I don’t understand why self-love is a taboo topic.
While we admire confident people, we tend to belittle those who genuinely love themselves.
Yet, self-love is one of the greatest powers we can use to live a happy and fulfilled life full of joy.
If you don’t love yourself, why would others do?
If you don’t make time for yourself, why would others do?
Loving yourself doesn’t mean being selfish. On the contrary: Self-love is not an emotion but constant work.
It’s tough, and it requires a vast amount of honesty, but it’s totally worth it.
We all make mistakes, and while forgiving those who hurt us is hard, forgiving ourselves for significant mistakes is even more difficult.
Many people spend their lives feeling miserable because they can’t forgive themselves for mistakes they made years or even decades ago.
Self-love can look different for anyone. While I might appreciate taking some time off and reading a good book, it might be a different activity that you prefer.
Yet, at the end of the day, it comes down to the same thing:
Appreciating ourselves for who we are now while still working on becoming an even better version of ourselves in the future.
Loving yourself means accepting yourself, including your past. We all make mistakes, and we all have regrets, but there’s no reason to carry those mistakes with us until the end of our lives.
Life is much more fun once we accept our faults and start appreciating ourselves for who we are.
“You’re always with yourself, so you might as well enjoy the company.” — Diane Von Furstenberg
I believe this quote entirely sums up why we should care about self-love and even teach it to children at school.
Everyone except you can leave you.
You are the only person with whom you’ll spend your entire life. So, it makes sense to get along well with yourself, right?
When choosing the right partner, we go for someone who makes us feel good, appreciated, and worthy, so why not treat ourselves that way every single day of our lives?
Most people never achieve their goals or even live in misery because they don’t work on their self-worth. Instead of appreciating themselves, they keep tearing themselves down and expect to receive love from others.
Most of the time, it’s you standing in your way. So, get off the damn road and stop standing in the way of your dreams by blaming yourself for mistakes that happened in the past.
“Self-love is not selfish; you cannot truly love another until you know how to love yourself.”
Most people confuse self-love with egoism. The truth, however, is that not loving yourself is egoistic.
If you can’t love yourself, you won’t be able to spread love to others.
Those who fail to accept themselves often also fail to run healthy relationships.
If you lack to trust yourself, you will also fail to trust someone else. It’s easy as that.
Finding peace and love within yourself, however, is the first step in establishing productive, nurturing relationships with those who surround you.
We all know the following saying:
“You can’t pour from an empty cup.”
You can’t give to others if you are poor yourself. Neither money nor love. The more you nourish your own wellbeing, and the more you take care of yourself, the easier it will be to support and love others.
“Put yourself at the top of your to-do list every single day and the rest will fall into place.”
Once you start investing in your own wellbeing, you’ll see how many things in your life will fall into its place and start working out for you.
Yet, you need to make the first step. You need to start making time for yourself and investing energy (which might also include money) into your prosperity.
“Your relationship with yourself sets the tone for every other relationship you have.” — Robert Holden
I’ve spent the first two years of my current relationship fighting a lot with my boyfriend.
Looking back, I know what the problem was: I didn’t love myself. As a result, I couldn’t believe he’d love me and never leave me. Guess what happened? A lot of fights because I misunderstood him as I always saw the negative.
Once I practiced self-reflection and learned to love myself, not only my relationship with myself but also the one with my boyfriend tremendously changed. Now, I entirely believe in his love and trust him. I trust in myself, and I know that I will never leave myself, so I have nothing to fear.
It wasn’t easy, and it took many months of personal growth, but it was worth it. Without working on myself, I might have miserably failed to keep a healthy relationship with my boy.
As soon as I learned to trust and love myself, I also managed to love my boy fearlessly.
“If you aren’t good at loving yourself, you will have a difficult time loving anyone, since you’ll resent the time and energy you give another person that you aren’t even giving to yourself.” — Barbare de Angelis
“The more you love yourself, the less nonsense you’ll tolerate.”
For me, self-love also means self-respect.
The moment you start appreciating yourself, you won’t deal with the bullshit of others anymore. You’ll walk your way and do what feels right instead of worrying about what others might say or think.
Too often, our insecurities hit, and we start tolerating things that we actually don’t want. We say yes instead of no and let others mistreat ourselves. Mostly, that’s a sign of a lack of self-worth.
Here’s what Eleanor Roosevelt once stated:
“No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.”
I love this quote. It reminds me of the fact that I am the only one responsible for my life. Whatever happens to me, does so because I allow it.
Nobody can enter your life without your consent, and nobody can hurt you without your agreement as long as you love yourself.
“If you’re searching for that one person that will change your life, take a look in the mirror.”
One of our greatest mistakes in life is that we put our happiness into the hands of others. We believe we need someone special to come over and transform our lives. Yet, the reality is different.
The reality is that you are the master of your life. And only you can transform your life for the good and the bad.
You can be your greatest cheerleader, your best friend, or your own enemy. It’s up to you, and every day, you choose your mood and the way you treat yourself.
Each day, we decide whether we act in an inspiring, uplifting way or if we chose to feel pity for ourselves.
“In order to love who you are, you cannot hate the experiences that shaped you.” — Andrea Dykstra
This is actually one of the things many people get wrong about self-love and appreciating yourself.
You don’t need to change to love yourself.
You need to start appreciating who you are right now.
Self-love doesn’t happen when you’re perfect. Hell no!
Nobody is perfect, and nobody will ever be. It’s about appreciating yourself despite all your weaknesses and mistakes.
Stop living in the past, forgive yourself, and focus on creating the future of your dreams.
Life is not about who you’ve been or what you’ve done; it’s about who you can become.
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