Life has no inherent meaning.
We are the ones that bring meaning to our lives.
We are not just our identification with our jobs,
or what we look like, or our bodies.
We're so much more than that.
We are not our birth certificates.
We are not the identities our parents have put on us.
We are individual, beautiful,
powerful, magical, creative beings.
We just have to find our power again.
And for me, the primary thing that will change that is self love.
We really, really are our own worst critics
and quite cruel and mean to ourselves.
We start to question ourselves, doubt ourselves.
I think that was me. I hit a point in my life
where I couldn't go on any further.
It was really quite painful.
I had to come up against a lot of
self criticism and judgement.
It felt like a dark night of the soul.
The most dreadful thing in life for me ever
has been those few times when I was younger
when I was not friends with myself,
which then means you're in solitary confinement.
For at least 80 years, you are stuck with yourself
and that relationship needs to work.
There is a fairytale which Hans Andersen wrote
about the ugly ducklings.
When I was younger, I used a lot of time
thinking about what others might be thinking of me.
And I saw myself as the ugly duckling among my friends.
And it took such a long time
to find myself
and to look in my eyes and say, 'You are good enough.'
The process of accepting oneself
is a normal process which starts by itself
inside of your soul when you are ready for it.
It's a process, and it's a beautiful one.
There's always more to be discovered.
There's always more layers.
Each time I revisit a part of myself
I have a different relationship
with that tricky aspect.
It doesn't mean there's a part of myself
that isn't still critical.
It just means when that part shows up
I know how to handle it,
I know how to have a dialogue with it.
I just want to be who I am...
a real man, not a fake man.
A real man is a man who
stands up for who he is
and accepts himself for who he is.
And most of all, I think a real man is a man who
understands himself.
The more that we can embrace
and bring back into the home of our heart to be loved
the more whole we are,
the more we can just be ourselves.
Just learning to accept yourself the way you are
and let yourself express
no matter what that's going to look like.
And to not care, to not give a damn...
to do it anyway.
We are all a bit touched.
And it's about how much courage
or the lack of fear that you have
with allowing the more exotic elements of yourself
to display themselves
or whether you have a terror of that.
One wishes everyone could express themselves
more freely and without fear of censor
or needing others to OK everything you do.
Trying to become what other people think I should be
is not who I am.
That's not the greatest gift that I can give to the world.
The greatest gift that I can give to the world
is to be 100% authentic Laura.
Now that may mean that
that comes with some messiness sometimes,
some tears, some joy, some fieriness.
But that is the gift that I am.
Our authentic creative expression is so unique to us
that if you don't learn or find a way
to express your uniqueness
that will never be seen in the world.
It will never be expressed.
And it will die with you, unexpressed.
Because it can only come through you
in your own special way.
I am aware that I just need to live my life in a way
that its really clear to other people around me
what I believe in.
I believe in connecting with human beings
and trying to love each and every person
as much as I can.
If we want to live an open hearted,
loving, compassionate life
then those doors of your heart
have to be opened up again.
Otherwise we're isolated and alone.
When you start to belong to yourself,
to your own heart and your own life,
then you start to have compassion for others.
It enables me to love the people around me
more deeply, in a more real way.
I don't feel like an ugly duckling today.
I am extremely happy to finally say,
'Jan Terje, you are who you are
and you are good enough.'
Throughout my life I've realised
that the very, very best me that I can be
is just who I am.
I cannot be a better Laura
than to just be my essential self.
We have to learn to love ourselves.
We have to learn to be really, really good to ourselves.
We need a revolution.
And the revolution needs to start from our own self worth.
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