Practicing self-love allows us to be our best self. It strengthens our self-esteem and confidence, it’s healing and makes us magnetic to our desires. Loving ourself teaches others how to treat us. Most importantly, it increases our capacity to love and receive love.

Some signs that we may need to tend to our love and relationship with ourselves is if we’re feeling tired all the time, have low energy, feel easily frustrated and annoyed, overspending, addiction, health issues, self-abandonment, inconsistency with taking care of our needs, feeling like what people are offering is never enough, and intense feelings of jealousy and insecurity.

The good thing is we can always change things. We can start loving ourselves more at any moment and every thing can start to change.

Here are 5 Ways to Increase Your Self-Love

1. Feeling your emotions without flinching.

When scary feelings come up staying with them and embracing them with love and compassion is key. Sometimes it’s easy to reject negative emotions and stuff them down. But when we’re honest about what’s going on inside us and feeling whatever feelings that come up, as chaotic as they may be, we make it easier to heal and release them. While at the same time increasing our self-esteem and emotional well-being.

2. Expressing your true essence without holding back.

Give yourself permission and space to be completely you. Decide that you love and accept yourself. Create a boundary inside yourself that says, I don’t withhold myself to please others or avoid rejection. It’s a freeing feeling when you make this decision. This could also mean owning and accepting that you don’t feel like talking or participating. It’s about deciding to stay true to your heart unapologetically no matter what.

3. Taking care of yourself with good boundaries.

This means when something or someone is making us feel bad or uncomfortable we remove ourself from the situation. We give ourselves what we need to feel better. This could also look like walking away from an uncomfortable conversation or changing the subject. It could be canceling a get together or plans because you aren’t feeling well or you just don’t want to anymore. It’s being unashamed of what we need and giving it to ourselves instead of abandoning our needs to make people happy. Of course we can still be kind to others it’s just that we don’t put ourselves last.

4. Having fun stuff to do and look forward to.

This could be dancing around your house, reading a good book, spending time with friends, booking a trip to Paris, or a paint night. I personally like to dream and plan things quarterly. This keeps me excited and gives me that giddy feeling about my life.

5. Practicing self-care and keeping our routines.

This could look like taking more relaxing baths, booking a massage, getting your hair done, or getting your annual physical done. Anything that makes you feel like your best self. It’s about prioritizing and nurturing your body (I personally categorize self-care with physical needs and practicing self-love with caring for your being as a whole. Physical, mental, emotional and spiritual). Routines are also an important. Having a morning and night time routine that gives your body and soul the food, exercise, and heart connection you need. To stick to this one you could try setting alarms for yourself and deciding what you want your routines to look like beforehand.

Throughout this process it’s good to remember that it’s our job to make ourselves happy and meet our needs even when it feels hard. It’s what moves us out of codependence and into self-love.

I hope this post serves you well.

Sending you love ✨

Alex