It's hard to love your life when you're mean to yourself all the time. Loving yourself isn't as easy as it sounds (but you probably know that). Yet it's rewarding, enduring, and leads to love elsewhere. If you want to love and respect yourself, but you're not sure you deserve it, read this.

“Self-love requires you to be honest about your current choices and thought patterns and undertake new practices that reflect self-worth.” – Caroline Kirk

It’s not up to others to love you, though it’s a blessing when they do. Try to let go of your expectations of how you want others to feel about you, and assign *yourself* the task of loving you. It's an awesome one.

How Loving Yourself Changes Everything for the Better

1. You learn to listen to the quiet voice of your intuition, trust it, and follow what your heart is telling you is right.

2. You somehow, have more passion, energy, and motivation than you once had, and you realize that it comes from that source of love inside of you, not the goals in front of you.

3. You cherish your life and make the most of your time and energy doing things that bring meaning and joy to you.

4. You procrastinate less on the things that move the needle, make a positive difference in your life, move you forward. Because you can bring joy to the experience of those things, or at least a healthy respect to them.

5. You consciously surround yourself with people who make you laugh, smile, and keep you hungry for life.

6. You become grateful for the smallest things, and you notice that your life keeps giving you more to be grateful for.

7. You have more energy to love others without feeling exhausted by what you give, express, and care about. The love flows, and goes, full circle.

8. You stop wasting your precious time wishing you were someone or something else.

9. You make healthier choices for your body, the vehicle through which you experience this gift of life, without all the fuss.

10. You get better at bringing appreciation and attention to more moments. And your life is made up of moments. And so your life becomes richer, fuller, more meaningful.

11. You don’t invite and keep any relationship, feeling, or habit that makes you feel anything less than respected, loved, and fulfilled.

12. Your creativity blossoms. You're open to new ideas and trying new things without as much self-doubt to hold you back. You want to expand and enrich yourself.

13. You start attracting healthier relationships full of love, respect, and compassion. You get better at pinpointing situations that don't serve you, before you get involved in them.

14. You become your own best friend and you don't need to rely on so many other people to fulfill your needs of being loved, respected, appreciated, and nourished.

15. You’re more optimistic about your life and start opting to see the bright side of things. Not because bad things don't happen, but because you know just how powerful your perspective can be, for you and for others.

16. You see past physical appearances and recognize the beauty of the heart, the power of the mind, the light of the soul. Nothing shines so bright.

17. You value your own opinion. You learn to love the decisions you make. You trust yourself.

18. You embrace and accept people as they are and treat them with kindness and respect, because that’s something you’re practicing with yourself.

19. You accept compliments and praise with more sincerity and gratitude, which makes all your relationships more fulfilling, for everyone.

20. You're less offendable. You're not on the defensive whenever anyone disagrees with you. You're more curious than anything.

21. You’re open to growth and different perspectives, and you’re not against changing your own mind. This frees you to forgive yourself, which makes you feel even more free to live life fully.

22. You base your self-worth on internal habits like moral values rather than external things and events. This gives you fewer reasons to be stressed out, depressed, anxious.

23. You begin to trust the process and timing of your life, because you believe you’re where you need to be to get to where you ultimately want to go.

24. You invest your resources in self-education and personal growth. You participate in your own life in new ways. You find purpose in your learning.

25. You still make mistakes and get frustrated, but you bounce back easier and faster. You know it’s more productive and helpful for you and the work you feel you're on this earth to do.

. . .

Tell me:

Which of these thoughts did you need to read today?

Tell me in the comments. I read every single one, and I'd love to know!

With love,

Jen

Save

Save

Save

Save

P.S. Never forget how valuable you are, how far you've come, how much potential you have. Go visit my shop for prints of handwritten poems and other words of hope and heart. You'll remember how stunning it is to be here at all.