Journey to Wholeness

The Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams is a children’s story about a rabbit that wants to be Real. I, too, wanted to be Real. I wanted to be whole. To be whole is to be Real. Like the velveteen rabbit who was a stuffed bunny, I was “stuffed” with social conditioning, scuffed around the edges, lacking wholeness. Like the velveteen rabbit, I had “no control” over who I had become, because I lacked awareness of what I had to do to set myself free (so I could become Real: authentic, whole, and happy).

If you, too, are wondering what you can do to set yourself free, please read on…I had been “programmed,” “conditioned” to be the way I was by my social group (without my awareness), whether it was by the group which constituted my family, society, school, or work environment.

It is my conviction, as both scientist and human being, that the group in whose context we generally find ourselves (our “everyday group”) becomes the group whose standards we use as our own (our “reference group”) if we lack self-Love (lack wholeness). By contrast, if we genuinely love ourselves—love ourselves unconditionally—are already whole—we do not betray our hearts, betray ourselves, to win social acceptance from the group. So, we remain true to ourselves: authentic, whole, happy, and free. Yet when we lack self-love, we conform to the group to win acceptance, because we don’t have our own acceptance, so we can feel complete within ourselves.

However, because this acceptance comes from outside ourselves, instead of being cultivated from within, it is conditional instead of unconditional acceptance. It resembles an ebbing tide: Sometimes it comes in and sometimes it goes out, so we are left hungry, feeling unloved, incomplete, broken.

What we really want is love that stays with us. What we really want is unconditional love, which is cultivated from within by making the non-social our reference group. When we make the non-social our reference group (which we do by making it our everyday group, we are staking our sense of self on the unchanging, so we become aware of our identity-less-ness and experience unconditional acceptance, which I propose is “internalized” into unconditional self-acceptance (self-love) through long-term contact with the non-social. (I introduce these ground-breaking ideas as Socialization Theory in my book Towards a General Theory of Social Psychology [Treynor, 2009], which is founded on social psychology research).

I thought I was Real, but I wasn’t, because I was still “stuffed” with others’ social values and conditioning. My self-approval was contingent on social approval, and it was exhausting.

Because I didn't love or know myself, I let others’ opinions determine my own opinions and actions—including my own self-opinion. Because they didn’t value me, I didn’t value myself. If they accepted me, I felt joy. If they rejected me, I felt sad. My emotional well-being was hopelessly dependent on their opinions of me and therefore my emotions were a rollercoaster. In retrospect, I now understand that if I had unconditionally loved myself, my emotional well-being would have been independent of my social group, and I would have felt whole and been Real, enjoying smooth sailing, emotionally, almost all the time. (In my keynotes, seminars, workshops, and one-on-one sessions, I teach people how to love themselves so they can feel the Love and Joy that they are again— so they, too, can enjoy smooth sailing, emotionally, almost all the time by being whole, authentic, happy: Real.)

In the past, I had betrayed my heart so many times to “fit in” with my social group; other times, I was often unable to “fit in” to my social group no matter how hard I tried.

Consequently, my identity (my sense of who I was) and values were “stuffed” into me. Unfortunately, my “stuffed” values included how I valued myself: My overwhelming sense of defectiveness and feelings of self-hatred were “stuffed” into me by the social group: I could not meet the standards of my reference group no matter how hard I tried to meet them, so I was shamed and rejected for being as I am and therefore came to view myself as shameful and defective, leading to my depression and feelings of suicide (These are aspects of my cancer story, which I share in my upcoming I Can Heal book series and A Treasure Map to Happiness and Why People Can Be Happy Making You Unhappy & How You Can Be Happy keynotes and seminars, which I offer for meetings, conventions, and conferences). I had been “stuffed” with self-hatred and shame. By contrast, if I had been “stuffed” with love and acceptance— by being a member of a social group with standards that I could meet—I would have felt happy and whole! Like the velveteen rabbit, I longed to be happy, to be free, to be whole—I longed to be free of stuffing: to become Real, but I didn’t know how to do it. What was the trick?

To become Real, whole, we have to navigate ourselves into an unconditionally loving social environment or become our own (Treynor, 2009). By immersing ourselves in an unconditionally loving social context, we come to internalize this unconditional acceptance into self-acceptance or self-love, reclaiming our wholeness (Treynor, 2009), becoming Real. If we cannot find an unconditionally loving social context, we become our own. Practically speaking, I have found that this translates into taking breaks throughout the day to meditate, whether that mediation takes the form of yoga, contemplative walking in nature, or seated meditation. I propose that through long-term contact with the non-social (making it your everyday group) the non-social becomes your reference group (the group whose standards you use as your own), and you experience “identityless-ness” and unconditional love for yourself (Treynor, 2009).

The non-social became my reference group, through my daily morning practice of yoga and meditation, and in my walking breaks throughout the day, which I took every 3 hours during the work day: I walked (a) before my workday began at 9:00 am, (b) at my 12:00 pm lunch break, and (c) at 4:00 pm, when I combined my two 15 minute breaks into one 30 -minute break. In this way, I became the peaceful center of my reality, and the bustling world around me faded off into the distance, emotionally speaking, as I acquired self-love and became authentic, whole, happy, and free—as I became Real.

Like the velveteen rabbit, I had been “stuffed,” but with ideas, values, and an identity that was not my own, but which instead, had been created by my social group: I had been stuffed with others’ conditioning and fears, carrying wounds in my being. Like the velveteen rabbit, I was shabby; I had been “beaten up” and “frayed at the edges.”

Unlike the velveteen rabbit, however, I was shabby not from being loved too much, but from being loved too little. As a result of this lack of love, I didn’t love myself. Equally true, however, is the reverse: I was shabby because I loved too little… and as a result of this lack of love in my life, I didn’t feel loved. Unconditional love is unconditional love is unconditional love, whether it is for the self or others. My conviction: Our body makes no distinction between the unconditional love we feel for ourselves versus unconditional love we feel for others, which is why loving the self unconditionally (self-love) translates into loving others unconditionally, and conversely, why loving others unconditionally translates into feeling unconditional love for ourselves!

When we let our unconditional love flow, we are whole: We become connected with All That Is. Not only are we whole, we feel whole: Our life feels meaningful, miraculous, magical! We feel free because we are free: Love frees us so that we are no longer a prisoner of our own wounds and conflicts. We are complete, we are Real, having been released into wholeness through the amazing power of unconditional love.

Copyright 2015 by Wendy Treynor. All rights reserved.