love yourself

In a world that continues to define a person by the number of likes on a picture or the number of shares and followers, it has become increasingly hard to accept and love yourself. We live in a world that places priority on a person's theme rather than their self-esteem and value. And this is a problem in pretty much everyone in our society. There was a time where I also placed my self-worth on the number of followers, likes and comments I had and I continuously compared myself to people I would see while scrolling through my feed. During this time I had a large amount of toxicity within myself and this created toxic relationships with my friends and family and stopped me from pursuing things that I dreamed about because I felt like compared to these people, I was nothing.

But then I went through a journey of self-discovery and nurturing. I know that sounds awfully wishy-washy and off-putting, but let me tell you, it doesn't have to be. Because this journey is yours, you get to set the rules and do it all your way. But here is a guide that helped me accept that I am more than a number and that I am worthy of anything. I won't make any claims that this is 100% going to work for you because we are all different people, but this is certainly a way to start if you don't have any ideas or if you have already tried everything out there.

The Beginning:
So you have just found this post and you just want to let go of everything and breathe. Well, that is exactly what you will do. This can be done in many different ways it can be either metaphorical such as meditation or yoga or something of that sort or it can literal such as writing down things, people or events that lower your self-esteem and getting rid of that toxicity. What I did is I went through all of the people I was following on Instagram, Snapchat or whatever social media you usually use and unfollow people and celebrities that make you feel bad about yourself. By doing this you are removing the causes of low self-esteem and you can work on building yourself up without any distractions. I also recommend that you remove people and things in your life that create toxicity, I know this can sound daunting and mean but you don't have to make so, simple start to drift away from these people and soon you will be on the path to greatness!

Thinking of Yourself:
Sometimes people wrongly confuse selfishness with self-love. They believe that when someone knows their worth and knows that they are truly a good person, that they are being selfish. And although there is a line between cocky and self-love, as long as a person remains humble, kind and compassionate, they will seldom cross it. Now that you have gotten rid of all or most of the toxicity in your life, you can start to build up your self-esteem. This part of the process involves a lot of mental and self-control as you will be removing all the bad thoughts from your mind and replacing them with good, constructive ideas. To start off, whenever you think off something negative about yourself, stop yourself and say no, and then think of something good about yourself. For example: if I was to think "I have a bad smile" I would stop myself and instead think "my smile is unique, no one else has but one day some will fall in love with it." By doing this you are replacing negative thoughts with positive thoughts and you are creating a sense of self-worth. Do this with any degrading thoughts whether it's about your physical appearance, your talents, your academic achievements or anything. Another exercise you can try is standing in front of a mirror, taking a deep breath and listing all the things you like about yourself and if you think of something negative, replace it with a positive thought.

Being Confident:
Now that you are reinforcing positive thoughts and people into your life, you will start to build up confidence. Hopefully, this will happen naturally but some ways to help are: your body language (standing up straighter, speaking up etc) and faking it until you make it. I know you have probably heard this many times before but it works. I have tried it out and it does work. All you have to do is make people believe that you are confident and then you will begin to also believe in yourself.

Not Falling Back:
This process isn't quick but can take weeks, months even years to achieve, but it is worth it and as long as you keep reinforcing positivity, and believing in yourself you will continue to grow as a person. Also as soon as you feel any kind of toxicity get rid of it.

Hope this has helped, and keep in mind that I have not covered everything and that each person is different so your journey is going to be different to mine and to others.

Let me know what else you would like to see and I hope you enjoyed!