Emotional woundedness and its chronic inflammation morph into contempt. From that contempt you adopt a stance, a “starting” posture – you make decisions based on it, and you become convinced that the splinter can’t be the underlying problem. It can’t be that simple. . . but it is! It’s the same for all humans. A loving person gets wounded, and from there has trouble seeing from the viewpoint of love. A filter develops; made out of contempt from the wounds that were experienced, and this way of seeing the world takes on normalcy, while the reality of the lenses is lost. Until one day perhaps someone says, “you have the capability of 20/20 vision, why are you wearing those glasses?”

Compassion for themselves and others just sort of emerges on its own as people are doing significant healing. By people who are healing, I don’t just mean people who are willing to open up to verbalize about their wounds, grief and emotional thoughts about themselves. I mean people who open their hearts and minds in earnest to actually make healing happen. The more love you have for yourself, the higher your self-esteem, and the more you want yourself to succeed in life, and your actions prove it. Simple behaviors in your life start to naturally shift towards the more self-beneficial as you generate more love for yourself.