This Is How You Truly Love Yourself

Self-love is trusting that we will stand by the standards we set. The standards for what we will and will not accept.

By

strong girl with tattoos
Timothy Paul Smith
strong girl with tattoos
Timothy Paul Smith

You are amazingly strong, full of unique beauty and grace. You have so much to offer the world, and so much love to give. But why do so many of us struggle when it comes to loving ourselves, the most important love of all?

Because we are constantly being fed by society and social media on how everything should be in our lives… from how we look, to what our relationships should be like and everything in between. They call these portrayals “normal”, but they’re far from normal and they give us a skewed sense of reality. We need to choose to look beyond what we see on social media and remember that nothing is ever as it seems. We need to band together, to stop being part of this epidemic of self-doubt and insecurity, and promote self-love.

Self-love is acceptance of where we are right now with our bodies, careers, lives. We need to stop looking in the mirror and criticizing what we see, constantly wondering if we would be happier if we were thinner/curvier. We need to stop overthinking where we are in our careers and lives, because our journeys are unique. Instead of self-doubt, let’s choose self-love and acceptance.

Self-love is not comparing our romantic lives to others. We need to stop overanalyzing our relationships based on what social media tells us, or pulling back and playing games because that’s considered the norm. We should demand more from a relationship we feel is lacking because we love ourselves enough to know that we deserve it, and we refuse to lose ourselves in loving another person.

Self-love is trusting that we will stand by the standards we set. The standards for what we will and will not accept, for trusting our intuition and listening to those who love us when they warn us, and the standards to not settle for mediocrity and unhappiness. It’s an understanding of what will make us happy and what will cause us emotional turmoil, of when we need to hold on and when we need to let go, and trusting ourselves to make
the right choices.

Self-love is worth the effort it takes to achieve, but it takes time. It’s a daily effort of choosing to love ourselves. It’s acceptance and understanding of who we are and what we want, because fully loving yourself means owning your individuality, your story, your emotions and actions.

Get to that point. That point where you completely understand the importance of self-love and strive for it. That point of knowing that you are always worth the fight and love you so willingly give others. That point where you realize that the most important relationship you will ever have is the one you have with yourself. Thought Catalog Logo Mark