#SELFCRUSH: MAKE SELF-LOVE A PRIORITY!

“The worst loneliness is to not be comfortable with yourself”- Mark Twain

You can NEVER be lonely if you like the person you're alone with, which is you. Love yourself first, because that's who you'll be spending the rest of your life with. Henri Frederic Amiel once said, "The man who has no inner-life is a slave to his surroundings." Until you get comfortable with being alone, you'll never know if you're choosing someone out of love or loneliness. Be your own first love! To love oneself is the beginning of a lifelong romance. It has been ascertained that almost 80% of self-esteem and self-abuse issues are a result of people not learning to enjoy their own company. He who trims himself to suit everyone will soon whittle himself away. Amit Ray said, “Have love for your inner self and everything else is done for you.” You cannot get from people what you are meant to get through self-love. The best self-image is the one that is internally motivated. You have to learn how to live in harmony with your own inner world and love yourself.

Mandy Hale once said, “Learn to be alone and to LIKE it. There is nothing more freeing and empowering than learning to like your own company”. Enjoy your own company. Be your own best friend. Take yourself out on a date; learn to stay alone sometimes and relish in your own company. Learn to give yourself what you are asking for from others – you will never be lonely again. The degree to which you fall in love with yourself is the degree to which you can love others. You need time to Reflect, Review, Reconnect, Refresh and Refire. Marilyn Monroe said, “I restore myself when I’m alone”.

Don’t ever lose yourself in a bid to find someone else and don't wander away from yourself to get close to somebody else. Contrary to popular belief, one of the greatest signs of maturity is making yourself a priority. Selflessness is not neglect of self! Mandy Hale said, “It's not selfish to love yourself, take care of yourself, and make your happiness a priority. It's necessary”. You will never gain anyone's approval by begging for it. When you stand confidently in your own worth, respect follows. Most times, in a bid to find others, we neglect the most important thing in life - finding ourselves. The ultimate search in life is not for things, money, job or power. Life’s ultimate search is in finding and discovering ourselves. Helen Keller said, “What I am looking for is not out there, it is in me”. Don't ignore the love you DO have in your life by focusing on the love you DON'T.

Michel de Montaigne, Lord of Montaigne and one of the most significant philosophers of the French Renaissance said, “The greatest thing in the world is to know how to belong to oneself”. The most important decision of your life, the one that will affect every other decision you make, is the commitment to love and accept yourself. It directly affects the quality of your relationships, your work, your free time, your faith, and your future. Be there for others, but never leave yourself behind. When you are saying ‘YES’ to others, make sure you are not saying ‘NO’ to yourself. There comes a time when you have to stop crossing oceans for people who wouldn’t even jump puddles for you. It is really tough to lose someone you love, but it’s even worse to lose yourself while loving them. Learn to create ample time to reconnect with yourself and relish your own company.

One of the critical truth about building a healthy self-esteem is that you will evolve past certain people. It makes no sense to try to extend a friendship that was only meant to be for a season into a lifetime. Never hold tightly to someone that you are afraid of losing except yourself. You cannot discover yourself while building your whole life around someone else. Don’t make someone a priority when all you are to them is just an option. You are a priority! When you are your own best friend, you don’t endlessly seek out relationships, friendships, and validation from the wrong sources because you realize that the only approval and validation you need is your own.

I would rather be ALONE than in a room full of people who could care less if I am there or not. It's a hard lesson learned, but never forgotten! We all need our moments of solitude, and the more we deprive ourselves of this inner adventure, the more our souls go bankrupt. Come to think of it, I have never had a problem with my own company, it has always been with others!

Begin your day with self-love and not technology. Remind yourself of your worthiness before getting out of bed. You owe yourself the love that you freely give to others. I have observed that lack of self-love attracts the wrong people into our life. When we don’t love ourselves deeply, we will always end up demanding from others the love we’re are not giving to ourselves. This is actually the origin of unhealthy expectations; it ultimately opens us up to abusive relationships. Once you start practicing self-love and self-acceptance, you’ll create the right conditions for love to find you.

I want give a special advice to people in relationships to avoid one of relationship grievous sins-Possessiveness! Everybody should be given a ‘space’ in relationships to nurture their individuality. We must learn to give people their ‘breathing space’ in relationships. Every man is entitled to experience life in their own way. Stop choking your partner and stop acting as if you own people. When you refuse to give space to your partner, you deny them the platform for personal growth and experience. Love need space to grow. A wise partner never underestimate the value of space in relationships. The greatest form of abuse is being in a relationship that doesn’t give you the space and platform to be yourself.

Your needs matter, your goals matter, your dreams matter, your life matters, and your happiness matters. Make yourself a priority; you are worth it. It is a fundamental truth of life that no man will value you more than you value yourself. Don’t ‘PAUSE’ your life while you help others ‘PLAY’ theirs. Don’t put your life on hold while waiting for others. What we are waiting for is not as important as what happens to us while we are waiting. Self-love is not an option; it is a critical necessity of life. An internal security will always produce an outward stability.

Be intentional about self-crush. Acknowledge that you are important and worthy of your time. Make a list of things you like to do and incorporate that into your daily routine. Find your happy place and visit it often. Develop hobbies that relieve stress, build confidence, and increase creativity. Take yourself on a date (table for 1 please)! Celebrate your wins, big or small. Say “I love you” to yourself. Someone said, “I fell in love with me and the whole world joined in”. Love yourself enough to take actions required for your own happiness. Love yourself enough to cut-off yourself from people that continually bring you pain. Love yourself enough to move on.

Self-crush check yourself daily. Many times, we may often doubt the love we give to others, but you are always worthy of the love you give to yourself. You can never ‘over-love’ yourself because you deserve all the love you give to yourself. Give yourself an over-dose of love. As a ‘self-love’ doctor, you have my permission!

“There are some places in life where you can only go alone. Embrace the beauty of your solo journey”-Mandy Hale