Self Love

 What is self-love? Is it saying I love myself? Is it saying I choose myself or is it a decision you make to prioritize yourself? Because many a times the people who profess this act way contrary to their confession and you are left wondering, 'didn’t you just…?'

In my opinion, loving yourself is a lifestyle and not a phrase you throw around in the beginning of the year, month or in the unfortunate end of a relationship. It is a conscious decision that you are not going to allow some things into your life. Self-love is making decisions and actions with your best interest at heart. If helping a dying person means jeopardizing your own safety then withhold the help.

Loving yourself means saying no to some habits because you know their consequences will not be pretty later on. It is choosing what is best for you irrespective of how strongly you feel against it. So like I said, it is a lifestyle, a series of decisions that culminate into you realizing the best version of your self.

And sometimes loving yourself means separation from some people and relationships and circles because their core beliefs or practices are against what you feel is right for you. It means waking up one day and deciding to reduce your interaction with some of your friends because their influence on you is not in tandem with the person you are aspiring to be.

Self-love is choosing you over your friends, emotions, colleagues and those around you. It means being intentional about your words, your actions and interactions.

At this point I know both you and I realize that we have not been loving ourselves equally as loud as we have been shouting it. So how about we start doing it? How about we slowly start choosing ourselves? How about we start making decisions with us in mind and not the other people? Like that day you went out with your friends even though you knew you had work the following day just because you did not want to disappoint your friends? Or that time when you made a huge sacrifice for a person at the expense of your own dreams and aspirations? There are loads and loads of examples to quote of the times we have chosen others and neglected ourselves.

May this, therefore, be a wake up call to us. That we shall choose us. We come first. We shall love ourselves and not just in word but in deed. Reminds me of this verse in the good book ‘Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth.’