5 Ways to Cultivate Self-love
Self-love is an important part of our overall well-being that's often overlooked! In order to be truly successful and happy, you need to learn how to accept yourself and develop a healthy relationship with yourself. To help you get started on your journey toward self-love, here are 5 ways you can begin practicing today.
Table of Contents
Why do we need to love ourselves?
What does self-love look like?
5 Activities to Help You Cultivate Self-Love Each Day
#1: Use the Words, "I am enough."
#2: Watch Your Language with Yourself
#3: Have Your Own Back
#4: Get Out of the Past by Forgiving Yourself
#5: Practice Emotional Awareness
Bonus Activity: Cultivate Self-Love by Activating Your Empathy
Why do we need to love ourselves?
We need to love ourselves for two big reasons.
1. Self-love helps us be healthy, happy, and fulfilled.
When we don't love ourselves, we don't do the self-care that's required to stay physically, emotionally, and mentally healthy.
We also tend to get stuck in negative emotions and as a result can fall into a downward spiral that could lead to anxiety, stress, depression, or substance abuse because we're not fueling positive emotions.
Also, when we don't love ourselves, we don't accept ourselves authentically. This means we don't take steps in our life to move forward in alignment with our unique self and so we're not fulfilled.
2. Self-love helps us have great relationships with others.
We need to love ourselves so that we can have deep, meaningful, healthy relationships with other people.
Self-love is that feeling inside that you are worthy of love from others. When we lack self-love, we lack the feeling that we're worthy of getting or receiving love. So we feel this scarcity of love and that is why so many relationships fail. Relationships fray and fracture because when you are coming to that relationship from a place of scarcity and lack, you tend to put that energy of fear forward in your relationships.
But the more you love yourself the more you give love to your relationships and those relationships can thrive.
What does self-love look like?
Self-love is comprised of four parts:
1. Awareness
You're in tune with and aware of your emotions, and you accept and honor them.
2. Attention
You're giving yourself the attention that you need physically, emotionally, and mentally so that you're meeting your needs. This attention is essentially self-care.
3. Compassion
You give yourself grace for being human and for being imperfect. You show yourself some empathy on your journey.
4. Respect
You show yourself respect by using positive self-talk and keeping the promises you make to yourself.
What are some ways I can cultivate self-love?
There are five ways that you can cultivate self-love.
#1: Use the words, "I am enough," in your vocabulary.
I learned this from Marissa Peer, a world-renowned hypnotherapist. She works with some of the world's most accomplished people and celebrities and she said that, at its core, a lack of self-love can stem from not thinking you're worthy or enough as you are. So using your language to reprogram your mind and your beliefs is really critical here. It's just three words: I am enough. Write it on a post-it note on your mirror in your bathroom or set an alarm on your phone. Start to look at and listen to those words every day to empower yourself.
#2: Watch your language with yourself.
Watch your language with yourself. We often say things to ourselves that we would never utter to another human being, especially if we wanted to show them love and respect. So if you wouldn't say it to someone you love - your best friend, your partner, or your child - don't say it to yourself. Show yourself some respect. The negative self-talk gets to us and we start to think badly about ourselves and that energy compounds. You deserve respect, so please, talk to yourself with kindness.
#3: Have your own back.
You might have everyone else's back but you need to have your own back, too. Honor the commitments you make to yourself; if you make a promise to yourself, keep it.
#4: Get out of the past by forgiving yourself.
You are human. You are going to mess up. Forgive yourself. Take the lesson and move on. If you need help with this, or if you're feeling stuck, ask yourself this question, "What would happen in my life if I forgave myself for that?"
#5: Practice emotional awareness.
This includes both accepting your emotions as-is (negative ones, too) and shifting into a more positive state in terms of how you view and lead from your emotions.
Your emotions come up automatically. You can't control the emotions that come up in you but you can control what happens after; you can control how you react to the emotion. You can move into a more positive state. A very specific emotion to cultivate in order to do this is empathy. When you have more empathy for yourself, you can show yourself love and understanding instead of judging yourself and feeling shame, guilt, or blame, which keeps you stuck in the past.
By having empathy for yourself, and knowing that you're trying your best, you can positively move forward and make your next decision with integrity.
Bonus Activity: Cultivating Self-Love by Activating Your Empathy
This exercise is called Your Childhood Photo Exercise and it's been designed through the Positive Intelligence Mental Fitness program. I’m a partner coach with Positive Intelligence and we use this exercise to teach our clients how to activate their empathy which helps build their self-love.
Start by getting a photo of yourself as a child from when you were very young, under 5 years old, if you can. Then look at the photo. I mean really look at it, at yourself. Jot down what you see. What are the attributes you see in this child, at his or her core? (For example, curious, playful, excited, thoughtful, observant, energetic, loving, etc.)
Ask yourself, "What is that child's strength?" We were all born with an essence, with some superpowers, with uniqueness.Often, throughout our lives, over the decades, we tend to focus on our limitations and weaknesses, on all the bad stuff that's happened to us. Over time, we put up shields and wear masks that hide our authentic selves. And we forget about our essence.
When that happens, we're really hard on ourselves. We're not kind to ourselves the way we would be kind to the childhood version of ourselves. This exercise forces you to look at your childhood photo and write down what you see in yourself before any life experience impacted you and altered that uniqueness you possessed.
I want you to look at your true essence and ask yourself 2 questions:
1. What would shift for you if you started to activate and lead from that essense and those superpowers, strengths, and talents, more often?
2. How can you start to be a little more empathetic and kind to that child in you?
As adults, as humans on this journey we call life, you're going to make mistakes and that's ok. Mistakes are good! Mistakes mean you’re trying and learning.
Learn from them and use them as fuel but remember, that it does not serve you to continue to beat yourself up and hate yourself over your mistakes. Instead, activate your empathy by looking at the child inside you. If you were watching a child just learning to walk and you saw that child fall over, would you ever say to that child, "Oh buddy,you fell over. Looks like you won’t be a walker. Just give up right now!" Of course not! You would encourage that child. You would clap your hands and after every fall, say, "Good job. Keep going! Keep trying! You can do this!"
Remember that story when you speak to yourself. Put that photo of yourself as a child up in your bathroom or your bedroom; look at it and start to think about how you can be a little more kind and empathetic to yourself. This empathy is going to fuel your sense of self-worth and self-love. When you lead from your strengths and self-love, that spills over into your relationships and creates more positive, meaningful experiences with others.
One Degree Shifts Can Help
Ready to shift your mindset and cultivate self-love to move your life forward? At One Degree Shifts, I can help you identify and shift away from limiting beliefs and self-sabotaging behaviors that hold you back from reaching your full potential.Get in touch to begin your journey to more self-love and fulfillment today!
