Self love. It seems so simple, right? Talk to yourself in a way that makes you a friend, not an enemy. It should be something that comes naturally, yes? Yeah, that’s definitely not how it works.
In a world so heavily influenced by the media, constantly telling us how we should look, or how we should feel if we don’t look a certain way; we get so caught up in the “should” of it and never stop to think about who we are right now. We should do this to make ourselves feel better. We should wear this because that’s what “looks best” on our body types. We should wear makeup because you cannot look beautiful without it. In this generation, self love appears to be nearly impossible to achieve simply because it's not easily acquired.
I went through hell to be able to love myself. When I was younger, I was a chubby kid. I always wanted what I knew I couldn’t have and I can’t remember a time when I was little that I felt comfortable in my own skin. I couldn’t share clothes with friends or even change at their houses because I was embarrassed of my body. Once I got to high school, I decided that I wanted to change. I started working out every day and eating better. Changes started to happen rather quickly, and I was loving it. Even though I felt better mentally and looked better physically, I still wasn’t satisfied. I realized I didn’t quite love myself. I would catch myself still tearing myself down because I wasn’t good enough, or because I didn’t look like a picture in a magazine.
It wasn’t until a couple years after I started my new health routine did I actually start to love myself. I changed my way of thinking from “that won’t look right” to “let’s give it a try and see what happens.” It sounds very cliche, but I just convinced myself that I didn’t have to try to be like the girls in magazines, or even my friends who were thinner than me. They were beautiful just the way they were, so I taught myself that I’m allowed to be beautiful just the way that I am. I figured out that no matter what the media, society, or anybody who hates themselves told me, I had the choice and the power to feel good about myself no matter what. I also learned that it’s just so much easier to talk kindly to yourself than it is to sit there and beat yourself up. For me, it changed everything.
I hate talking about self love because people often confuse it with being conceited. They think that being nice and gracious with yourself is being so self absorbed that you don’t have room to care for others. I hate talking about self love because I cannot make people see their beauty, worth, and value. I know that there is so much more to every single person on this planet than what they look like on the outside, but it doesn’t matter if I see it because all that matters is if they see it. It is something you need to teach yourself. It’s definitely not an overnight thing, and you will have your bad days, but think about it like this: you would not talk to your best friends in such a degrading way, so why would you do it to yourself?
