Self love creates a loving and positive environment where you can recognize your worth. When you are looking at yourself through a lens of love, you are kind, nurturing, & forgiving to yourself.

You can see how amazing you are. You can see your talents. No matter good or bad, you will love every part of you.
You can see your worth. When you know your worth, amazing things happen in your life.

You can not think about positive things in an unloving environment. If you are always downing yourself, you can not see your worth.

“You’ll never change your life until you change something you do daily. The secret of your success is found in your daily routine.”- John Maxwell

Practicing self-love should be a daily habit. It needs to be intentional.

I am not a doctor or psychiatrist. I am only sharing my personal experience.

How to practice self love?

Positive self talk

Positive self-talk helps you challenge the inner critic. Everyone has one.

You can retrain your mind. Isn’t that wonderful? You have the power to replace a negative thought with a positive one.

Have you heard of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)?  Morin on PsychologyToday.com discussed studies that showed how CBT can help retrain your mind.  She also talked about three ways of CBT to help you with retrain your mind.

They are:

reframe your thoughts

proved that your brain is lying

create a personal positive saying 

It is our responsibility to challenge the naysayer in our heads. We do not have to believe every thought that comes to our head. When you challenge the inner critic, you are practicing self-love. You are showing kindness to yourself.

For e.g. If you had a friend downing herself or himself, you would want to say nice and positive things to that person to lift their mood. It is necessary to apply that same energy to yourself when that inner critic talks in your head.

Let me say this. This will be an ongoing process. It will be beneficial to add this to your daily practice. Over the years, you have accumulated so many different types of negative thoughts due to life experiences, other people’s opinions, relationships, etc.

If you would like to go further in learning how to control your thoughts, check out Eckhart Tolle’s book, “The Power of Now.” 

This book blessed me. It is also on my 24 must read books that will change your life here.

Positive affirmations

Speak positive things over your life.  Speak positive things about yourself.  During my skincare routine, saying positive affirmations while using my facial roller is my jam. I speak more on this later. If you are on Pinterest, here is a board with a variety of positive affirmations you can use for yourself.

Create boundaries

Make sure you are taking stock of who brings negativity or negative energy into your life. Everyone does not need to have access to you.

Surround yourself with people who care and love you

It is important to have loving energy around you.

Be your own cheerleader

You validate yourself. You encourage yourself.

Support from others is GREAT, but they are not with you all the time. You are with you all the time (24 hours).

If you think about it, it is you vs you.  I wrote a blog post on how to be your own cheerleader. You can check it out here.

Forgive yourself.

Forgive YOURSELF. I mean, take some time out to FORGIVE YOURSELF. If you need to seek a professional (Therapist, Social Worker, Counselor, etc.) to help you with this, do it.

They are here to help. Most people focus on forgiving others but forget to forgive themselves. Forgiving others is important, but Forgiving yourself is too.

If you don’t forgive yourself

Sometimes we don’t make the best decisions. We have to forgive ourselves. Lack of forgiveness creates negative energy. It is difficult to thrive in negativity.

You will continue to beat yourself up for the decisions you made in the past. You will find yourself in stagnation. You will have difficulty recognizing your worth. You will find your mind lying to you that things will not get better for you.

That is not TRUE. I repeat that is not TRUE. It will only be if you let it be. You attract the energy you put out. Your mind is powerful. Give yourself another chance. Don’t quit on you.

Forgiving yourself is necessary to help you realize your worth.

How to Forgive Yourself?

Practicing self-love opens up the door to forgiving yourself. It is hard to forgive yourself if you are not practicing self-love. It is also hard to continue to love yourself if you have not forgiven yourself.

Self-love can start the process toward forgiving yourself. Again, if you are having difficulty, seek a professional.

Daily Activities I practice self love

Each day I participate in something that I love to do.

For e.g.
I have a daily eucalyptus leaves shower or spa/herbal baths. There is some type of classical or jazz music playing in the background, aromatherapy candles are lit, the diffuser has oil in it, etc. I like to set a relaxing scene.

During my eucalyptus leaves shower or spa/herbal baths, I have beautiful uplifting conversations with myself. I speak positive affirmations. There is a lot of self-love going on.

Afterward, I do Mirror Work during my skincare routine. I continue the uplifting conversations & positive affirmations from the shower or bath to the mirror. There will definitely be a jade roller or a 24k gold facial massager in my hand.

While the facial roller is during its thang on my face with relaxation and helping my moisturizer absorb better, positive affirmations are doing their thang in my mind. There is nothing but good & loving vibes feeling up the room.

Another thing I love to do is a Relaxing time with my acupressure mat.

This is a part of my nighttime routine. It has been doing wonders for me. I take my eucalyptus leaves shower or self-love bath.
Next, I put on my white plush robe. I create a relaxing and calming vibe in my bedroom.

I turn on my white noise machine to the sound of the ocean, I light an aromatherapy candle, and my salt lamp is on.
I lay the acupressure mat on my bed. For 25 minutes, I get lost in the feels all of this brings me.

Afterward, I have a natural high. From my experience, this helps with back pain, create relaxation, and improve sleep.

I made a promise to myself. No matter what, something I love to do is going on my daily to-do list. It is necessary because this helps to create a loving personal environment.

So, whether it be tea time or painting, if I love it, it is going on the daily to-do list.

Here are a list of things I love to do for self love or self care.

• Eucalyptus leaves shower
• Self love Baths
• Mirror work
• Meditation
• Journaling

• Earthing or Grounding
• Relaxing time with acupressure mat
• Enjoying nature in my backyard
• Painting
• Reading

• Tea time
• Trying or cooking a new recipe
• Listening to music
• Dancing to music

• Buy flowers
• Make a picnic in the living room or outside. It depends on the weather
• Exercise
• Enjoy time by the pool

In conclusion, practicing self love is the overall theme to knowing your worth.

When you participate in components that make up self love such as 

Positive self talk

Positive affirmations

Creating boundaries

Surrounding yourself with people who care about you and love you

Being your own cheerleader

Doing something daily you love to do

You are creating a personal environment where you can know your worth.

I mentioned earlier how forgiving yourself helps you realize your worth.

Practicing self-love in your daily life creates a positive and loving environment where you will forgive yourself. How?

As I mentioned earlier, when you practice self-love, you see yourself through a lens of love and kindness.

Forgiveness is a part of love.  In this type of environment you have created through practicing self love, you will understand that love includes forgiveness, kindness, calling yourself out, being your cheerleader, going after your goals, etc.

Since you realize forgiveness is a way of showing yourself love, you will forgive the parts of you that need it.

You also will realize it is a disservice to you if you only love certain parts of yourself.

Every part of you needs love shown to it. Each one of them may need a different aspect of love, but they need it. It is ok to give love to all of you.

When you show those parts the love they need, you will be able to see the rest of you. You will no longer be stuck on those parts.

You will see your beautiful gifts & talents. You will recognize your worth.

When you realize your worth, you are able to

To create boundaries when needed,

You will not accept anything from anybody (I do mean anybody),

You will not settle in life,

You will go after the life you want,

You will cut the excuses,

You will become your own cheerleader or hype man

You will not need others to validate you

You will challenge your inner critic

You will call yourself out on your own BS and level up,

You will show up in the world as a better person, etc.

This list can go on and on.

Until next time

Source

Morin, A. (2017). How To Train Your Brain To Think Differently. Retrieved from https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/what-mentally-strong-people-dont-do/201710/how-train-your-brain-think-differently

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