How to practice self-love and stop being hard on yourself
On our recent family vacation, I noticed I was being very hard on myself and needed to remember to give myself some grace. It is easy to constantly dwell on what you could have done better and forget to enjoy the moment. In our lives as individuals, mothers, partners, caregivers, or professionals, there will be times when you will have to choose to love yourself and not be overly hard on yourself.
In this blog post, we will explore five ways to practice self-love every day.
#1: Accept that good is good enough
While striving to do our best is a good thing, it can very easily become a burden. Wanting to be perfect in everything you do puts you under so much pressure and is not sustainable. You want to get to a place where you feel ok with delivering good outputs. Especially if you are playing multiple roles, you need to know when to accept that you have completed a particular task and be ok with it. Sometimes striving to get things done well and not perfect is what we need to do to enjoy our lives.
Questions to consider
What areas of your life are you putting yourself under so much pressure because you want to be perfect?
#2: Track your accomplishments and celebrate your successes
When you get into the habit of celebrating your wins, it helps remind you of how far you have come and the progress you are making. Often, we forget to celebrate the completion of a task or project and keep moving to the next thing without taking a moment to enjoy it. Celebrating what you have accomplished is a great way to remind yourself of how amazing you are.
Questions to consider
What have you accomplished over the past three months?
#3: Track your learnings
There will be situations that will go differently than you planned. Although you might not be satisfied with the outcome, the best way to deal with them is to take away the lessons you learned and keep moving. We tend to dwell on the failures and regrets we have. It would be better to learn from them and strive not to make the same mistakes again in the future.
Questions to consider
What lessons did you learn from the last thing that you did not do well?
#4: Continue discovering who you are
We are growing and evolving with every life experience and phase. Spending time getting to know yourself is essential. You will discover things that you did not know about yourself that are awesome. Knowing your strengths and things that make you unique will help you appreciate yourself even more.
Questions to consider
What is one thing you like about yourself?
#5: Take care of yourself
We focus more on caring for others and ensuring their needs are met while neglecting our own needs. It is time to start taking care of yourself and spoiling yourself. If I asked you when last you did something nice for yourself, it might take you a while to remember. We deserve to be a priority on our lists. Make time to practice self-care, take a break and get some rest as often as you can.
Questions to consider
How are you going to spoil yourself this month?
Final Thoughts
You are doing an excellent job even when you do not see it. We are often our worst critics and sometimes set unattainable goals for ourselves. Be kind to yourself and celebrate your awesomeness.
Time for Reflection
How have you been hard on yourself?
What is one nice thing that you need to tell yourself more?
What is one way you want to practice self-love this week?
