Self-Love

By Nainika Rijesh

In the dictionary, self-love means regard for one's own well-being and happiness. The relationship you have with yourselves is the only life-long relationship and is the most important love of our lives. It gives us courage to be assertive, make decisions and set boundaries. Scientifically, it relaxes our brain cells, reduces stress, and increases our mental health. People who love themselves are less likely to suffer from anxiety or depression. The Bible says, the cup runneth over. If we fill our cup and truly love ourselves, we can also share healthy love with others.

Even though it sounds very straightforward and easy, many people find it difficult to develop self-love. One of the main reasons why it is hard is the high standards we set for ourselves. We tend to look at the fact that the glass is half empty instead of half full and often end up being too hard on ourselves. Reasons for dissatisfaction could arise from various factors such as poor academic performance, disapproval from authority figures, social beauty standards, ongoing stressful life events such as financial trouble, abuse and more. Society has moulded us to give unduly importance to what other people think, resulting in low self-confidence, fear that we are not good enough and dependency on assurance from others. We try to put up a happy act even when we are discontent within and forget to seek true happiness. If self-love is lacking, it is difficult to help or empathise with someone else's problems.

A few signs of low self-esteem are saying negative things and being critical about yourselves, thinking other people are better and blaming yourselves even when you are not at fault. In order to deal with these, we must stop comparing and stop being afraid of making mistakes. When we process our insecurities and accept ourselves, we start to experience true happiness. We must scrutinise our thoughts and learn to challenge our negative thinking and let negativity pass instead of burying ourselves in them. If we start to accept ourselves as who we are, we can immediately see changes like clarity of thought, stronger determination and motivation, a better sleep cycle, improvements in our relationships etc.

We should be careful not to mistake self-love with selfishness. Selfishness is all about taking care of oneself without thinking of others, while self-love is about caring for oneself while still being considerate of others. All of us are unique and on different life journeys, compassion and love to oneself and others will only make the journey more beautiful.

By Nainika Rijesh