Loving Yourself- A Guide To Self Love.

 

 Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash

 

We often use the term, "Self-love", but how many of you are aware of the meaning of this term? Most of us know that loving yourself is the first step towards happiness. But still, we always make some mistakes, and we regret them later on. In initial stages, those mistakes feel like they are small and negligible, but deep down, it decreases our importance for us. Sounds familiar? One sweet text from someone who is ignoring us from days, we give up our self-respect, and we rush to help that person. It is not like helping someone is bad, but helping someone with the cost of our self-respect is a bad thing, and we need to work on that. 
The first step in this is to love yourself and sometimes think about yourself first and then the next person. Before jotting down some points regarding how can you start this journey, let me give you some additional information. Let's go.

 

Importance of Self Love

I belong from a family where girls are expected to think about others before themselves. In this scenario, I never came across the concept of self-love. So, when eventually, I grew up and learnt about self-love, my first reaction was, "How are we supposed to love yourselves?" Because I always thought there must be someone else who should love us.

 

With due course of time, I learnt that this is not always needed that someone else should be there to love you or value you. To be loved, you need to love yourself.

 

What happens if you don't know the value of self-love in your life?

·        You fall in the trap of perfectionism, and you will always try to please everyone. But keep in mind that you can never please everyone in my life. There will always be one person that will try to find flaws in you. You need to accept yourself, find the best and embrace yourself.

 

·        You may accept every blame and accusations without speaking any of it. When you do not raise your voice, you lose every inch of self-respect slowly and steadily.

 

·        When you don't know to love yourself, you will neglect your needs in order to fulfil someone else's.

 

·        In order to please others, you may end up in taking decisions which are not your choices. You eventually sacrifice everything slowly, in a fear that if you fail to please this person and the needs of that person, you might lose that person forever.

 

I made you aware of most of the issues that can emerge if anyone doesn't practice, self-love. Let us work on the solutions now. I need you to make a promise to yourself that you will implement these things in your daily life if you want to see some positive results. Because only scrolling and reading the solutions won't help. Before I introduce you to some tips, pat yourself at the back and say that you are unique, easy right?

Take a deep breath, and here are some tips that will help you practising self-love every day:

 

1.      Start your day with a blissful and joyous thought, which is good enough to hook you through your day and whenever you feel like now you are losing yourself remember this thought again so, that you won't ever run out of positive energy.

 

2.      Spend quality time with yourself. Now it's obvious you deserve a special date, pick any place which is of your interest. You may pamper yourself with a spa day, or you can grab a cup of coffee and choose a beautiful book. It solely depends upon you; you can customize your date; however, you feel.

 

3.      Choose people who encourage you. Don't make the mistake of going back to such persons who have always underestimated you. Instead of that, make new friends who can encourage you and remind you of your accomplishments. You deserve better!

 

4.      Don't compare. You are particular, everyone is impressive and unique in their own way. When you compare yourself with someone else, you are losing yourself in a way because no one in this land is like you! You have your qualities which distinguishes you from everyone.

 

5.      Say no to those toxic relationships. We all have been there, an unhealthy relationship. Now, by relationship is not always meant to be your boyfriend or girlfriend, the person can be anyone, your friend, boss or colleague. Well anyone who makes you feel like you are less impressive, what is that person doing in your life?

 

6.      Recognize your accomplishments Doesn't matter how small and big your wins are, you must reward yourself. Be proud of yourself.

 

7.      Explore the world. Well, there are a lot of things in the world. Try those things, learn a new skill and explore places every day. Maybe you will find something in which you gain mastery.

 

8.      Value others as well. Now self-love doesn't mean that you need to ignore everyone. If you hope and expect that everyone treats you with love and respect, you must pay the same behaviour back to them as well.

 

9.      Denying is not a crime. If someone asks you for an offer or an outing, you have all rights to say no, as I mentioned earlier that you could not please everyone in your life. Sometimes you have to look out for yourself as well. But deny politely, so that the emotions of other person does not get hurt.

 

10.  Keep a journal. It is an old way, to write down things, but trust me it is the best way. Jot it down, doesn't matter, how crazy, wrong or mean the item or thought is. Writing things will help you to process those thoughts.

 

At the end of the day, calm yourself and take a minute to think about how was your relationship with yourself? Most of the people term self-love as a selfish feeling, let me tell you sometimes it is important to be selfish some times. Looking after yourself allows you to explore a whole new world and to embrace that. Accept who you are and leave the thought, who you are not. Remember, YOU ARE A STAR!!