10 Methods for Self-Love to Build Resiliency
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I am learning how to love myself. It will be a life-long process, but I’m vested in it. The most crucial moments in practicing self-love come when I’m at my worst. When I’ve tumbled so much under wave after wave and don’t know how I’m going to come back up for air.
The moments when I can’t breathe are when I need to force myself to breathe because I deserve air. This is true self-love—when you stand up tall after being knocked down again and again and again.
And we all have these moments. My most recent moment was two days ago. I am a habitual binge-eater when shit hits the fan. Save for being overweight, I’m a relatively healthy woman. But, I wasn’t taught how to process negative emotions. They were always swept under the rug, brushed off and not talked about. I’d stuff them down deep and bury them with ice cream and pretzels until they threatened to overflow again. The process would ebb and flow, and my weight would, too. But because I have PCOS, the weight started hanging around.
When the scale read 198, my mouth dropped open. I needed to make some changes, and fast.
Since then, I’ve been eating better and exercising more. I’ve even been working on the problems I have with negative emotions. But, two days ago, the emotions became too much. I binged.
Usually, I feel so awful after that I binge some more. This time was different. Instead of feeling like a shitty person, I got mad.
Getting mad was a good thing because it led to this thought about my practicing self-love:
Getting knocked down in life happens, and it needs to happen to love myself more.
That sounds crazy, right? How does feeling like crap lead to loving myself more?
First, let’s acknowledge that you nor I will go our entire lives without feeling defeat or despair. We’re humans, capable of the full emotional-spectrum, and dammit, we will feel every. last. emotion. there is to feel while on Earth. That’s how it is.
Everyone will be knocked down, many people more than once. No gettin’ around it, I’m afraid. And I have been knocked on my ass many times. Because I was taught that falling down was a bad thing, I never learned to recover gracefully. It takes me awhile and some serious ugly crying. I’ve become good at keeping myself pinned under heavy rocks. When the rocks eventually crumbled, I’d get back up and keep going, waiting for the next rock to fall.
Living that way is like trudging through tar in the fog. You curse yourself for not noticing the signs warning you about tar. You curse yourself for going out after rain when the fog is known to be heaviest in your area. You curse yourself for leaving the house at all! And when you finally make it out of the tar and fog, you stand there. You wait for the next wave of fog to roll in, knowing there's more tar out there somewhere.
Can you imagine how living in such fear, anxiety, and worry is damaging to your health? There are many studies on how bad living with constant negativity is for your well-being. But you know this, and I know this. And yet, I continued putting myself into these types of positions.
This last binge-episode sparked something new, though. Perhaps, we’re viewing this all wrong. We’re not supposed to go through life afraid of falling down all the time. The point of life is to get back up every single time. In fact, it’s imperative when showing ourselves love.
I’m not showing myself love if I’m kicking myself in the ass. (No shit, right?)
Sounds so simple it’s stupid. Of course I’m not showing myself love when I’m contorting my body to stick a boot up my arse every time something bad happens. And yet, I’ve done it time and again.
In my last binge-episode, I realized this is ridiculous. I’m stuffing my face full of food because I let someone tear me down? I let someone else’s poorly conceived notions of who I was at my core seep into my own thoughts about myself? What that person had said was mean and hurtful, but it wasn’t true. And I knew it. Yet, here I was, destroying my health in more ways than one.
I was pissed.
At first, I was pissed at them for making me feel that way. But then I realized no one can make me feel any sort of way unless I let them. And it was because I didn’t stand up for myself. I didn’t put up boundaries with this person and say, “hey, not cool, time to move on.”
Bad shit “happens to us” so that we can learn from them. I had to learn that being healthy meant loving myself so much that I won’t allow others to affect me. Easier said than done, I know. But the first step is admitting there’s a problem, and that’s done through changing perspectives.
What can I do to show myself love when I’m down?
No matter what, easing off the self-battering is the first step. This is also the most crucial. It won’t matter what you do if you’re berating yourself the entire time you’re doing it. After you’ve lightened up on the destructive self-talk, try these 10 methods to show yourself love.
Save inspirational pins to a “feel better” Pinterest board. I call mine “motivation.”
Journal on why you’re feeling down and what part you played in allowing it to happen (we all play a part). What positive action can you take to ensure this situation doesn’t happen again.
Document several instances when you overcame a hardship.
Do a self-check of all your amazing qualities. If you’re having trouble thinking positively, take your negatives and flip them. Ex: “I’m so clumsy. I always spill my drinks.” -----> “I may not be a ballerina, but I stumble out of falls gloriously.”
Create two columns on a piece of paper. Write down all the “bad” qualities you feel you have in the moment in one column. Then, in the other column, write down what qualities you wish you possessed. On a separate page, write positive steps you can take to get those desired qualities.
Write down what you would tell a good friend in that situation. Roleplay if you have to.
Find one positive image online to represent a good quality about yourself. Make that image your phone or computer background.
Find your favorite comedian on Instagram and scroll through their pictures. Whatever makes you laugh.
Take a nap or go to sleep for the night. Sometimes, you need to reset.
Acknowledge that you’re a human being. You’re not perfect. No one is, and that you’re doing the best you can with the information you have at the time. Tomorrow is a new day with a completely clean slate.
Only you are 100% present at all times in your life. Might as well love yourself and enjoy your company as often as possible. Remember that no one is perfect all the time. No life is completely perfect, despite appearances. Shit will happen and you’ll fall down. What’s most important is that you conduct a self-check each time it happens. Assess what happened and what should change to make your future better.
Then, you pick yourself up and move on with your newfound knowledge.
Here’s to always getting back up and moving on, yeah? We’re all in this together.