Self love

yinka ogunlami

April 7, 2017 1:32 PM

A lot of us don't know what self-love is. We often use the term without full knowledge of what it really means.

Love yourself

Self-love is not selfishness, self centeredness or conceit. It's just loving yourself to the point where you know you're enough for you.

It's not thinking you can function alone or thinking you don't need anyone, it's seeing yourself as good enough to the extent that no person or situation can make you feel any less.

Nobody can function entirely in isolation. We all need each other. That being said, we shouldn't have to depend on outside sources for approval or validation. We should be able to give that to ourselves. We should have the conviction that we are good enough regardless of whatever flaws we may have.

It's easy to put ourselves down, it's easy to see ourselves as not smart enough or not pretty enough or not handsome enough, there would always be people who would try to make you feel less of yourself, mostly because it makes them feel better about themselves.

People who don't love themselves enough often tear others down or secretly hope for some form of negativity to creep others lives. Doing this makes them feel better about themselves. It's like therapy for them. It's their way of masking their insecurities.

It's like since I can't be as good as this person, let me bring the person down to my level. Or maybe if I bring you down, nobody would notice my insecurities.

There's nothing wrong with having insecurities. A lot of people have them. Where it becomes a problem is where your insecurities start to define you, when it starts to make you feel less beautiful or less intelligent or less of a person in general.

It's up to you to eliminate the power that insecurity has over you.

A lot of people mask their insecurities under the guise of self-love. If you see yourself often struggling to convince yourself that you're good enough or bringing others down, brandishing what you have over those who don't have it or constantly trying to prove a point, to prove yourself, chances are you haven't attained that level of genuine or honest self-love.

Self-love is not lying to yourself that you're perfect and building resistance to criticism, it's admitting your flaws and learning to love yourself regardless. If you love yourself, you wouldn't have to constantly tell people that you do.

Lack/absence of self-love is one reason many people remain in abusive relationships. They don't believe they can do better than they're currently doing.

They're afraid of the future, afraid of being alone. They feel like who's going to love me now? So they remain. They hold on to it because they're scared if they let go, they aren't good enough to move forward - to attract a better person.

We're all human, there are things people would say or situations we would be put in where we would feel hurt and probably start to question or doubt ourselves; our ability to move on and rise above that, is what's important.

Loving yourself doesn't stop you from regarding others opinions or accepting criticism. It doesn't involve over-confidence but rather it is a feeling of adequacy - saying to yourself I know I'm not perfect, but I love myself regardless.

Written by Noya Sedi

Twitter: @ashotofnoya

yinka ogunlami