One of the strangest, and most regrettable, flaws that separates us from other animals is the ability to hate oneself.
A self-hating person not only dislikes themselves, they cannot get over their dislike. They remain tied to their hatred by the shortest of nooses. Every new day, we torment ourselves:
“If people knew who I really was, they would be horrified.”
“I’m sexually revolting.”
“They’re laughing at me in secret.”
“It’s only a matter of time before terrible things happen to me.”
“There is something fundamentally wrong with me.”
Such torment then leads to a tense spine, insomnia, malfunctioning bowels – self-hatred is the bitter fruit of an ingrained sense of what we should be like.
