Learn to Love Yourself

Learning to love yourself is not an easy task - tell me about it. As I reach my 50th year it has taken me a long time to appreciate and accept myself fully for who I am. In all honesty, I would say the love I have for myself has only happened in the last decade. Like most we seek love from outside of ourselves, thinking that those external to us will provide us with all what we need. When in fact it provides us with the opposite of what we are longing for.

We hear it all the time: “Love yourself!” We hear how loving ourselves is the most important, most beneficial thing we can do. But what we sometimes don’t hear, or fail to understand, is how. What is self-love? What does it mean to practice it? How do we begin to do so?

Self-love is having a relationship with yourself that has compassion, kindness, patience, tolerance, and curiosity. It does not mean that you are so nice to yourself that you never take accountability or responsibility for the decisions and the choices you make.

Self-love is about giving yourself grace and forgiveness when you inevitably make mistakes. It is about believing in yourself and trusting yourself and your intentions.

One of the best ways to grow your self-love is to be able to self-advocate. In standing firm in and expressing your needs, providing yourself with care and respect. Setting boundaries with yourself and others is a great way to communicate and strive for your needs.

Loving yourself will bring you self-confidence, self-worth, and in general, you will feel more positive. If you can learn to love yourself, you will feel happier and will learn to take better care of yourself. Accepting yourself fully for being you allows you to befriend yourself and to deepen your relationship with yourself.

For me I needed to learn to like myself first before learning to love myself. But if I knew how good loving yourself felt; I would have embraced myself earlier in my life.

I have learned that the relationship you have with yourself is the only life-long relationship you will have and that self-love is the most significant and meaningful love affair you will ever have in your lifetime.

Below I have shared my Top 5 Tips to help you befriend yourself and then in turn love yourself.

Top 5 Tips for Self-Love

1) START each day with telling yourself something positive.
2) STOP the comparisons to others
3) CELEBRATE all wins - no matter how big or small
4) EMBRACE yourself - just as you are
5) NURTURE the relationship with yourself

Do this every day not just on Valentine’s Day and I promise, you will have a deeper, richer and more balanced relationship with the most important person in your life - YOU.

With love
Gillian x