We get it. It’s so difficult to accept and love yourself when no one is giving you instructions on how to do it. We’re expected to learn self-acceptance ourselves, as if it’s the easiest thing to do. In reality, in the world of the productivity cult and social media posts that foster a constant competition between you and other people, it’s extremely difficult to focus on self-love. We collected five practical things that you can do right now to take a little step forward to accepting yourself.
Top 5 Actions
- Set your childhood picture as your lock screen.
This will help you feel more empathetic towards you. Maybe it will break the cycle of you treating yourself less than a human being or thinking that you deserve every bad thing that ever happened to you. Maybe you’ll remember that everything you’re doing is for the younger version of yourself. Now you have all the power to treat yourself with love and compassion (which you might’ve lacked when you were a child).
That’s why it’s important to make your younger self visible, in the first place, to yourself. Seeing your picture would make you think, “What would this little person want?” Maybe when bad thoughts are going to pay you a visit, you will ask yourself, “Is this helpful? Would a little me want to hear that? How can I take care of myself?” As Antoine de Saint-Exupéry wrote in his novella The Little Prince, “We are from our childhood as we are from one country.”
- Beat the paradox of self-acceptance.
We think that we’ll only accept ourselves when we’re perfect; this is where the paradox comes in. You have to accept yourself to the point where you consciously take positive actions and put energy into what’s best for you. Constantly improving yourself is incorrect. We always want to make ourselves better, and if we always want to better ourselves, it means that we don’t like the state we are in now. From this comes the inability to change, which lies in the fact that we cannot change until we fully accept the current situation. Be gentle enough to give yourself permission to love yourself. To be loved is to be changed.
- Look at yourself through the eyes of someone who loves you.
It’s my mom’s advice. Every time I doubt myself, she reminds me of how (im)patiently she was waiting to meet me for the first time. Try to see through your perceived flaws and imperfections. Remember your loved ones. Also, remember random strangers that you meet: your favourite barista in the coffeeshop, your neighbours, the cashiers. You might’ve made them smile one day; imagine your impact on people around you and try to perceive yourself through their eyes. Their love acts as a mirror. It reminds you that you are deserving of love, not just from others but from yourself.
- Get to know yourself (you don’t hate yourself, you just don’t know yourself).
Remember that healing is about coming home to yourself. A popular piece of advice that is out there is to create, invent, and find yourself. We recommend remembering yourself. Just like with the childhood photograph. What did you like to do when you were little? What did you like to do before everything changed (the changing point could be the pandemic year, graduation, breakup, or another pivotal event that you sometimes mark as a point of no return)?
How did your day look when you felt good? Maybe you worked out, journaled, sang, and/or danced but, for some reason, stopped. Try to continue, even if it seems daunting at times. Try to introduce yourself to an imaginary person without using your name, age, sex, occupation, nationality, ethnicity, or location. Think about what you actually enjoy doing, what you love, what your values are, and what you care about.
- Сompliment other people.
Research shows that giving compliments doesn’t just benefit the recipient; it also brings positivity to the giver. It feels nice to be nice. We usually hesitate to compliment people because we underestimate the impact of a simple compliment such as “I like your sweater” or “I love your authenticity.” Simply speaking, when you give a compliment, your oxytocin (happy hormone) levels rise, and you feel good about yourself as you witness the positive effect your words have on others.Your self-acceptance will grow as you step beyond your comfort zone to express appreciation. Stepping out of your comfort zone is an act of self-love itself. “Every time you allow yourself to have fun, when you’ve been so strict and restrictive, you’re loving yourself. Every time you get disciplined, when you normally have very little discipline, that is an act of self-love. Every time you set a boundary that is really necessary, when you usually don’t set the boundary, you’re loving yourself,” says Jillian Turecki, a certified relationship coach, teacher, and writer.
The easiest way to practise self-love is by sending a compliment through Morale. The Morale websites: www.moraleboost.co.uk (UK) and www.moraleboosts.com (US) send anonymous text messages to your friends on your behalf. All you have to do is find a compliment and put in the recipient’s number, we then send it from us saying ‘Sent by a friend using moraleboosts.com’.
