I think your counselor is giving you excellent advice, Juditha. Self-love and self-acceptance are the basis for all that we have to offer others. Unless we value our own needs and meet them we will always feel incomplete.

I completely understand your need to be alone sometimes. I require a great deal of time alone to balance the work that I do which is done in a very busy, social setting.

Additionally, I find that most of society seems to come to terms with "reality' and doesn't really have much interest in "afterlife" topics. And even upon a family member's passing, many people prefer to simply go on as before. It triggers no urge to explore more deeply.

But I wouldn't be here on this board if I didn't feel a deeper need to know and understand. You are also a seeker, and it is sometimes easy to be distracted by the opinions of others. But these opinions are ultimately unimportant. Everyone who ever took a different path was misunderstood. It is the way of the world.

And there is no reason to resent it. It's just the way of the world. But we know something very important, that there are other ways.

What can be distracting is to hold oneself up as "different" from others. Often this can lead to "better" than others or "worse" than others. We are each unique. Our "preferred" qualities can be enhanced and made more active in our lives. Our disliked qualities can be useful as well, and can be transformed by our service to others.

There is no part of a human being that cannot be transformed by its own self-knowledge.  Take care.

love, blink