The act of ‘loving’ is often focused on the outside world. We love our partners, family, pets, and hobbies. In most cases, we can also explain why we feel that love.

To value yourself, you need to look at yourself with an open mind. On the other hand, self-love ‘obliges’ you to look on the inside. It also requires letting go of judgments and expectations and seeing yourself as you indeed are.

Self-love is:

• Looking in the mirror and being happy with yourself.
• Seeing yourself as being immaculate, despite your imperfections.
• Daring to be yourself.
• Allowing yourself to deserve the world.
• Owning up to your power.

Living the life you want to live (despite what other people think).

What is self-love good for?

Why is self-love so important? Isn’t loving yourself egotistical or narcissistic?

Ab-so-lute-ly not.

Self-love is the foundation of everything. To explain this, we will use the cliché of the oxygen mask in the airplane. In an aircraft, they always tell you that you should always put on the oxygen mask first before helping others in case of an emergency. You probably thought to yourself the first time you heard this: ‘no, my children/partner always comes first.

However, you can’t help your children/partner if you faint due to a lack of oxygen. That’s why you need to take care of yourself first before taking care of someone else.

Only when you control your own life can you help others to get control of their lives? It works the same way with self-love. You can only truly love someone else – unconditionally – if you love yourself first. You can only take care of others if you’ve learned to take care of yourself.

What’s the point in helping others when you’re too tired, moody, angry, or sad?

Why self-love?

Self-love is the foundation of a happy life. It determines how your life will go. If you love yourself, it will change how you live your life. You will feel more beautiful, more self-confident, happier, and more comfortable with your body. If you think this way, you will exude happiness and positively influence the people around you.

To feel this way, you need to make decisions for yourself. This is difficult for many people because they feel selfish when they put themselves first.

Let’s say you’ve worked hard all week. You get invited to a party but prefer to stay at home, take a hot bath and go to bed on time.

Self-love also means saying ‘no’ and preserving boundaries. It doesn’t mean you’re egotistical; it just means you are putting yourself first. Eventually, it will give you more energy, you’ll feel happier, and you’ll be a more friendly person all around.

It’s just a matter of practicing.

How do you develop self-love?

You can start practicing self-love by making plans with yourself, just like you would with other people.

How often do you meet up with friends, family, or colleagues? You might schedule appointments like these in your planner and try to stick to your schedule. If someone else wants to meet with you on the same date, you would probably tell that person you can’t meet because you already have plans.

But how often do you apply this to appointments with yourself? Perhaps you decided on watching a movie tomorrow night so you can relax after a hard day’s work. However, you allow an appointment with a friend to get in the way.

Self-love can teach you how to make appointments with yourself just as seriously as your appointments with others. You can watch the movie without feeling guilty and have enough energy to meet up with your friend on another occasion. So you will be able to say to your friend: ‘No, I can’t, I already have a license.

Why affirmations for self-love?

Let’s say you have relationship problems and keep attracting the wrong men/women. You may tend to look for the situation outside yourself:

• ‘How come I never meet the right man/woman?’
• ‘I’m always the one to have bad luck.’
• ‘I always attract the wrong men/women.’

Why not ask yourself this question: do I love myself enough?

Only when you genuinely love yourself are you able to be yourself? Then others can love you for who you indeed are. That’s how you attract the right people into your life.

The fact is that when you don’t love yourself, you could be pretending to be someone you’re not. You feel insecure, act differently, try to please the other person, or overcompensate. The result is that you attract a partner that suits this version of yourself.

You’re like a magnet. You attract what you accept and what you are. If you are not entirely yourself, don’t love yourself, don’t dare to be yourself, you will attract someone who fits that description.

But if you have a positive outlook in life and put yourself first, you will attract someone who suits you better. Someone who positively compliments you, who makes you feel more powerful.

Love works with romantic relationships and other kinds of relationships, like friendships and customer relations.

What are affirmations for self-love?

Self-love is a journey that needs your utmost dedication, and that’s something you can train yourself to do. Being strict with the appointments you make with yourself is one way to do it. Another way is to use the affirmations for self-love.

An affirmation is positive reinforcement. Short, powerful sentences to influence your conscious and subconscious.

Loving yourself requires a different way of looking at yourself. It means trying not to be negative when looking at yourself in the mirror in the morning: ‘ooh, I look terrible, ‘I really should lose some weight,’ ‘I look so tired’…

You can change these automatic thoughts by repeating positive affirmations for self-love (out loud or in your mind). Instead, you have positive reviews when looking in the mirror: ‘wow, I look good, ‘I love myself, ‘I am powerful.’