Day 3 of self-love February:

Self love has been a hot topic in the social media world – with body positivity and the emergence of body neutrality.

Herein lies the problem:

All too often, loving yourself is tied to n external something. It can be your body shape and what you look like, your job, your income, the car you drive, the last vacation you went on, the success of your children, etc.

You will never, ever be happy – or love yourself – if this is what you are basing your worth on. You need to understand that you are worthy of love now, just as you are.

So how do you get to that point?

I can tell you, it’s not easy. It takes a lot of soul searching and self-evaluation.

One good way is to have a look at your reactions. How do you react when something goes wrong or someone says something or something happens against your expectations. If you have a strong viceral reaction, chances are, you have tied up your identity and happiness to that event – and so long as that is, you’ll never truly be happy or achieve self-love.

For instance, if you’re looking for outside validation with your looks, and someone says something negative, you might get incredibly defensive. You are tying their opinion of you to your happiness and loving yourself. Whether or not they think you’re attractive, you are still worthy of love and respect NOW. And remember, SELF love and SELF respect are far more important than from some random stranger on social media.

Plenty of people would call me fat. Yeah? And? I feel sorry for you if that’s how you choose to see me and others. I know my worth – and it is not tied into my looks. I am working on my health and wellness so that “insult” you sling at me? Inconsequential.

See where I went with that example? Anything that relies on another person’s perception is not a good way to measure self love.

Ask yourself this: would you go to that person (leaving a mean comment) for advice? Then don’t care about their opinion. Most people don’t even like themselves.

Whether it’s your current job – did you get passed up for promotion because someone can’t see your value? Their loss! Maybe put your feelers out there for new employment! Or your child didn’t get into the university they wanted – or maybe they chose not to go to college/university – are they happy and healthy? Then good job!!

Self love is exactly that; SELF love! Not “I’ll-only-love-myself-if-I-achieve-XYZ-based-on-someone-elses-widely-subjective-opinion”

Even if you can’t easily identify where it is you struggle with self love, don’t worry –  as we work through the month, there will be plenty of opportunity of more self-evaluation.

Or if you know where you struggle or your list is long and you don’t know where to begin, just hang tight, give yourself patience, and show some kindness to yourself.