3 steps towards self love

Last year was rough…my mental health was all over the place and I was looking in all the wrong places for relief. The truth is, that the anxiety I was feeling was being fed by the lack in self awareness, self love and extreme comparison I was constantly inflicting on myself. Social media has blown up and it is so easy to see these beautiful, successful women living their best life and boasting about all of their successes, which leave you wondering where you went wrong or how they do it. The answer is, you did not go wrong and they did it the same way you could do it too.

Reality is that most of these people and their perfect lives are not the whole story…we share what we want to share to the world. We are all going through some type of struggle that we deal with behind closed doors for our own reason. For example, I always try to keep things light and airy on my platforms, but still real and raw. I might share about my struggles in motherhood during a bad day with the kids, but I will not share about a disagreement my husband and I had (these are normal, but something that I like to keep private).

Going into the new year, I spent a lot of time reflecting on myself. There is nothing I want to change about me as a person, but there are things that I would like to improve on or just manage better. Self-love is absolutely one of them and I wanted to share 3 things I am working on to navigate my journey towards self-love.

Put yourself first
I know this is step one in extreme mom guilt, but it is also one of the most important steps towards living a healthy, joyful life for yourself. This is sooo hard to do, but please find time to be intentional in this step. We always hear the phrase “you cannot fill from an empty cup” and while so true, I know the hard work it takes to make sure you are filling your own cup. It is so important to take time to decompress and do something for yourself - with 24 hours in a day, you can absolutely find at least 20 minutes that belong to just you. As women, it is so easy to always put the needs of others before ourselves especially when children and partners are involved. My journey to self love includes being selfish, selfish because I will no longer allow the needs of everyone else to always come before what I need for myself. Remember that this looks different for everyone- maybe it means you go get coffee and a pedicure, or maybe it means you get 20 minutes to read your favorite book. Whatever it is, just make sure you find some time in your day to dedicate to yourself.
Allow yourself to explore your feelings + process your fears
Feel things fully. No matter the emotion, feel it and revel in it. Allowing yourself to navigate through the different emotions we have throughout the day will help you understand why you are feeling the way that you are and ways to improve that if needed. This has helped my anxiety in many ways! Having feelings is normal and part of the human autonomy and being able to explore and understand your mind will literally help your mental health. I am always thinking worst case scenario, and questioning the what if’s, but why do that at the expense of my mental health? If I am feeling happy, I am going to soak in all of those feelings. If I am feeling hurt or afraid, I need to process why I am feeling that way and what I can do to get out of that funk. I can be extremely happy one minute and then feel extreme overwhelm the next- why? Because maybe I began thinking about my never ending to do list. So to reverse this, I start to think about the things I have accomplished that day and not what I didn’t. This way I am allowing my mind to understand that “yes, I did not do x,y and z, but I did finish a,b and c” and that right there is enough.
Stop comparing yourself to others
Lawdy, probably second hardest, but most important. As I mentioned in the intro: social media is a highlight reel and we are all navigating through something on the back end. Perfection does not exist and even if it did, it would mean several different things for us all. It truly is all about perspective- you are living the life you are meant to be living right now. If you look back at the last 5 years, would you envision yourself anywhere near where you are today? Because if it were me, I’d be yelling hell no from the roof tops. The life my husband and I share with our children today, is not quite one we ever imagined. When I was younger, I had a friend who seemed to have had the most perfect life. Perfect in my eyes because her parents were happily married, they were not strict and she was allowed to have a boyfriend (gosh, was I silly). But when I see her life today, it is not one I would ever want. I am not here to speak about her, but to share that the life I thought was once perfect, was in fact not. And actually, the broken marriage and strict father I grew up with was exactly what I needed. It has shaped the mother I am today, the work that I have put into my marriage and saved me from a toxic, abusive relationship in my teenage years. So live your life and live it hard because you only get one and it should not be spent comparing it to the life of others.

The takeaway here is that self love is important. You are important. Soak in the moments that you are currently living, dissect the toxic out, explore your feelings and know why you are feeling them, spend intentional time with yourself, open your eyes to your life and the good in it. A journey towards self love is not an easy one, but it is one you can reach. We can do this together ya’ll- trust me when I say you are not alone!

What will you do today that will lead you closer in your journey to self-love?