Jan 14, 2019 by Renee Linnell

Self-love. There is so much talk about self-love, but what is it exactly? I feel qualified to tell you because lack of self-love almost killed me and learning self-love saved my life.
 
Self-love is giving to yourself everything you want to come from another person. Everything you yearn for. The compliments. The flowers. The nice dinners. The lingerie. The bubble baths with candle light. It’s not waiting around for someone else to give this to you. It’s not waiting around for someone to come into your life so you can dress up or light candles or go out to dinner. It’s dressing up and lighting candles and going out to dinner on your own because you are worth it. 

Self-love is treating yourself the way you would treat your own three-year-old inner child. Would you make her wait 45 minutes to go to the bathroom if she had to pee? Because you just want to get through traffic and get home? Or would you pull over for her? Would you feed him a healthy lunch when he’s hungry or tell him you are too busy working to stop and make a meal? Would you pull over for strawberries and raspberries because he wanted bright nourishing food or would you make him eat another frozen burrito for dinner because you don’t feel like stopping? Would you make her wear clothing she feels ugly in or not go back to the house because she’s cold and you forgot a jacket?
 
Self-love is so subtle. But when we do for ourselves what we would do for a loved child or what we fantasize about a lover doing for us, the child inside of us smiles. S/he no longer feels afraid. S/he feels taken care of. S/he feels safe and joyful. When you have your own back you no longer get as disappointed with the world or with people because you know you are the cause of your own happiness. It is incredibly empowering.

And, the most interesting thing happens: as you fill yourself up with love you become happy and softer and kinder and more patient and people become drawn to you. They want to help and love and give to you. The more you love yourself, the more you get surrounded with love and the more you attract people that are loving. And then, best of all, you attract in a partner that loves him/herself. And the two of you lift each other up instead of dragging each other down. It is a circle, you see. Love begets love. Kindness begets kindness. Patience and compassion begets patience and compassion.

We have launched into a brand new year and the astrology is ripe for love. We are being astrologically supported in making all the changes we need to make. Let’s try, every day, to be a little kinder to ourselves. A little more patient. A little more giving. A little more caring. Can we look in the mirror and see ourselves as beautiful? Wouldn’t you tell your inner child s/he is beautiful? Do we have to give in to the media that tells us we are ugly and need their product to look better? The answer is no. It is up to us. It has always been up to us. Do we have to use the crappy iPhone camera images as examples of our ugliness? Can’t we tell ourselves instead that those images do not depict our inner beauty at all and just ignore them? We get to decide we are beautiful. We get to decide we are worthy. We get to decide we are lovable. And once we do, hallelujah, this life on earth becomes so much more fun.

Image: by Tumana for Shutterstock

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