The deepest principle in human nature is the craving to be appreciated
William James
Humans are social animals. We crave for acceptance and appreciation from our fellow beings; partners , friends, colleagues and family. But we often miss out on the fact that no amount of affection and appreciation from others will be enough if you do not love yourself. We tend to be less than satisfied with ourselves most of the times. Social media has made this easier; you see a not so bright old friend doing great in their life now, all of a sudden you start questioning your life choices. How much ever these emotions seem juvenile they actually effect your entire day. For some may be even days!
Self-Love, Self-Care, Self-appreciation might sound selfish and at times narcissistic. That is how much our cultures and religions made the word ‘self’ an evil. you are always supposed to be giving, kind and altruistic all the times. But how can a person only give! Being kind and charitable are good things but thinking that these things alone can make you happy is a grave mistake. Yes, For sure these will bring you great appreciation from people around you but if you get used to such appreciation you will always crave for it and think it is the only way to feel accepted. Learning to love and appreciate oneself will help you in being strong and confident.
Many people mistake Self appreciation for narcissism and self love for selfishness. Such people make you feel bad for taking care of yourself not because they are mis-informed but because they cannot stand seeing you get confident. STAY AWAY from such people.
What is the Need for Self-Love
1. You are your harshest critic. So we tend to slowly build avoidant personality in order to protect ourselves from failure. Fully accepting yourselves will help you take up new opportunities without fearing and completely avoiding them in the first place.
2. On the other hand people have a mis-conception that loving yourself and accepting who you are will lead to complacency, but in reality, Self-love and self-acceptance will fortify your confidence and the ability to believe in yourself.
3. Being our own harshest critic, we tend to seek validation from external sources. This starts early and from our own homes. As a child we expect our parents to love us and accept us for what we are and what we do. when this acceptance is not felt we imagine that we are not good enough or not lovable. The same way of thinking seeps into other aspects of our life, school, office, relationships. When we start loving ourselves we tend to give less importance to what others think and don’t seek validation from others if what we are doing makes us happy.
The Four “Self-s” of Self-Love
1.Self-Care
Self-Care is the most easiest of all the steps towards Self-Love. As the name suggests its about taking care of yourself; both mind and body. It is not just about your diet, fitness or meditation it is also about the minutest of the things like what kind of food you like, kind of music you listen to, kind of friends you make, your thoughts about your future. Taking care of yourself will make you fall in love with you even when you feel like the sky is falling down.
2. Self-awareness
As we always say; The First step to improving your emotional intelligence quotient is by being able to identify what exactly you are feeling. Being aware of why you are feeling what you are feeling helps you understand yourself better. You may be feeling anger but when you really think and try to find the root cause, the anger might stem from deep sense of hurt, injustice, unmet expectations or simply a growling stomach! Being self-aware lets you be kind to yourself.
3. Self-Esteem
Self-esteem though is highly dependent on your childhood and your upbringing, you can still improve it by working on your self worth. Achieving your Short term goals and working on long term goals everyday is a good thing, but the problem arises when your self-worth becomes dependent on your accomplishments. You need to make peace with the fact that you cannot expect yourself to be highly productive on daily basis. Its okay to not accomplish something and still love yourself.
4.Self-worth
We often judge our capabilities or our strengths based on what the society or the people we look up to believe is the norm. You cannot take others opinion as measure of your own worth. Identify your strengths and believe that you have endless potential to grow; This is your self-worth. Self-Worth is you accepting that you are valuable regardless of your talents or achievements.
Practicing Self-Love Everyday
Let it Go:
The first and foremost thing that you must learn is to forgive. Forgive the people that wronged you. Most importantly forgive yourself for not reaching your expectations, forgive yourself for slacking, forgive yourself for not reaching your true potential.
Appreciate yourself:
Make sure you celebrate your achievements. However small they might be you must cherish those accomplishments. This ill give you the much needed encouragement from within. And it is more stronger and valuable than any other external source of appreciation.
Fortify your boundaries:
Setting boundaries help you in maintaining your mental peace for longer periods. When you have decided that you will value and respect yourself limitlessly and maintain a safe distance from people, work, comments, food or content that bothers you will help you love yourself more.
People in your Life:
You may be an extrovert or introvert but at the end of the day we are all social animals. We need to feel as a part of a community though you are centre of that circle or a just a viewer from its circumference. Choose the kind of people you want in your life wisely. Don’t join a club or group or relationship just because you are feeling lonely. Get to know people before you call them your something.