Self Love

Self-love is a long journey. Self-love is hard. What is self-love? Those are the questions and statements that I have heard throughout the years. It is a question that myself and many others have asked, why is loving yourself so hard?

Loving yourself requires a certain level of selfishness. A lot of us have been taught that being "selfish" is a bad thing, when in fact, it is the complete opposite. When you think of yourself first it allows you to develop that self-love. When you are taught to not put yourself first and to think of others, then you are limiting what you can be to others, by limiting what is available to yourself.

Self-love may be hard because it forces you to look at yourself. It makes you fully responsible and accountable for yourself. Your decisions, actions and mistakes, you are the first on the scene. You cannot blame anyone for your state of being. If you accept yourself and all what may appear to be flaws, then others will too. We often do not see ourselves the way other people do anyway, so we might as well show them how to love us, by loving ourselves.

Yes, it is easier said than done. For example, I used to date guys that needed to be fixed. It was almost a requirement that they had something that needed to be fixed, until I ran across a drug addict. I must tell you a functioning drug addict can fool you for a while, but when the mask comes off and you still do not leave, then the reality check comes in to save the day. It was not until this drug addict needed a fix and I would not give him money, so he decided to choke it out of me. That was my reality check. At that point I knew that I did not love myself enough to see that I could not save this drug addict and if he had to, he would kill me for his drug. Now that’s love, and I was no match.

Then there was the time I thought that I could control the situation, by not getting too emotionally involved. Right! What woman can truly do that? I thought that I would date a married man, no real commitment, just fun times between scattered moments topped with impossible promises. I wanted to fix the fact that he wasn’t “happy” in his marriage. I really believed that I could have a fairy tale with a married man. He sold me a dream and I bought it all. Until his wife caught wind and started following and harassing me saying they needed bills paid, calling me sister-wife and he just played dumb and moved on to the next. Self-love would have never let me go down that road, but my low self-esteem said it was ok and so I dived straight into the abyss of illusions 101.

So, the search for me began. The missing part of me that wanted to save everyone, but myself needed to be found and yes, it began with self-love. Tough love, standing in your truth no matter what that is and loving all of it. Pure acceptance to the point that if someone dislikes you, says bad things about you, it does not matter. They too have a journey of self-love to discover. Wish them well and continue your journey.

Self-love does not happen overnight. You must undo all the things that you believed about yourself, that simply is not true. You are not a failure. You are not a bum. You are not a slut. You are not a bad mom or dad. You are not a doormat. You are a person on a journey to self-discovery, whether if it is your intent or not, finding yourself is a painful, yet joyful and essential prerequisite to an amazing life. You must uphold yourself in high regard and teach people how to love you.

Your mistakes become less because you are now learning and growing. The relationship with yourself is the more important than anything. Time with yourself is priority. Self-care is mandatory and you will no longer put anyone above your needs, unless you feel that person, thing or place has earned it. Now you know your worth and will not be giving your energy over to anything that does not have your best interest. You trust yourself and your decisions and stand firm in your conviction because now, you know you and whoever doesn’t, never mattered in the first place. Loving yourself also removes those who do not genuinely love you. When you put up boundaries, you get to see who will stand firm or get offended by your decision to love yourself. (Yes, people will get offended because it is no longer about them.) Please be unbothered.

Self-love should be taught in college. I believe it is where most people do the most discovering of themselves. Or, share what you know regarding loving yourself to your children, friends, and lovers. We must do it as a collective for everything to change. Do your part in your universe to serve yourself in the most loving way possible. Let us make this the norm.

Lavidus, Author