Love Yourself!
Why is self-love so important? How much can it benefit me? What can I do? These are questions I rarely hear because it’s not brought up enough. Self-love is gaining appreciation for yourself through the physical, emotional, and spiritual support you provide yourself with. It can be a long journey to establish self-love, but it’s a crucial step to improve your mental health and overall happiness. If you truly love yourself or not, it will not only impact your character and views on life, but also impacts those around you.
Self-love is important because it opens more doors for you to give and receive love. It’s true when they say, “love yourself first”, the way you love yourself shows others how to love you. According to licensed marriage and family therapist John Kim, from Psychology Today, “Forming a healthy relationship with yourself that is full of care, understanding, compassion, and healthy boundaries will help you achieve that kind with yourself and others.”
The most important ingredient of self-love is just starting it. Throughout your journey of applying true love to yourself, listen to your inner coach, the positive self-talk, rather than your inner critic, the negative self-talk. Your inner critic will attempt to divert you from trying new things that can help you, so mute that voice and listen to your inner coach, the voice that’ll help you through your journey.
A way you can begin your journey to self-love is by forgiving yourself. Don’t be too hard on yourself, struggling for perfection has you overlooking the fact you’re only human. Although it looks like you are holding yourself accountable, too much self-deprecation can be harmful to your mental health. So instead of putting yourself down, learn to forgive yourself for the mistakes you have made and treat them as chances to grow.
Another effective way is applying good traits from other people to yourself. Do you have someone you like? A friend? Family members? Celebrity? Try thinking about why you like this person. Is the way they are always trustworthy? Optimistic? Kind? Now just adopt those traits for yourself so that way you will have reason to love yourself as you get better and better at it. Some people may hate themselves because of low self-esteem and the thought of feeling less than others. So, when we apply more positive traits we admire and love, the likeness of ourselves will increase a lot more, and give us reasons to love ourselves.
You can also start a self-care routine, what I consider the counterpart of self-love. A self-care routine is any combination of habits that help you feel calm, pleasant, and happy. These habits will look different to every person. For creative types, you feel happiest when you are inspired and free to create. You may also fill your self-care routine with artistic outlets and self-contained tranquility. Each routine is unique to your lifestyle, preferences, and your goals. It may take a lot of trial and error, but overtime you’ll find a routine personal for you.
In conclusion, love yourself. Everyone is talking about stopping drugs, skipping classes, ending fights, but it all comes down to self-love. If we all just start showing appreciation to ourselves, I can almost promise you will find that best friend you need, boy/girlfriend, that spot in varsity, and that A in the class you hate. Love all and love you.