Welcome to the first entry on the self love blog.
I hope to bring you my musings on all things self love so that you can digest them and perhaps journal through them, try a self love or self care practice I suggest or just hold a safe space for you to explore themes and topics as they arise.
The aim is to release a blog post every 2 weeks so twice a month from here on in. Make sure you subscribe to my emails to be notified each time one goes live.
So welcome! I wanted to start off the first blog with getting stuck in and to the bottom of what self love is - to me, to my clients and what it might mean for you too.
I truly believe that self love underpins EVERYTHING we do. From the way we talk to ourselves, our confidence levels, the conversations we have, the opportunities we take, the relationships we are in and the boundaries we feel comfortable setting with others.
Let’s take it even further and say that the way we treat ourselves and the relationship we have with ourselves absolutely encompasses self love or in some cases our lack of.
I know when my self love is at its lowest, this shows up in the foods I eat, the conversations I have, the internal dialogue I have with myself and how I believe others see me too. If I’m going through a low period of self love then I assume other people think badly of me, I’ll put myself down a lot and I’ll do something that I call “playing small” in life.
So what is playing small? To me, playing small means holding back my opinion from others incase fear of judgement. I don’t express my wants because deep down I don’t feel worthy of receiving them. I am committed to the story of why I won’t be successful in a particular area and I collect evidence to prove myself right (I’m not proud of that one).
I basically show up as a watered down version of me, the one that I feel is the most socially acceptable to fit in. The people pleaser me. The one who doesn’t like to cause much of a fuss or speak up too loudly. Does that make sense?
Now I know that no one walks around thinking “gosh I have low self love today” or maybe they do? But for me, identifying what low self love looks like in my day to day actions helps me identify when I am there which then means - I get to do something about it.
Some of my low self love actions looks like the following:
Drinking too much alcohol
Eating fast food or foods high in sugar and calories
Texting men back that aren’t worthy of my time and/or energy
Low motivation to exercise and move my body
Late nights and late starts to the next day
Breaking my own boundaries, for example - being available for phone calls after 10pm when I like to be off my phone by 9pm
Wanting to save money but spending it on daily takeaway coffee
There are times I can recall where I have done ALL of the above at the same time. And that’s when the outcome of my life wasn’t very positive. And I’m sure you won’t be surprised to learn that it was hard to break out of that cycle. As you can see - it was a pretty long list of bad behaviours and habits.
However, all it takes is to change one tiny little part to start having a positive impact on your life.
When you start to value yourself by showing up for life with your best self in mind - I wholeheartedly believe that your life will change for the better.
I don’t recommend showing up as your best self in all these areas at the same time if you’re currently not doing any of them but maybe take some time to look at the following areas and notice where you are now and where you would like to be.
For example: If your lack of self love is showing up in your diet and the foods you eat, how can you incorporate one healthy meal a week/ a day to make changes to that straight away? Can you drink more water?
Or is your lack of self love showing up in the partners you are choosing? Do you feel like you find it hard to be yourself? You don’t show your true colours as you don’t want to come across demanding and hard work?
Self love is feeling like you are enough and that you are worthy of living a life you desire. It’s the relationship you have with yourself and how you feel about yourself. Which in turn impacts the relationship you have with others. It’s about how you are able to speak up for yourself. Identify where you are perhaps being unkind to yourself and showing up for yourself with the upmost kindness, compassion and love.
Self love isn’t selfish - it’s essential. And you’re worthy of it.
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