I concealed myself from exposing my deepest fears and anxieties, trying so hard to please others and meet the expectations of those around me. I wanted to break out of this cycle so badly. And in order to do so, I had to do the single most painful and demanding thing I had ever done, that is to learn to accept and love myself for all that I am. "Maria, you need to love yourself." I replied with, "okay and so how?" Some will just say, "I don't know. It's your own life. You figure it out." Since then, I had been struggling with that. I do not know how to love myself. I do not know what self-love is, I do not know why it is important and I do not know how to achieve it. I did not talk from the age of two to four. I started to talk only from the age of five. I began my pre-school education only at the age of six when kids my age would have completed their two years of pre-school education.In primary two, I got hit by a basketball during a Physical Education lesson. From then on my front tooth broke and grew back in the same colour as the ball I did pay a visit to the school dentist but he had no idea why it turned out that way. A couple of years later, I started to develop myopia and had to wear spectacles. Kids in school asked me questions like why was my spectacles so round and big and I looked funny. Then, the most humiliating incident in upper primary, I urinated and soiled myself. I still got ridiculed and teased because of my yellowish tooth and big round spectacles as I progressed to secondary school life. 'The Nerd', 'The Blur', The 'Gigi Kuning' (Yellow Tooth) were some of the name calling I got back then.I became an attention seeker as no one cared what I did. Nobody wanted to know if I was a top reader or joined the Singing Competition. Because in their eyes, I am not pretty. I am just a random ugly girl. Few years after leaving secondary school, I started to really fall in love with a guy when I was only 20 years old. Turned out he was toying with my feelings. I guessed as much. My working life was hell too. My work life at a previous company was a disaster. I felt that majority did not like me. They were not pleased with me. I was somehow invisible to them. From then on I formed this self-limiting belief that I can never be loved and I am not worthy to be loved.Flash forward, I met my soulmate, my husband. We had been married for six years now. The marriage made me reflect upon my journey thus far. Truth is, marriage is not easy. It comes with plenty of highs and has a fair share of lows too. I have met people who rarely knew me as a person yet questioned the decisions I have made in my life.I have also been made to feel guilty, ashamed and less worthy of a woman because I do not have children. And this has greatly affected me for a long while. For the first few years of marriage, I struggled to make myself happy and ignored those sarcasms and harsh remarks. I was often asked intrusive questions as to the reasons as to why I have not conceived yet, by well-meaning people. It was like scratching a deep wound in my soul that was on its way to healing slowly, cell by cell, and such heart breaking questions just made the wound rise back again. At times, I could not take it and I cried. I felt like a failure as a woman who cannot give children to my husband. In addition, my stress at work piled up too making my emotional turmoil more difficult to manage. All these emotional roller coaster rides changed in the year 2017, when I crossed path with this Earth Angel who touched the lives of women like me. An amazing lady who not only mentored my entrepreneurship journey but my spiritual journey as well. I aspire to be just like her, touching the lives of women with low self esteem. That is why I enrolled in one of her online course - FLY Train the Trainer. FLY or First Love Yourself Train The Trainer is an online self-development course.
