Self-love
Self-love according to the wonderful Google is: “regard for one's own well-being and happiness.”
But this has become something that we are doing less and less of, and that's due to many reasons that I will go into later.
What's happened to self-love
Self-love is something that can be associated with different life experiences. We must aim to keep it, or if it goes, we have to fight to get it back. This may sound a bit confusing but the following will help to iron this out.
A lot of people struggle to love themselves internally, and this is due to many reasons in life such as, not being happy with where they are in their working lives, personal lives and more.
Others may fall victim to bullying (both in educational environments, social and working). Some may fall victim to a negative upbringing or situations in their life that have been so traumatic they feel victimized (something that I used to suffer with for many years).
On top of these common reasons, society itself (people, colleagues, family members, friends) is always trying to tell you to act a certain way, or be a certain person, or be how they think you should be instead of supporting positivity and self-love for freedom of oneself. When someone has to change who he or she is to match others, that is when self-love can start to become destroyed. Thankfully we live in a generation that this is accepted (or at least in the western world I live in), but there are still places in the world that do not have this mentality, and this does affect many people.
Working to overcome
When you face these challenges and battles, this is when self-love can really help. Once you surpass comments from people in society and stop focusing your energy on what others say and start listening to yourself, your self-love will come back into play. That is when you can use that feeling to achieve the right things for you and be happy within yourself. Don't get me wrong, there are things that people in your circle say that are correct but there are also things that you may have to dismiss. Learning that art is something that takes time, and something I still struggle with on a day to day basis. Acknowledging what someone says doesn't mean you need to act upon it.
Following your intuition
Following what you believe deep down is not easy in the reality of life. However, remember that nobody really knows the situation you are in and, in the most beautiful way possible, they don't really care as much as you think they do. People just want to have an opinion to make themselves feel better or feel like they are a part of something.
Remember to love yourself
Loving yourself, doing what makes you happy and not letting others' opinions affect yours are three main ingredients that have helped me overcome a lot of challenges.
Even though this is challenging in itself, with controlling the mind as much as possible and getting on the right path with the power of yoga and meditation, this can start to become a reality.
Thank you for reading and I hope you have enjoyed today’s topic.
Written by Suraj Ghumra.