Standing Up for Myself, Against Myself

A personal reflection on emotional intensity, shame, and slowly learning to trust myself and have my own back.

Original artwork by me — Mea Jordaan. 🌞 Free yourself.

The way I used to feel

I used to feel completely powerless, hopeless, apathetic… sometimes I still get that way, but these days it's less often.

I'll be the first to say that it's a pretty awful way to feel. During this time I numbed myself constantly by withdrawing into myself and my thoughts.

I don't think the people around me really understood how bad it was, because it was so difficult for me to open up and share my emotions. My throat would close up as soon as I would try to express the pain that I was feeling.

I can't say that I thought this was normal, but I also didn't understand anything else. I had no point of reference for what it's really like to be totally and fully seen by others, and to be accepted and feel safe for it. It has taken me a long time to learn how to have my own back — and that's what this is really about.

Coming to terms with my intensity

I'm an intense person. I have deep, intense feelings. That means that the way I experience emotions is dialled up to full volume. Or sometimes down to zero, maybe one.

My experience is one of extremes. It takes me time to process certain things. Sometimes that looks like I'm not feeling it, but it just takes a while for whatever it is to settle in.

Other times, I am flooded with emotions — sometimes, often times, contrasting emotions. That can be tremendously confusing.

How I process this within my body isn't fixed. It changes from day to day, and sometimes throughout the day.

Feeling these extreme emotions and managing them is a full time job for me. It's part of my biology, it's not a mindset thing. Where mindset does come in is around my awareness of what's going on within my frame of reference at any moment.

Managing sensations without shame

It is super easy for me to feel overwhelmed, especially with sensory overload. Small things have the potential to feel very big to me, which can lead me to extreme thoughts. Again, biology, not mindset. I cannot change that this body operates in this way.

What I can change is how I think about myself, how I speak to myself, how I act to care for myself, and generally how I "handle" myself. I have to remind myself that this is simply how I'm built, and just ride it out. Judging myself for being the way I am doesn't get me anywhere good — it only leads to shame, and shame is one of the most crippling emotions we can carry with us.

Shame is a wound so very many of us hold, blaming ourselves for what happened to us beyond our control in times when we were vulnerable.

I used to feel chronically ashamed. I still struggle with it at times, but I also do my best to treat myself and others with equal kindness.

Kindness over niceness

I think that's a major learning point for a lot of us — learning how to express kindness towards ourselves and not just others. I've noticed a tendency to equate self-sacrificing behaviour with kindness, or being "nice". But being kind to another shouldn't mean being unkind towards yourself — that just doesn't make sense.

And if someone expects that of you, I would beg you to carefully examine that relationship, and ask yourself if you need that in your life.

In a world where most of us are doing our best to survive, it's important to be able to spot when you're being played for a fool. There are people out there who take advantage of the goodwill and vulnerability of those they see they can manipulate.

I've had to learn to love and trust myself enough to be able to firstly hear, but also to really listen to my intuition.

Trusting myself and my intuition

I have listened to enough Real Survival Stories to know that your intuition speaks to you in critical moments, and to ignore it leads to literal disaster. If you ever get that feeling that tells you not to go ahead with something, you should listen to it without question. I am not talking about self doubt, I'm talking about sudden, distinct knowing. You will get a clear signal, a very bad feeling about what's to come, and I beg you to listen to it.

Of course now I'm talking about the extreme, but our intuition is always available to us. I've been consciously making the effort to grow my relationship with my intuition, to really learn how to trust myself and my gut. I think that learning to respect this aspect of myself has helped me to gain confidence in my decisions and just in myself generally.

Meeting myself honestly

It's amazing what having your own back can do for your relationship with yourself, but also with others.

How I do this day-to-day comes down to honouring my limits but also being disciplined and really staying accountable to myself. It doesn't do me any good to "push through" when I lack energy or specific capacity on a day, but it's up to me to discern between "can't" and "don't feel like it." I strive for kindness and honesty towards myself.

Being dishonest with myself is not kind — it's the opposite. There are very few instances where lying to yourself is a good thing.

It's tough when you feel trapped. I think we probably all know the feeling of being forced to perform because we feel we have no choice, whatever the context may be. I know also that my intensity plays a role in this, and I really have to be mindful of that.

When I'm stricken with self-doubt, it can feel like my whole life is a sham. In those moments it's incredibly challenging for me to "talk myself down". Words really don't help me in these times. I have to ride the wave of the emotion and remind myself not to make decisions while I'm in it. What also doesn't help is berating myself for what I feel. The feelings come from somewhere, some time and place where I felt threatened and unsafe. What does help me is being kind to myself by acknowledging what I'm feeling and that I am allowed to feel it. To suppress my feelings traps them within me, and it only worsens the situation for myself.

What people decided about me

I've had multiple situations in my life where I get torn into for something that I had no awareness of, no intention of doing, or simply for being myself. This is really damaging to a kid. It taught me that at any moment I could suddenly be verbally assaulted and accused for just being. Intentions that weren't mine could be attached to me and used to hurt me, to tell me what a bad person I am.

I'll share one example: when I was about 9 or 10 I did gymnastics once a week. In one class, I stumbled on the mat and fell against another girl. The instructor accused me of bullying the other kid, even though I literally apologised immediately and it was obvious that I had fallen over and not shoved her intentionally. What I learned is that people will believe what they want to believe. She didn't like me and found reasons to believe the worst. What I did had no impact. In her eyes I couldn't be trusted.

What I internalised was that message that I couldn't be trusted, and it was reinforced throughout my childhood. At some point I bought into it, and started acting that way. I don't think it would have played out the same if I had been shown compassion instead of suspicion.

Choosing my building blocks

Part of my solution is to practice actively choosing what's important to me and staying true to those choices. That means taking care of my health both physically and mentally (as they really are inseparable), and nourishing my spirit as much as possible.

Staying connected with community, nature and creativity are non-negotiable for me, and I would argue are necessary for anyone to be a happy and healthy human.

When you consciously connect with these aspects and nourish them, you'll likely find that you end up with a lot more purpose in your life. I have suffered from a lack of purpose, as most of us do at some time or another, and I know well the aimlessness that accompanies it. There is always some itch to scratch, but you can't tell what it is, so you end up doing something familiar but ultimately distracting, like watching random videos or doomscrolling.

Simple actions like making sure that I go outside after I wake up, drinking water before I have more coffee, and going to bed on time, end up compounding in unexpected and delightful ways. These aren't just rules that I impose on myself, they're building blocks of inner peace and harmony.

If your day is going terribly, take a minute to reflect, with kind honesty, on what you've been building that day. Have you prioritised obligations without giving yourself any thought or consideration? Have you stuffed yourself full of stimulants and stress without taking the time to care for your actual needs? Have you given your wellbeing any consideration other than being stuck in survival mode where everything feels like an emergency?

It's important for us to show ourselves that we matter and are worth taking care of. Yes, we all have obligations and life gets challenging and complicated for all of us at one time or another. But when you're a free adult — barring genuinely coercive circumstances outside your control — then it is very much up to you and only you to advocate for your own wellbeing. Few others are willing to do it for you.

The real trick is standing up for yourself against yourself. This can be super challenging, I know. If you take a long hard and honest look at how you treat yourself, I'll bet, especially if you've grown up conditioned as a woman, that you find countless ways to discount yourself. So often I don't even realise that I'm doing this, which is part of why staying aware of my internal landscape is so important to me.

I am here to advocate on behalf of yourself, to yourself. You are worthy of love. You are worthy of compassion, kindness, happiness and peace. You are worthy of the life that you dream of. You don't need to prove your worth, you are inherently worthy because you exist. You are allowed boundaries, even with yourself. It's not on you to make people feel comfortable. You don't have to manage feelings other than your own. The only opinion that matters is yours, and it's the only one worth caring about.

You can't control what other people think and feel, and attempting to do so usually leads to your own suffering. Your own thoughts and feelings, and how you respond to them are the only things that matter. This is literally what you use daily to construct your reality. You have the option to choose your building blocks, or you can be buried beneath someone else's.

I dare you to do one thing only for yourself. Something that really truly speaks to your soul and lights your inner fire. Commit to it, be disciplined and patient. A little consistency goes a long way. Don't give up when it gets tough — embrace the challenge and notice just how much more satisfying and gratifying something is when you earn it through your own will and determination.