How to: love yourself.

Step 1: believing in all you can be.

🌼🌼🌼For the ones who feel that they are “too clingly, too dramatic, not caring enough, too stupid, too irrational, too impulsive, too fat, too skinny, too loud, too tall, too short” and too anything and yet, never enough, this one’s for you. You don’t need to change to be worthy of love, you already are.🌼🌼🌼

Self love. Perhaps the toughest love of all. The one that is the hardest to maintain, the hardest to honour and the hardest to accept. We tend to take ourselves for granted, being stuck in our body for life.

I’ll admit it, the journey to self love, though wonderfully inspiring and relieving, can be tough at times. But that’s only if you’re going through it alone. How about we do it together, you and me? I promise it’s worth a shot.

What really is this self love? Is it being able to wear fitting clothes in public despite having a noticeable beer-belly? Is it being sassy 24/7 and responding to hate with “I don’t care” comments, despite feeling a little hurt? Or it is being able to dance in public at the most unexpected moments?

As much as movies and books try to preach it that way, self love runs deeper than the ability to publicly show your appreciation of yourself or your talents. It’s a silent, soft kind of love. The one you would feel when you know you did something right, like give your seat to an old lady on the bus. The one that hits you when you make your family happy. That feeling you get when you tried your best and don’t even care about the results because you’re satisfied with how you did. Self love isn’t just about appearing confident in front of others, it’s loving yourself when you’re alone, when things go wrong, or on your bad hair weeks. It’s loving yourself despite failing. It’s never giving up in what you believe in because above all, you believe in yourself.

Self love encompasses one’s unconditional affection for one’s body, mind and personality. It’s not only about feeling good in your skin, it’s about being confident of your words, not being ashamed of your actions and being able to withstand the pressure from people who don’t like you.

There is always going to be someone who doesn’t like you, someone who will find flaws in everything that you do. Those people will always exist.

But, it’s also true that there will always be people who admire you with just as much passion and zest. People who’ll feel more excited about your future than you will ever be, the ones who see the potential in you, see the amazing opportunities at your arm’s reach. They who love you and would never want you to feel hurt. Those whose hearts would break a thousand times over if they knew the depressing thoughts that went through your mind. Your parents. Or your relatives. Or your neighbours. Friends. Someone, somewhere cares. Learn to appreciate those who do. Every time you let a negative comment tear you down despite hearing a thousand sweet nothings, just know that you’re discarding someone’s love and you’re focusing on someone else’s hate. That’s exactly what we humans do. But we don’t have to. You don’t have to.

One positive person in your life is enough, if you want it to be. Because a crowd of thousands of people could cheer your name night and day and that wouldn’t be motivation enough- no, not until you decide that you are good enough. Because you’re your sole companion from life to death, the only one to see the whole picture, to know the whole book, the only one who withholds every little detail.

Because everyone else will witness a few chapters of your journey in life, a couple of fleeting moments without knowing everything. Because at some point, people who have loved or hated you for years will be gone and then, you won’t have their opinions to base your perspective of yourself on. Because of all those reasons and so much more, you have to learn to love yourself.

You have come such a long way without fully loving and accepting yourself, pretty human. Just imagine the great, great things you could do if you loved and cared for yourself. Oh dear, what an unstoppable force you would be if you loved yourself properly.

If others’ views mattered to all the great man who marked history, chances are, we wouldn’t know their names today. If they didn’t believe in themselves, despite being called stupid, worthless, lazy and worse, they wouldn’t be so great.

Haven’t you noticed, beautiful soul? That the one thing that all successful people have in common is their unwavering faith in themselves. If you’re not here yet, don’t worry, we’ll go through this together, step by step. I believe in you and in all the wonders that you can do. Soon, you will too.

Can you imagine the Wright brothers trying to explain how they aspired to build a flying machine? Can you hear the mockery, the taunts, the nasty comments that were thrown at them? Surely you would, if it were not for the roar of some dozens of planes taking off, on their way to the other part of the globe, thanks to them. My point is quite simple, actually, if you aspire to do something great, you have to believe in yourself, even when the whole world thinks you’re crazy. Because people who do great things often walk against the crowd. Because you can’t act like everyone else and be different, darling.

If there’s one thing that we should learn from our ancestors’ mistakes, it’s that today’s “crazy” is another era’s “genius”. So who knows? Maybe, just maybe, you aren’t such a “lunatic,” after all.

That’s why, you don’t owe any explanations to anyone. You don’t owe anything to anyone, except to yourself. You, without a doubt, owe yourself unconditional love, care, affection, trust and above all, you owe yourself the peace that comes with the knowledge that you tried.
If you do, one day, when you’re skin’s too big for your body and your bones lack strength, you won’t be bothered with the thoughts of what could have been. The endless what ifs and the regret.

No, you won’t find yourself on your deathbed, desperately begging for another chance at life, for another opportunity to work towards your dreams, against everyone’s will. No, you won’t take your last breath while crying and reminiscing the mundane, uneventful and boring life you’ve led while adhering to every rule of society. No, none of that will happen to you.

And you won’t be the parent who unconsciously bullies their child into fulfilling the dreams that they themselves couldn’t achieve. You won’t crave to relive your life in your child’s younger skin. No. You won’t.

Because if it doesn’t work out, you’ll grow old while telling the tales of your eventful youth. How crazy you were, how you don’t know what went through your mind. And you’ll laugh while telling those stories, boring your children and grandchildren stupid with the same tale every time. Nostalgia will swell through your heart at your deathbed and you’ll die knowing that you did try to be someone in a world where everyone is the same. You’ll know that you tried to make that crazy idea work in a place where everyone is brought up in a standardised fashion, much like a factory mass producing the same old shirt. You’ll know that you felt different, alive at some point. And you’ll die knowing a thousand more lessons than the one who hasn’t tried at all.

So tell me now, what do you have to lose? Have I stripped you of all your excuses yet?

Believing in your dreams is step one to self love. If you feel that tingling sensation in your stomach, the rapid beat of your heart along with a slightly nauseous feeling, and the overwhelming excitement on thinking about your future, congratulations sweetie, you have completed step one with utmost success.

You are now a step closer to your goals, buddy. Because now you’re not just strong, hardworking, beautiful, capable, intelligent, creative and positive. Now, you are aware of all the great things you can do. 😉

(Update: you can find part 2 to this article here)

Sending you loads of love and positivity,

Priyanka.