So if I were to ask you how you love yourself, what would you say?
Do you even have an answer to that question?
OK so let me try something a bit easier…how do you love your (pick one or two) spouse, significant other, children, parents, pets, friends?
I bet that time you had an answer. So as I shine the spotlight on the answer to how you love yourself and there is nothing or very little there, my next question is how do you think that impacts your life and your self worth? Because many times when we seek feelings of worthiness we look outside of ourselves. And the truth is we will never see it outside of ourselves if we do not see it first within.
And when we are able to go within to get what we need for ourselves, our neediness around how we expect others to behave gets reduced! And that makes life easier for you and it will also improve your relationships with those you love.
When it is no longer their responsibility to make you feel good about yourself, when you have learned how to love yourself, then you can really begin to have a fulfilling relationship full of love, laughter, fun and anything else that had been shadowed by neediness.
So how do we get there?
Well it’s a process like all things, and sometimes an uncomfortable one because many of us are not used to loving ourselves. Often we equate self love with ego driven stuff but to love ourselves serves to expand our capacity to love others. It’s a deep subject with many facets and not enough space to cover in a blog post, however I would like to make some suggestions.
Pay attention to the way you talk to yourself!! When you make a mistake do you berate yourself and put yourself down? What kinds of things do you say to yourself? I suggest you really spend some time over the next few days investigating this. You may be surprised at how awfully you speak to yourself.
Ask yourself if what you are saying to yourself is something you would say to someone you love.
Another actions step I invite you to take is to pick a day in the near future and pledge to treat yourself the way you would treat the person you love most in the world. No excuses. No talking yourself out of deserving that. It is just ONE day. Try it on for size. See what changes.
Wake up and smile at your reflection in the mirror in the same way you are happy to see your loved one. Tell yourself it’s OK if you make a mistake. Remind yourself of some things you really enjoy about yourself. Heck go out and buy yourself a small gift. Just cause!!!
It’s a good point to remember that if you are unable to fully love yourself you will never be able to accept truly being loved by another person.
Something so grand and ultimately empowering in our lives will not change overnight. But with awareness and perseverance and support you can change the way you feel about yourself, the way you feel on a daily basis, and in your relationships. To get this type of support and to take a deeper dive into how to love yourself stay tuned for details for my upcoming class on How To Throw Out Your Head Trash beginning October 14, 2015.
Would love to hear your thoughts in the comments below!
