The holiday season is a time of immense joy for some, and immense pain for others. While it’s a great time to visit family, some re-experience the loss of a loved one. Despite the ups and downs of the season, it’s important to focus on what it’s important. One of the most important things to remember is self-love.
Why is self-love so important? Self-love comes with learning your worth. Creating a sense of self-worth is tricky, but once you have it, no one can ever take it from you. When you learn to set your own values based on your own standards, no one can tell you anything about yourself.
The process of loving yourself is long, and it is a never-ending one. You don’t wake up one morning and realize you love yourself (although I wish you could). It’s a long journey of unlearning biases and phobias that you hold and apply to yourself. You start to appreciate your flaws, notice other flaws you can fix, and realize where they are coming from.
For me personally, I never thought I could even like myself. I figured I had nothing to offer and nowhere to start. Once I realized that some of those hurdles that stood in front of me were made up by my own mind, I started to tackle them one by one. I began to see my thoughts change from I wish I could do that, but I don’t want people to notice me to let’s just try it and maybe it’ll be a good laugh. Some may say it’s a selfish and cocky thing to love yourself, but if you can’t even openly be comfortable in the skin you’re in, then what is there that you can appreciate?
Once your thoughts become empowering rather than self-deprecating, they carry through to your actions. Instead of letting your friends beat themselves up, point out some of the great things about them and the great things that they’ve done.
Loving yourself is a journey, as corny as it sounds. It’s hard to shift your mindset from hating on yourself to thinking you’re THAT bitch. Taking the first step is often scary, but once you start, you can’t stop! Whether it’s strutting to class while listening to your favorite song or going off on a feminist tangent at a party and feeling on top of the world, appreciating yourself is the key—especially for the little things! Hyping yourself up on those little things forms a habit, and this transfers to the bigger things! In the end, all we have is ourselves, so we might as well enjoy being us!