The What, Why, and How of Self-Love

Think back to a time where you had a thousand things on your plate, all happening together, converging in on you.  A time when you thought you were prioritizing what needed to be prioritized.  It might have gone a little something like this: 

You’ve agreed to help your neighbor move her couch, you said you’d make dinner for your family, you are 7 loads behind on laundry, you haven’t showered yet today, and forgot to eat lunch because you were busy vacuuming.  You missed 3 calls from your sister, so you call her back and after a 90-minute conversation, it’s 11:47 pm, and you meant to go to bed an hour ago, but still have to eat dinner.  Sound familiar?  

I bet you’ve probably had days like this, where everything on your agenda for the day is about anything but yourself.  But, let me guess, you don’t have time to give yourself a break, right?  Wrong.  Here’s a healthy reminder that running yourself ragged until you reach burnout and prioritizing everything but the kitchen sink is not healthy.  

What is healthy is prioritizing yourself and your own health.  And no, that isn’t a selfish thing to do.  After reading this post, you’ll be inspired because you’ll learn about self-love and how to practice it which will allow you to prioritize your inner health and wellbeing, even when life is crazy.

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What is Self-Love?

You’ve definitely heard of the importance of self-care.  It’s kind of a buzzword in our society.  But self-care is actually different from self-love.  

Picture this: You ran yourself a hot, bubbly bath, you’ve allowed yourself 5 minutes of quiet time, or maybe you’ve journaled a bit before bed.  These are all self-care actions, and they allow you to take care of your physical and mental health.  

Self-love is bigger than just self-care.  Yes, caring for yourself is absolutely part of it, but self-love goes a little deeper.  It’s about being gentle and understanding with yourself.  Treating yourself kindly, talking to yourself the way you would talk to a loved one.  Allowing yourself to care for yourself, and also be cared for by others when you need it.  

| Related Reading: 31 Incredible Techniques for Maintaining Inner Peace

Genuinely loving yourself means understanding who you are, loving, and being patient with that person.  It means being gentle with yourself when you mess up, when you’re feeling down, or tired, and allowing yourself to feel whatever you’re feeling.  It’s about not beating yourself up for things.  

Self-love is simply what it sounds like- loving yourself for who you are and treating your inner self well.

Now, I know that I have a tendency to overthink the future and in turn, I spend lots of time planning.  Admittedly, maybe even over-plan.  Here, self-love to me is learning to appreciate that girl who turns her gears ’til the cows come home creating a crazy detailed life plan and seeing it as a strength, rather than labeling myself as a worrier. 

Why Love Myself?

You’ve seen those quote graphics on social media that promote self-love.  They’re out there gaining momentum because we’re feeling the toll the world takes on us and we’re making strides to remedy that.  

So why practice self-love?  Simply because life is hard!  It can so easily get you down, but if you’re in the habit of practicing self-love, you’ll be equipped to prioritize your mental health and avoid the tornado of overwhelm when life gets crazy.  

You deserve to allow enough space in your life for self-love.  I’m over here happy to remind you that you’re worthy of that.  Your inner health and wellbeing are just as important as other responsibilities.  

You might be saying, “Okay, self-love sounds great, but I literally just don’t have time.”  I hear you!  But self-love doesn’t have to be this huge investment of your precious time.  It can be a mindset that you weave into your world.  You’re deserving of that mindset. Trust me!

Here’s why:  You’re the only person on earth that is YOU.  Nobody can do you better, and you have specific talents and strengths to offer that the world could benefit from.  Only you have the experience and perspective that your life has given you.  That makes you incredibly unique and special.  

That unique and special person you are can’t possibly shine through if you’re bogged down with all the things of life, right?  Now, I’m not suggesting you run away from all responsibility and move to Mexico to live a care-free life.  

I’m suggesting you allow space and time to put yourself first for your own mental health so you can better handle what life throws at you and show up authentically and be present for those you love.

Application Time

I’ve made it a habit of reminding myself to be gentle with myself.  I found a cute little graphic with the quote, “Be gentle with yourself.  You are doing the best you can.”  I posted this quote all over my home and workspace, and what a difference this phrase has made for me!  It’s transformed how I respond when I make a mistake at work, or at home like when I royally screwed up my slow cooker dinner recipe beyond repair (note to self: resist the urge to always dump all ingredients into the slow cooker at the beginning, I’m still learning).

Self-Love: A How-To

Loving yourself so that you can prioritize your inner health and well-being looks different for everyone.

Even though there’s some wiggle room with how to self-love, the core is about engaging in actions and an attitude of gentleness with yourself, and giving yourself the grace you give to others.

How-to if you are NEW to self-love: establishing the mindset is key.  It might look like beginning to be mindful of how you treat yourself, and starting to take it easy on yourself.  This could just be a small, intentional mindset shift.  It could start with your self-talk.

If you’re a newbie, another good place to start is being gentle with how hard you are on yourself throughout the day as you move through all the things you have to do.

Another way to start loving yourself and making your inner health and wellbeing a priority is to start saying “no” to things that will overwhelm you.  Learning how to only take on what you can handle is a form of self-love.

Or, if you’ve already implemented a self-love mindset and you want to continue on in your self-love journey: self-love might manifest itself in more self-care activities. You can set aside time to renew your mind and body.

This might look like eating whole foods, moving your body through exercise, meditating, getting outside to breathe in some fresh air, journaling, getting out of the house, spending quality time with a loved one, listening to your favorite music, taking a nap, or any other activity that takes care of your physical or mental health in some way.

(I read the book Woman Code by Alisa Vitti and it helped me understand how engaging in self-love activities like the ones above allow us to live in this certain special “flow” where we can experience life through a vitality mindset.  I highly recommend this for book for aaaaaany woman!  It’s so enlightening.)

Story Time

Thanks to my trusty eye doctor, I have a heated eye mask I do once a day for 15 minutes.  I have turned this recommendation from my doctor into a self-love ritual!  For those 15 minutes each evening, I lay down with my lilac colored, gel bead eye mask and relax my muscles from my toes to the top of my head.  I work my way through my body, physically relaxing it as I use the quiet time to either reflect on my day, pray, or listen to a guided meditation.  When I feel too lazy to start this ritual by popping the mask in the microwave, I remind myself that I’m worth it and deserving of these peaceful 15 minutes!  Yay self-love!

Bonus if you relax on My favorite hammock! I swear this thing is so relaxing.  It feels like I’m treating myself right when I allot a few moments on this hammock after a long day!  Double yay for self-love!

Let’s Bring it Home

You are uniquely you, beautiful and perfect, so you deserve to be gentle, understanding, and gracious with yourself by implementing a self-love mindset and self-care actions so that you can genuinely prioritize your inner health and wellbeing.  The good thing is that you’re in the right place for prioritizing YOU!  This entire website is devoted to helping you thrive.  You can get encouragement sent straight to your inbox here.

Go for it, get that extra encouragement!  You deserve it!

And to help you get started loving yourself, read more tips here.

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