Ilana Estelle is a mental health and wellbeing advocate who combines educational insight with her personal experience of living with physical, mental, and emotional disabilities.
She holds diplomas in Counselling, Diet and Nutrition, Nutritional Therapy, Psychotherapy and Counselling, and Stress Management. Through her writing, Ilana supports others in navigating their emotional, mental, and physical health challenges.
In addition to writing for The CP Diary, her work has appeared in healthy lifestyle magazines.
Ilana is also the author of three books: Cerebral Palsy: A Story – Finding the Calm After the Storm, Spirituality, Healing and Me, and Survival: The Covid Years – Time for Change.
Something inspirational: “Think wrongly, if you please, but in all cases think for yourself.” DORIS LESSING Thinking for yourself means more than having your own opinions. It means owning your words, your choices, and ...
Something inspirational: "We are not what happened to us. We are what we choose to become.” JAMES HOLLIS "I am drawn to James Hollis's words: 'We are not what happened to us. We are what we choose ...
Something inspirational: "Healing begins when we can hold our own experience with compassion." TARA BRACH Brach's quote reminds us that healing begins when we meet our pain with kindness instead of judgement ...
Yes, we have to accept ourselves to know ourselves so we can change what we want to change. We may look at ourselves and decide we like what we see and not want to change.
Thanks Lisa. I agree with you on both points. I would just extend that by saying that if I may be saying that if we like what we see there would be no need for us to change.
Sometimes though what we see isn't how others may perceive us and it's that which may cause problems.
Accepting myself as I am has been such a very hard thing to do!
I've always felt less than human, after the way I was treated as a child so I didn't develop a very good sense of self. My parents never seemed to accept me as I was which didn't make things any easier.
I've learned that just because I have to accept something, doesn't mean I have to like it which is a good thing. I'm still trying to get used to looking at myself as more than nothing, so I'm slowly getting there!
I completely understand your first sentence Randy. With nothing but the wrong input from both of your parents, it would be easy to see why accepting yourself has been so hard for you.
I'm glad you're slowly getting there with the way you see yourself now. From my own upbringing I remember being neutral about how I saw myself, although I wasn't keen on looking at myself with CP. It took me until I got in my 30's to really appreciate myself and how I saw myself. I like what I see now.
That part often comes with age and a desire to move beyond the flaws of what we see.
Yes, we have to accept ourselves to know ourselves so we can change what we want to change. We may look at ourselves and decide we like what we see and not want to change.
Thanks Lisa. I agree with you on both points. I would just extend that by saying that if I may be saying that if we like what we see there would be no need for us to change.
Sometimes though what we see isn't how others may perceive us and it's that which may cause problems.
Accepting myself as I am has been such a very hard thing to do!
I've always felt less than human, after the way I was treated as a child so I didn't develop a very good sense of self. My parents never seemed to accept me as I was which didn't make things any easier.
I've learned that just because I have to accept something, doesn't mean I have to like it which is a good thing. I'm still trying to get used to looking at myself as more than nothing, so I'm slowly getting there!
I completely understand your first sentence Randy. With nothing but the wrong input from both of your parents, it would be easy to see why accepting yourself has been so hard for you.
I'm glad you're slowly getting there with the way you see yourself now. From my own upbringing I remember being neutral about how I saw myself, although I wasn't keen on looking at myself with CP. It took me until I got in my 30's to really appreciate myself and how I saw myself. I like what I see now.
That part often comes with age and a desire to move beyond the flaws of what we see.
Great saying and I guess the first step to change is accepting ourselves.
Yes you're absolutely right. We cannot expect to change anything else in our lives if we don't learn to accept ourselves first.