How Cultivating Self-Love Supports Social Justice

posted by Elizabeth Scott / December 16, 2020

The practice of turning towards our critical voice with curiosity and kindness is the foundation of social justice work. Why? If we can become aware of how our aggression towards ourselves comes from allowing our fears to motivate our actions, we can choose to kindly nourish the parts of ourselves that are afraid. This allows us the freedom to choose self-care instead of self-harm. It works the same way in larger social spheres… when we can own our own fears and learn to process them with self-awareness and love, we can free ourselves from projecting them unconsciously onto others in the form of racism, homophobia, transphobia, and other forms of discrimination.

Cultivating Self-Love is a two-part process: focusing on expanding our experience of love in our own bodies and then turning towards our fearful parts with kindness.

We can practice drawing our fears close, like a frightened child, pressing them to our chest and allowing our solid loving heart to transform them into confidence, ease, and calm. This is a warrior’s path, it takes bravery and practice but it brings great freedom and peace to transform fear into care for ourselves and each other.  

I invite you to listen to my latest podcast here in which I discuss the links between white privilege and eating disorders. I talk about how I see white privilege contributing to disruptions in embodiment in my clinical practice. I encourage you to listen to it while paying attention to the ways that you have privilege. Even if you inhabit some marginalized identities it is likely that there are ways you are also privileged in this society. Perhaps you are able bodied or have U.S. citizenship or practice a dominant religion, etc.

I have found it useful to explore the impact of my privileged identities on my body experience in order to come to understand the dynamics of privilege more deeply.

I am interested in the ways I have learned to defend my privileges and validate my opportunities, and the ways that I deaden myself to the suffering of others. Recognizing the ways that participating in systems of inequality (as we all do by just living in this society) causes suffering in my life and proliferates suffering for others helps me to open up my heart and connect with others. It breaks down the isolation of privilege.

This self-awareness is what offers freedom to make change. For example, in the small ways that I talk about in the podcast, and in bigger ways, like joining in the movement for Black Lives Matter and supporting wonderful organizations like M4BLM. There is so much joy and freedom in strengthening our hearts and caring for each other. 

May your heart grow stronger through all of the changes you endure. If you need support and want to discuss these ideas more deeply, please visit my website to connect. I welcome your inquiries. Visit The Body Positive Institute for additional resources to enhance your self-love practice.

Warmly,

Elizabeth Scott

Elizabeth Scott LCSW, CEDS-S, is Co-Founder and Director of Training for The Body Positive. She has been practicing psychotherapy for more than two decades in Marin County, CA. She studies Vipassana Meditation, a practical, embodied approach to awakening, which she finds to be an inexhaustible resource for finding joy and purpose in life.

Elizabeth Scott

Elizabeth Scott LCSW, CEDS-S, is Co-Founder and Director of Training for The Body Positive. She has been practicing psychotherapy for more than two decades in Marin County, CA. She studies Vipassana Meditation, a practical, embodied approach to awakening, which she finds to be an inexhaustible resource for finding joy and purpose in life.