For many years, the concept of Self-Love was never given importance and was often ignored. In a country like India, you are often compared to people of the same age as their accomplishments. As a result, you put too much pressure on yourself in order to make your family proud of you. We grind every week and even when we are supposed to be relaxing, we think about all the stuff we have to do.
As individuals, we often crave love from everyone around us- be it our friends, spouses, children, and relatives. But we should never rely on someone else to give you love and happiness, it should come and be satisfied from within.
Self- love is the concept of loving yourself, accepting yourself with all your strengths and drawbacks. It is the concept you accepting your true self without any comparisons or any mode of competition. It is not being selfish; it is the idea of putting yourself first always.
Here are some reasons why Self-Love is important-
1. Positive Outlook
When you start loving yourself, you try to find the good even in the bad, no matter how small it is. You feel on top of the world with so much positive energy. This doesn’t mean that you don’t have bad days. You are meant to feel sad, angry, disappointed when something goes wrong and not in the way you wanted it to be. But the main point comes that you don’t turn this bad day into a bad month.
2. Not Caring What People Think of You
Picture Credits- Brilliant Business Things
Your confidence starts growing and you become less shy. Even if you feel judged, it feels okay because you care less about people’s opinions and you start following your own path, you don’t really care if people like you are not, you just care about yourself.
3. Open Communication
You know yourself truly, you are open to having honest and straight conversations with people, are more upfront about how you feel about things and people. You set standards in your mind about how they treat you, and when they don’t fall in its time to say goodbye.
4. Saying NO is Easy
Photo Credits- American Academy of Family Physicians
It becomes easy to say no to people and things which you don’t feel comfortable doing. You start realizing what is important and what is not. You stand firm to your ideas and do things that make you happy and grateful.
5. Taking Charge of Your Life
Taking charge of your own life results in making decisions about your won. You get the power of choice with everything with positivity. You make choices with everything that aligns with your life values.
Loving yourself doesn’t mean you become too selfish and start blocking or removing out people from your life, it means that you don’t give them power to make you happy, you are responsible for your own mood and choices.
You should realize that no one is perfect, everyone has their strengths and weaknesses. So, instead of blocking them out completely, give them a chance to show who they really are.
Self-Love vs Narcissism
Photo Credits- Healthline
It is important to know that there is a difference between Self-Love and Narcissism. Narcissism means having an excessive interest in oneself physically and psychologically. It is a person who is extremely confident about oneself with all that they do while ignoring their mistakes by putting it under the rug.
On the other hand, Self-love is taking responsibility for oneself. They accept their weakness and strength’s both at the same time. It is important to portray oneself and for having healthy and active relationships.
Here are some things that you can do to make yourself happy and rejuvenated in your own company-
1. Do Something that You Would Do With a Friend
Try to do something that you would do with your friends around like going to the movie, lunch date. Go to the spa, get got nails done. This will make you realize that you don’t need someone to make you happy, you can do things on your own too.
2. Make a List of Movies and Books
Make a list of movies and books that you would like to watch and read. Spend a whole day and research and download movies or go to the bookstore and spend a day looking through books you like. This breaks the monotony of your daily routine and makes your mind calm and stress-free.
3. Pick a Hobby
Experiment a little bit and try to find a new hobby for yourself. In this lockdown, you have plenty of time to experiment with new things. Try cooking, drawing, or even a sport. Live in the moment and enjoy the nature. You can even start your blog where you can write and post pictures about your thoughts and things you like.
4. Meditate and Yoga
Yoga and Meditation will make you collect your thoughts and you will be able to find your quiet time. Doing a lit bit of it in the morning for 10 minutes will suffice if you do it with full concentration. You can even go for a walk in the neighborhood because being in nature changes your mood.
5. De-Clutter and Re-Organize
Being inside the house 24/7 tends to make your house full of clutter and everything messed up because you are all over the place. Take out a day from your routine where you declutter and re-organize messy places. Get rid of stuff you don’t need and donate it to someone who needs it. Clutter less environment will make your mind and soul fresh.
6. Maintain a Gratitude Journal
Find a notebook and fill it with things you are grateful for, it can your family, your job, your house, basically anything. Fill the journal up with beautiful and happy memories by writing or even pasting pictures. Ten years down, you will able to see how much you have grown and make you remember olden times.
Don’t be afraid of doing things on your own, we came here alone and we will leave alone. So, there is nothing wrong with spending time on your own, working on yourself for yourself. After some time, you will start liking doing things alone like going to a solo lunch date or traveling on your won.
