“I hate myself.”
“I don’t know who I am anymore.”
My private coaching clients make these confessions more than anything else. They easily give unconditional love and acceptance to other people in their lives. But they don’t give it to themselves.
They are their own worst critic. They beat themselves up for all their flaws.
This lack of self-love is one of the biggest contributors to a lack of confidence and fulfillment in their lives. It hurts their relationships and holds them back in their businesses. It also robs them of joy.
In February, we celebrate Valentine’s Day. We do special things for our sweeties and our children.
Many women now even celebrate Galentines’s Day – a new, previously-fictional-but-successfully-marketed-so-it-became-real holiday where women celebrate the other women in their lives.
And these are great ideas. In all these activities, we tend to focus on our love for others. But you can’t give what you don’t have.
You can’t successfully teach your children to love themselves if you haven’t figured that out for yourself. You can’t honestly see the good in others when you can’t see it in yourself. And you can’t fully teach your clients to embrace the abundance in their lives if you can’t see the abundance that’s inside you.
So this month, as you look for ways to express your love for other people in your life, I’d encourage you to also focus on loving yourself.
Here are five ways to love yourself.
1) Banish negative self-talk.
Are your thoughts an endless stream of vicious statements that you’d never say to anyone else? Do you constantly remind yourself of all the ways you don’t measure up?
Take these thoughts captive. Replace them with kind, loving thoughts. Remind yourself of your victories and successes instead. Focus on your positive character traits.
2) Go on a date with yourself.
Many people dislike spending time alone, especially in public. That inner critic screams loud and clear: “Loser!” You imagine other people judging you in the same way.
Decide, for one evening, that you won’t care what anyone thinks – even yourself. Do something for yourself that you’ve wanted to do but kept putting off.
See the movie. Visit the museum. Try the new restaurant. Be your own Valentine, because you are special and you deserve it. You don’t need anyone else to validate your worth.
3) Write a love letter to yourself.
No doubt you’ve written a letter to someone in your life, extolling their virtues and telling them how wonderful you think they are.
Do that for yourself this month. Write down at least thirty things you love about yourself.
It may be hard at first. Your first ten or twenty items may be superficial. But the more you list, the deeper and more significant the details will be.
4) Give yourself unconditional love.
There are people in your life whom you love despite their flaws. Even when they hurt and disappoint you, you love them.
Give yourself the same gift. Love yourself despite your flaws, your failures, and your disappointments.
5) Forgive yourself.
Forgiving yourself is the key to unconditional love, and one of the most powerful ways to love yourself.
Accept your mistakes as part of your growth process. Gently thank each one for the lessons it taught you. Then release its hold on your self-worth. Your mistakes do not define you.
Love others as you love yourself.
I’m sure you’ve heard this phrase before. And it’s easy to focus on the loving others part.
But we often forget about what’s implied in that statement – that you must love yourself first.
Maybe it’s because loving ourselves seems selfish.
Maybe it’s because we’re conditioned to put ourselves down.
But finding ways to love yourself pays dividends in your life and your business. It fills your cup with love and confidence that overflows to everyone else around you, and to every endeavor you undertake.
Like putting on your oxygen mask first in case of an airplane emergency, loving yourself is crucial to a joyful, successful, and fulfilling life and business.
