What is self-love?
Self-love is built on the premise that was given to us as one of the greatest commands which is to love others as we love ourselves. The same compassion, kindness and regard that you give to others is how you need to treat yourself.
Self-love is what eventually ushers you into a mental space of accepting yourself (the great, good, and ugly aspects of you) and getting to that place within you when you are able to love yourself unconditionally.
What does self-love look like pragmatically?
Self-love in practice means doing the internal work on your inner self versus focusing too much on your outer (physical) self. It is easier to have a self-care/self-love checklist that focuses on doing things for your physical self – massages, getting your nails done, buying perfume, doing your hair. Although all of these examples are a good way of pragmatically executing self-care. Self-pampering can also mean taking the time to start working on healing the wounded parts of you that are hidden to the outside world, but are real and active within you. In essence, self-love is giving yourself permission to go into the internal areas of your development that need your attention and need to be worked on. I used to be so sceptical (even though I am inherently optimistic) because of the painful experiences I went through that inhibited my ability to be positive. So, my approach to life was to prepare for the worst case scenario and even expect it to happen, and because our minds and brains love us, they always prove us right. I would experience good things for very short periods of time and experience the painful things for longer periods and more regularly. I had to have a one- on-one with myself and confront this pattern of thinking and behaviour and realise that it was not serving me. Self-love is a concept you need to learn about and requires you to first learn what true love is and then understand that you need to give it first to yourself before giving love to others. It's a continuous process and you need to keep working on learning how to love yourself so that others can benefit from it. And as you pursue being a better "lover" to yourself, remember to be patient with yourself.
November 2023 | Collective Action Magazine Collective Action Magazine
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