There will come a time when people would put you down. People would judge you. Those who hardly know you. And those whom you thought knew you well. You will look for comfort but you will find none. You will wander the streets weeping but not a friend will be in sight.

Never let yourself down. Take heart, for no matter how awful the accusations against you are, you are still a child of God.

This is the time when your love for yourself will be tested. Whether you will believe what others say about you, or whether you will stand your ground because you know yourself best.

Take comfort knowing that you are never alone. God still believes in you, you know. God loves you and sees in you the person everybody else failed to see.

Don't fail to see that person. Never let yourself down.

© Jocelyn Soriano for I Take Off The MASK!, 2008. | Permalink | 7 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: believe in yourself, confidence, love yourself, never let yourself down, relationships, self esteem, stand your ground

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Loving Yourself Through God's Eyes

There are times when no matter how hard we try, we feel unable to love ourselves. In such times, we feel its so much easier to love other people. After all, they're not with us 24 hours in a day We don't see all their weaknesses. We don't have to live with their regrets. And we're not the ones who have to carry their hurts.

In such times, we feel overwhelmed. We don't have enough strength to accept this person we see in the mirror everyday.

We don't have enough love to love her. We don't have enough strength to uplift her when she couldn't believe in herself anymore.

During such times, I've known of a way to help you continue improving your relationship with yourself. And that way is to see yourself through God's own eyes.

In God's eyes, there is no judgment, there is only acceptance. In God's eyes, there is no pain too hard to bear nor weaknesses too weak to be overcome by His insurmountable strength.

God can embrace us wholeheartedly, opening us up yet sustaining us and healing us at the same time. God sees all our potentials. God sees our light when all that we can see are our shadows.

God sees this person who falls but who has the power to get up again and again. God sees this person who gets hurt but does not become hard or bitter, only softer, more resilient to change.

God sees you. God cherishes you. God's eyes love you more than anyone could ever love you as you really are.

© Jocelyn Soriano for I Take Off The MASK!, 2008. | Permalink | 4 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: confidence, love yourself, loving yourself through God's eyes, relationships, Strength

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Separating Our Mistakes from Our Self Image

Sometimes its so easy not to separate our behavior from our image of ourselves, to separate the sin from the sinner, so they say.

When we make blunders, we feel we're failures. When we have broken relationships, we feel we are broken too and worthless.

However, if we truly desire to improve our relationship with ourselves, we must learn to practice acknowledging our errors without eroding our overall belief in our worth.

So you failed in your exams, does it mean you haven't learned anything? So you weren't accepted for a job, does it mean no employer would later on trust you and consider you a valuable asset to his company?

Things like those happen. Things change. What should remain intact is our respect and love for ourselves, our belief that we are God's children and no matter how many mistakes we make along the way of growing up, we are still destined for Grace and eternal Joy!

© Jocelyn Soriano for I Take Off The MASK!, 2008. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: love the sinner hate the sin, relationships, self confidence, self esteem, separating mistake from self-image

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DIET AND LOVING YOURSELF

It's my third day of being conscious of the way I treat myself. I overslept a little but noticed a good effect of sleep in my skin. I also chose the best towel today when I washed my face.

Today I've noticed how our diets are greatly related to our relationship with ourselves.

For instance, imagine for a moment being in charge of the food of your loved ones. Will you be happy if your loved ones almost starve themselves to death and deprive themselves of food that they enjoy? On the other hand, would you rather that they overeat and eat foods that will make them obese and kill them later on due to high blood pressure or diabetes? Of course not!

You'd want them to eat healthy foods and observe discipline in their diets. At the same time, you'd want them to enjoy their favorite foods once in a while – crabs, chocolate, pasta, fried and grilled foods.

The same should be the way we treat ourselves. The key to loving yourself is BALANCE.

© Jocelyn Soriano for I Take Off The MASK!, 2008. | Permalink | 2 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: diet, diet and loving yourself, love yourself, nutrition, relationships

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LOVING YOURSELF

I've noticed that the quality of my relationships improved in proportion to the improvement of my relationship to myself. Indeed, it has drastically increased throughout these years. Even the quality of my suitors improved! :-)

I guess that's one of our main problems, or should I say, the source of many of our problems and frustrations. The inability to love ourselves enough. And more often than not, whenever we fail to do so, we play the blame game with everyone. We blame our boyfriends, we blame our best friends, we blame our parents, we blame the country, we even blame our dog! And that blame game would certainly lead us nowhere. It certainly wouldn't lead us to better relationships with other people.

I have just browsed over the book, “If Love is a Game, These Are the Rules.” It spoke of the same thing. That if we expect to be loved, if we expect to be special, we should learn to love ourselves first and treat ourselves as special. People respond only to how we treat ourselves. If we believe we are not important, guess how they would treat us?

The book also mentioned that treating ourselves special is a habit that has to be formed, and habits are usually formed by repetition, usually in a matter of 21 days.

Today I begin that day. I've been more conscious on the way I treat myself, even in small things. For instance, I usually don't mind the heat of the sun damaging my skin and drying my hair. Now I've used an umbrella and protected myself, the way I wish my boyfriend would have done so if he were here. I also treated myself to good lunch, bought make-up that I liked and even chose the best seat in a cafe. Hmm... was not as easy as I thought. But practice makes perfect they say. And how could we expect others to do these things for us when we couldn't care doing it for ourselves?

I guess I just have to carry on for the next 20 days. If you think you could also benefit from this, why don't you begin today as well? :-)

© Jocelyn Soriano for I Take Off The MASK!, 2008. | Permalink | 2 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: love, loving oneself, loving yourself, relationships, self improvement, Self-Development, taking care of yourself

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Not being meant for each other doesn't mean that one has become less, but that there are greater options that can still be worked out.

To turn down a person is not to judge him, but to believe that there is yet another who is truly meant for him and for you.

© Jocelyn Soriano for I Take Off The MASK!, 2008. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: breaking up, love, not meant for each other, relationships

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