Maybe In Order To Find Love, You Have To Start By Loving Yourself

Fall in love with yourself.

Admire your smile, embrace your natural hair, appreciate your talents, and your persistence in chasing the things you’re passionate about.

Enjoy your own company, take yourself out on dates, and most importantly, create your own happiness.

You know that love you’ve been giving to everyone else? Well invest it internally for once.

Sometimes life takes you off track from valuing the importance of self-love.

We can get so unbelievably lost in a new job, city, or relationship, that we forget that “home” really refers to the space we occupy in our own mind and heart. Be happy to go home at night, when you’re left alone with your own racing thoughts. Feel safe in your own head.

The thing is that sometimes “home” doesn’t always feel safe. Sometimes, being left alone with your thoughts is terrifying. Like a crammed Brooklyn sized studio apartment, your home sure is filled with a lot of clutter. It’s time to organize your mind, and fix your heart.

You fear that the worst will come if you start going down Over-Thinking Boulevard. You’re scared that once you start falling you’ll never stop.

But eventually the ground will break your fall, right?

Hit rock bottom. Embrace rock bottom. Let it hurt like hell in ways you didn’t even know were possible. Allow yourself to be at your absolute worst, and let yourself fall completely apart. Become unrecognizable when you look at yourself in the mirror. Forget who you are, and what you want.

But only do so temporarily.

It’s a scary thought, isn’t it? Losing sight of everything you are and everything you want. But maybe you were looking at life through a blurry lens, with little understanding of what the real picture looks like. Maybe you were at a fork in the road and you started to go down the wrong direction. You were lost.

Maybe you need a new perspective, and a change of heart.

You deserve a new start.

With each ending comes a new beginning, so think of your rock bottom as just that. You miss out on a lot in life if you numb yourself of fully feeling everything, so this time, let it hurt. Hit the ground hard and let yourself shatter into a million pieces, so that you can build a stronger version of the person you once were.

We all go through stages in our lives where we question everything, sometimes even our own self worth. But remember that no one else is responsible for defining your value, other than yourself. Our self worth should be self defined, but often we forget that when we become fixated on the ways in which we are perceived by the people we let get close to our heart. Sometimes when they exit our lives, we lose sense of who we were before we met them, and that’s a problem.

We forget that we are capable of being there for ourselves, in a muddled vision of thinking that we need to rely on someone else to verify our sense of being. Though you might not feel like it now, you as an individual are a whole person. You are complete on your own. You can pick yourself up and move forward. I promise.

So next time you hear a knock on the door, go answer it. Tear down those blockades you’ve created to guard your very bruised heart, and let yourself back in. Sit down at the kitchen table with a reflection of yourself on the other side, and have that brutal but long overdue pep-talk about how life goes on. Put on your fanciest dress, lift your chin up, and open that door.

The world out there has far more to offer you than just the one person who broke your heart, the job you got laid off from, or the friendships that have disappeared. Take a step outside and start a new relationship with yourself.

The first date is always a nerve wrecking one, but in this new relationship you redefine the story. Part one of the series was needed to bring you where you are now. Be grateful for the things in life that pushed you back to yourself.

In this sequel, you have the power to save yourself and be your own hero.