Why Fit in When you Were Born to Stand Out?
You are uniquely you. Dr. Seuss said, “Why fit in when you were born to stand out”?
I love my perfect imperfections. I love myself for who and what I am. I was born with everything I need to be.
When we don’t love ourselves, we don’t feel worthy of love and we don’t allow ourselves to be loved by others
When we don’t love and accept ourselves fully, we can’t ever have a great relationship or a happy life. We can’t expect others to make us happy or fulfill us. We can only do that for ourselves. This makes us stronger, independent and self-reliant. We carry around the pain of never feeling good enough to have the kind of love other people experience. We doubt ourselves; we doubt our partners, friends, and family. We doubt the sincerity of love.
We allow challenges to demoralize and deflate us. We don’t ask for a raise, we stay in dead-end jobs. We’ll lose weight and feel fatter than ever. We give up on our health, thinking it’s too hard or takes too much effort. We look for quick fixes to make ourselves feel better: shopping, spending money we don’t have, a new haircut, a one-night stand, a bottle of wine, a fudge sundae.
In the end, none of these fix us at all. Instead, they leave us feeling lonelier, emptier, and sadder than ever. We will remain that way until we stop looking for other people to give us the approval, love, and care we yearn for and deserve. After all, why would someone else love us, if we don’t think we are worthy?
Oscar Wilde said, “Be yourself, everyone else is already taken”. Your Individuality is what defines you.
Loving Yourself Changes Your Life More Than Anything Else You Can Do
Here’s the thing about loving ourselves: until we do, we don’t realize its power. We think the reason for our unhappiness is “out there,” and we go searching for someone, or something, to fulfill us. We do whatever we can to avoid looking inward because looking inward is scary. It means acknowledging who we are and accepting our self with all of our flaws. Remembering past hurts and facing our fears instead of loving all our perfect imperfections.
We reject self-love as the powerful, uplifting force in our lives. We take our credit cards, four-course meals, our barely-satisfying relationships, and we wrap ourselves in their protective cocoon… anything to avoid acknowledging how we feel inside. We forget about what loving ourselves means, and how it feels.
Loving yourself means you don’t hide who you really are. You share your feelings – even the messy ones – and own up the truth of your life and your mistakes.
You don’t need to prove anything to anyone because you know the only opinion that matters about is your own. You don’t accept bad treatment, or social pressure, or feel compelled to do things you don’t want to do just because you feel pressured to. You can fully accept and enjoy being loved by someone else. You aren’t doubtful of their feelings. You trust them. You never worry if their love will end, or if you aren’t good enough. You aren’t afraid of getting hurt. You don’t push love away, or subconsciously create reasons why your relationship will let you down. Loving yourself means you are at peace with yourself. You focus your energy on CREATING what you want. You are uniquely you.
