10 More Great Ways to Love Yourself
Every February I write about how to love yourself. Being your own Valentine is the best gift you can give yourself.
Loving yourself is the gift that keeps on giving: when you love yourself more you can share more of that love with others in your life.
Here are some concrete ways to get started…
Gifts that Say I Love You to Yourself
1. 5 minutes of doing nothing. Many people actually find this one difficult. Sit down in silence with no devices or distractions. Close your eyes and give yourself permission to BE with no doing.
2. Say goodbye to the Joneses. Stop comparing yourself to others. Don’t dwell on others who put on their Facebook faces. Everyone is unique and there is no good that comes from comparing. You are valuable just the way you are!
3. Thank yourself. Real gratitude is seeing the gifts that are inside of you. Before bed each night, thank yourself for one really wonderful thing about yourself.
4. Get comfortable saying No. Know yourself and know your boundaries. Listen to your inner wisdom and give yourself permission to say no sometimes. If you learn to stop automatically saying yes to things that others want or expect from you, you will have more time to say yes to what YOU want. Don’t say yes when your inner wisdom says no.
5. Speak to yourself with kindness. Give yourself the respect you would give to a friend. Stop the internal critical dialogue, name calling and criticism. Give yourself the benefit of the doubt. Just like everyone else, you’re doing the best you can in any given the situation.
6. Stop stuffing your feelings. Your feelings matter! Emotions are part of being a human being. You have a right to all of your feelings, even the ones that other people may not like, and even the ones that can feel uncomfortable like anger and sadness. Honoring all of your feelings is part of honoring and loving yourself. Allow yourself to have ALL your feelings and express them in a healthy, respectful way.
7. Time alone. Both introverts and extroverts benefit from a little solitude, with no one to attend to but your incredible self. Do whatever you want with your time – it’s all yours!
8. Don’t Do. Not “doing” can be an important gift to yourself. Don’t do that one extra thing before bedtime, don’t stay up late on Facebook, don’t have that third glass of wine, don’t rush out of the house at the last minute frantic about being late, don’t spend 3 hours of your time to try to save a few dollars. Find something on your to-do list that you really don’t need to do.
9. Allow yourself to receive. Value yourself enough to say yes to offers of help, say yes to support, say yes to a friend who wants to buy you lunch. Receive gifts graciously. You deserve it!
10. Let imperfect be good enough. You are probably your own worst critic. We are all imperfect. We all make mistakes. We all have regrets. Give yourself a break and allow yourself to be like the rest of us human beings: perfectly imperfect.
Need more ideas?
Here’s 10 More Gifts that Say I Love You to Yourself
And even More Ways to Love Yourself