Ever Wondered How to Love Yourself?

Love and relationships, self and others.

For so long I have always wondered, "what's the point?" For as far back as I can remember, I always felt unworthy of someone's love. From being a child and being bounced around from family member to family member, to being on the streets alone, and frightened because I didn't know how I was going to get my next meal. Nobody around to help, nobody around to talk to, but myself... nobody cared, or so that's how I thought. My father wasn't really there through my childhood, and my mother did the best she could, but that eventually ran out as well.

As I got a little older I found myself in relationships that were mentally and physically abusive. I was looking for something, but didn't exactly know what it was I was looking for, so I put up with all of the inconsistencies of the relationships, and eventually became emotionally abusive myself to those around me. This went on for so many years that it eventually became something that felt normal... Yep, for me that was the norm. It wasn't until about 4 years ago that I actually realized what it was I was missing all those years... it may sound like a cliche but honestly I was missing the love for myself.

It's true what they say if you don't love yourself, how can anybody else love you? And the reason for this is because I've learned that if I didn't love myself or respect myself enough to think that I deserve better than what I had received all my life, then people were going to treat me exactly how I treated myself. I didn't set the bar too high. So one day 4 years ago, I decided that I was going to learn to love myself to the fullest. Hey, I see where the other way got me, why not try something different? Now, loving yourself does not happen overnight, it's an ongoing, lifelong process. I had to continue to own my potential every day. To take action and believe in the limitless things I was capable of, because some how along my life journey I had lost sight of my good qualities. I had to remind myself that I was smart, loving, caring, honest, selfless, and I was willing to work hard. I had decided that I no longer wanted to be toxic for myself, or allow toxic people into my life, even if that meant I would be alone for however long it took to fix that wounded person I had allowed myself to become over the course of 20-plus years.

You see, to love and care about yourself means to have self respect and a positive self-image. It doesn't matter what other people think or believe about you, it means having confidence in who you are and knowing what you're capable of. This doesn't mean being conceited or arrogant, it just means being positive. Believe it or not, after a while of thinking this way and practicing it in your actions on a daily basis, even if it means correcting yourself 20 times a day... Eventually it will become natural and you will not even have to think about it. Once you start doing this, everything else will fall into place. People will start believing in you the more you believe in yourself. Together we will understand what loving yourself means. Next, I will share some more on how I got to where I am today. Over the next couple of months, as i share my love story with you, you will learn how to love yourself, and find love from others.