothing wrong with you and they are amazing reading. It changed my life, as reading your excerpts on relationships, especially breaking up, are doing for me now. I have bought so many copies of the above book by Cheri, and given them to friends and family. It has changed many peoples lives. I thank you for your insights and instruction. So thankful you could put your experiences into words. Thank you again, Shelley Dunivan
Thank you Shelley.
Which other books from Cheri would you recommend, I’ve only read two so far and she wrote a bunch of them.
All of them, they are all connected. If you can find them, read them all. There is a workbook also. It is very basic, used to help people to get in touch with their feelings and find themselves. I am sooo enjoying reading what you’ve written, I’ve spent almost all day on it. I will be heading to the bookstore to grab up some copies soon. Thank you
Sorry to hear Carl. I had a similar experience about a month ago. My girlfriend had fallen out of love and moved out, following a difficult personal year for me. I immediately began no contact (very limited while she moved out and I crashed at a friend’s place). I got really drunk one night and logged into her Facebook, too – not a good idea. Call a friend instead. It will only make things worse for the two of you – you don’t need anything running through your mind when you see some random dude has posted on her wall or sent her an email.
I’m still on Facebook, but blocked her and every single one of her friends I could think of to resist any temptation. Detagged and deleted all the photos two weeks later. It’s so minor, but it’s very difficult. Feels a lot better now that it’s all been taken care of.
I’m also feeling better in general after only a month – get the tough moves out of the way now and you’ll thank yourself for it. Good luck and stay strong!
My pleasure to come across your blog and read it, keep posting.
True.
Somewhere I read an very insightful metaphor (I’m paraphrasing here):
“For a relationship to be really fulfilling both must be complete for themselves, two one-legged cannot walk together.”
Now this is super true!