10 ways to start loving yourself the way you deserve to be loved

Loving yourself takes effort and investment into what makes you happy. It requires you to be playful, be creative and think outside the box. Routine can become quite stale after some time so mix it up. The following can help on your journey to loving yourself in a healthy way.

1. Watch and notice your thoughts

How are you responding to your own thoughts? Are you directing them to the negative or positive side? What is the quality of them? Is your thought process generally negative? We choose our thoughts - Becoming aware of them will help to strengthen our ability to take control of them and steer to the positive side.

If you notice that a lot of anxiety is coming from your thoughts, it probably means that they are doing their own thing. And thoughts tend to pull towards the negative if we don't watch them.

2. Learn the difference between just thoughts and intuition

It is important to take note of thoughts and intuition and practice the ability to differentiate between understanding a guided message to us through our intuition, or a thought that we have filtered through our own uniquely created paradigm set up.

85% of our fears do not come true and are simply our brain doing its very clever work of memorizing all that has once affected us. Any similarities to past events the brain might pick up on, that have previously hurt or scared us, will automatically be registered and very quickly realized into further feelings of fear as a way of 'protecting us against further pain'.

3. Realize that pain is your friend

As explained above, the human self tries to run away from pain. However, pain is a very vital part of living and a very vital part of loving yourself. If, for example, we let our fears overcome us and control us, we would not face certain situations that would be important for our growth, personal growth or business growth, whichever challenge it might be. On the other side of pain or discomfort is the reward.

It is the same as going to work out in the gym, the satisfaction comes after working out hard and going against tiredness or feelings of weakness and doing it anyway. When you have an exam or when you have to perform, fear always hits just before. But how good will you feel if you didn't go on stage, didn't perform, didn't push a bit harder to see results cause of fear? Don't be scared of pain; it is inevitable which is necessary for growth and development.

4. Go outside your comfort zones

For me, I can procrastinate very easily. So going outside my comfort zone would mean to be more diligent in acting on my deliverable against comfort-sitting on whatever that I use to while away time. Sometimes it is a matter of 'speaking up', not giving in to comfort food too much, pushing myself to go to workout even when I'm tired, etc.

We all have our comfort zones. So when it comes to self-love, it is many times not only about doing what you want to do right now or what you feel most comfortable in right now, such as instant gratification comfort situations. They can be more damaging than pushing through to go against your comfort zones as it will show results for the long run. Ask yourself, how will this help me in the long run?

5. Reactive vs proactive

When it comes to our day to day, how many times do you 'react' to situations? If it is reacting to a friend, neighbor, family or your boss? We don't realize how much of our actions are on autopilot. Simply reacting and not slowing down to think through our actions and possible short/long term effect can adversely affect our mood and ultimately how we feel about ourselves.

Every reactive behaviour gets stored and will come back to us in some form or shape. Sometimes we benefit from simply taking our time to respond to an email that might enrage us, a telephone call that made us sad or a comment that frustrated us. If we let ourselves calm down before reacting and come from a calm place, usually that place comes from a place of inner peace and calm. It's always important to act from a place of calmness and self control.

6. See the lesson in everything and practice letting go Whatever the situation, there is a truly powerful message being delivered to you. It might seem that the package looks quite harsh, but if we look between the lines, we had something to learn and without this happening, we probably wouldn't have seen it. Life will always enrich us with lessons that we can take from 'challenges'. If it is a loss of something or someone or a big unexpected change that really makes you tremble, you can choose to see the good in it.

Everything in life comes to us for a purpose. So what could it be that you might have had to learn? One can only get to this by being truly and honestly open to oneself. Admitting to oneself that one has things to learn will open up the ability to see what the message is. This is important to move on from this kind of challenge for it not to become recurring and also for us to grow and not feel affected as much as we once used to when faced with something similar again. By seeing this, we will only become stronger. Deflecting will make us weaker.

7. Tune into your body

What is your body communicating with you? Have you got a cold, maybe your body is telling you to slow down, do you feel tired all the time, is your heart racing in certain moments? Observe yourself and listen. What can you feel? And when? We can learn so much simply by observing. Some people have to adopt stronger habits than others to go against what 'runs in the family'. Illness is not a punishment it is our body communicating with us to adapt to what is healthier for us.

We can always improve on things, we can always make changes. We are no victims. We are our own master! Whatever we feed it, food to drinks to medication, to cigarettes, to whatever has an effect on our body, physically, mentally and spiritually - It can damage or it can heal! We will know for ourselves what truly is the right thing for us if we just tune in and listen to ourselves and watch our body communicating to us, from us.

8. Do more things that truly excite you

Since the feeling of excitement makes us happy, sends of endorphins through our body and creates a healthy bit of positive energy flowing through us, then we should do more things that excite us! We want to attract more positive things, we need to do more positive things. What excites you is unique to you and no one can tell you what this is. Embrace it and have fun! It will spark creative energy that will get the inspirations flowing. This space is where ideas can come flushing in and everything seems possible! It's about priorities.

Once you understand that doing things you truly love and make your heart shine bright will give you more quality at your life, be it at work, in your business and with your relationships, you will prioritize them more. Try it out and see for yourself! What have you not done in a long while but that was really fun? What is a hobby you have stopped doing or what can add more sparkle into your week?

9. Share your time with people around you

It is easy to get caught up in our own stuff and have our head hanging down in our phones or in our computers, not really seeing what's around us or who is around us when walking on the street. Life can get so busy sometimes and so fast too, but we forget (not intentionally) to snap out of it and actually open our eyes and be present for people around us. Even calling a friend out of the blue, lending a helping hand to people,  or even just throwing a smile at someone. It can make a true difference! When we do things that go out of our way and truly embrace those moments, with the energy 'because we want to' , not because we have to, we can transform a situation that might at first have been something we didn't feel like doing, into something that generates energy for ourselves and for the world.

10. Communicate fearlessly and kindly

Be assertive - Communication is probably the most important quality ever; both for the relationship we have to ourselves and the relationships we have with others. First we communicate to ourselves, we can tell ourselves lies because it makes us 'feel' better, but in the long run, it damages us. If we communicate to ourselves truthfully, even if it is difficult, we can also let it go easier. Then, when we communicate it out into the world, the universe receives that authenticity and reflects it back to us. The energy will be purified for us and the topic dealt with.

Tip: Let a minimum of three hours pass before answering an intense issue, if it is really a big deal, take three days. Just check yourself and see if you would respond from a hurt place or from a place trying to see both parts.

#selfacceptance #lifestyle