My Own Worst Enemy

In many novels, it turns out a character's greatest enemy is themselves, where their self-loathing and self-defeating feelings are their own worst obstacle. In some examples, these characters sabotage themselves, whether due to a fear of the unknown, some kind of deep psychological issue, or just run of the mill feelings of inadequacy. In other cases, the character has a flaw regarding a lack of skill, motivation, or ability, which will keep them from ever achieving true victory. Regardless of the basis, when that spark of happiness, the moment of love or the light of hope is upon them, they will ruin it and maintain themselves in a state of misery without a foreseeable ending.

Whatever the case, wherever the person finds themselves, they won't ever reach true happiness, success or whatever else they achieve until they first reconcile with their inner conflicts.

It is effortless to be your own worst enemy, often seeming like a better idea, preparing ourselves for other the ideas and opinions of others, the obvious path. What we miss when we allow this to happen is understanding our thoughts, beliefs and perceptions are creating our life, regardless of whether we are aware of it or not. I often talk about how the car seems to get me to work and back without much effort on my part. That happens with our lives as well; we are on autopilot, not realizing the point is to understand we control the accelerator, can choose to steer and take the road less traveled.

Being our own worst enemy leaves us feeling lonely, stressed and miserable, that we don't deserve success, happiness or love. We spoil our chances of achieving those things. We identify with our thoughts, feelings or the roles we play in other people's lives. Despite these all being transitory, we focus on them and disregard who we really are: the person who is experiencing all of them. We identify with our thoughts and allow ourselves to become them, which causes us to be a very specific, particular, and potentially damaging reality of who we are.

Being your own best friend is about loving yourself enough to fix your life, to take responsibility for it, to be your own caretaker, your own confidante, your own source of fulfillment. This is no easy task, and we're conditioned against it by our consumer mentality of buying or experiencing external happiness being the key to genuine fulfillment.

Accepting ourselves as we are is literally and figuratively the only way to become more of what we want. It helps us differentiate the things we truly want as opposed to the things we expect to heal us. It provides a space to allow the natural evolution of our being rather than a perpetuating cycle of attempted control and failure.

We all eventually realize that our lives aren't going the way we want and that it's up to us to change them. It's nobody's job or responsibility to love or take care of us. Relying on that thought basically guarantee that at some point someone else will deny us love, and we will be stuck on a hole.

Recognizing we can be our own worst enemy and becoming our own best friend is what we all need to do; when we choose to do so is up to each of us. The solution to a lot of problems in life is learning to be happy and content on our own. When that happens, we can actually enjoy and be content with others as well.