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Love Yourself

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Love Yourself. A hand is drawing a heart in red on glass spelling out I love me, representing the idea of love yourself.One of our beautiful readers, Nadia, wrote to me asking how to learn to love yourself more. I realized that this is something that all of us soft-hearted, sensitive, caring souls need to learn to do better. Here's her letter along with my response to share with all of you.

Dearest beautiful Jane,

The last articles were really good, thank you really for that! I really benefit from them!! There is this one thing that I've got on my mind...I wonder how do you love yourself more? 🙂 I feel I'm lacking this self-love and I wonder if you can give me some tips? I would really appreciate it.  Much love!

Nadia

My response:

Dear Nadia,

Thank you for your kind words. I'm so glad to hear these articles are resonating with you, and yet I understand what you are saying here; if the key to being more confident is learning to love yourself - how do you actually do that? Especially if you come from a place like so many of us do, where loving yourself is such a foreign concept, and self-loathing is a more accurate picture of what we're so used to doing!

A post I wrote about this, It's Time to Be Selfish, also speaks to this topic, but here's what I've discovered about the journey to love yourself more.

Surround yourself with love.

It's first and foremost about surrounding yourself with supportive people who love and accept you the way you are and make you feel good about yourself.

At the same time, it's about letting go of those people who have the opposite effect on you and are always overtly trying to change you, make comments that make you feel they don't truly accept you, and in one way or another send the message that you're not OK the way you are, you'd be better off being the way they think you should be, and ultimately give you the feeling that there's something wrong with you even though they don't know anything about what they're talking about! The don't.

Now if these people are members your family, while it's not possible to change our families of origin, we can choose to limit our interactions with them and set clear strong boundaries with them when we do need to be around them to limit the amount of control they're able to have over our lives and the way we feel. The idea here, is that by surrounding ourselves with supportive, positive people, it's much easier to be loving to ourselves than if we're always feeling like we need to defend or explain ourselves.

Be passionate.

Get involved in hobbies, passions, activities and projects that you're passionate about and enjoy doing. There's nothing that sends a clearer message to ourselves that we're special and worthy and have so much to offer than doing things that give us proof of that. From the small things like being kind to people when we talk to them, to causes we support or volunteer for where we can genuinely make a difference in the world, it's doing these types of things that give us a whole person to love in ourselves - and reminds us of even more reasons why we're special and can make a difference in a way that's unique to us!

Remember it's OK to say no.

Only say yes to those things you really mean to say yes to, and remember it's OK to say no to the things you really don't want to do! So often we get so caught up in that pleasing mentality where we feel guilty if we say no, and we feel like we always have to say yes if we want people to like us, that we miss out on a wonderful opportunity to show our beautiful selves just how much we're worth and how loving we can be to ourselves.

We becomes so much less authentic when we give up being true to ourselves in exchange for giving people what we think they want from us, and in the process, we send ourselves the very unloving message that we don't have the right to stand up for ourselves and let our yes's simply be yes's, and our no's simply be no's, without long, apologetic defensive explanations.

Responses like this only make us feel worse about ourselves and make us sound like we don't truly believe we have the right to make our own decisions that are best for us! This one can be especially difficult to do if you received the message that saying no was selfish and being agreeable made you a good little girl. But it's also one of the most important things you can do to honor and respect that beautiful woman you truly are!

Keep growing.

Stretch yourself to do things that are out of your comfort zone. Ask yourself what you believe isn't your strong point or your personality strength. Go back in time to think of those things that others told you that you couldn't do or thought you'd never be able to do. Whether the messages you received were subtle or not so subtle, chances are you got the clear message that there were some things you were better at than others, and some things you shouldn't even attempt to try.

The reality is, that those messages you received were based on other people's perception of you, and even though they may have had the best of intentions, such as not wanting you to fail, the end result is always the same. You end up with far too many should's and shouldn'ts that hold you back, give you a feeling of incompetence, and leave you much more likely to loathe yourself for all the things you can't do, rather than love yourself for all the things you can do!

Show yourself that you really can do whatever you put your mind to - this isn't about proving anything to anyone else, but yourself! And know that if there is something you fail at, it's never a failure but a learning experience that puts you more in touch with yourself as you learn even more about who you really are and what you're all about!

Pamper yourself.

Give yourself a fresh makeover. Not that you need to change yourself in any kind of a drastic way, but sometimes just treating yourself to a new updated hairstyle, some new makeup, a new wardrobe, a fresh manicure or pedicure or whatever else is within your budget and fits your lifestyle can do wonders for how you feel about yourself. Don't do any of this for anyone else but yourself, and make sure it reflects who you are and not some hairstylist's or makeover artist's latest craze, but just some small steps to make you feel your best can do wonders for your self-esteem and your ability to see your beautiful, loveable self in a fresh new light.

Becoming your healthiest self by joining a fun exercise class, finding someone to run or bike with, taking up yoga or dance classes, and finding your own path to healthy living by learning to cook healthy meals for yourself are all ways that you send yourself the message that you're worth taking care of in healthy ways!

Remind yourself of how loveable you are.

Finally, daily affirmations can make such a difference if you start each and every day with your favorite inspirational sayings that you post as a reminder on your bathroom mirror or fridge reminding you of all that you are, all that you have to offer someone truly deserving of you, and all that is beautiful and loveable about yourself! Find those sayings that inspire you and write them out so that they become that much more real in your own handwriting, etching them in your mind.

Most of all, Nadia, remember that there is no one like you, no one who can do what you were created to do, and there is no one you ever need to prove your worthiness to of all that is wonderful and beautiful and loving in the world. You deserve nothing less than all that love and life have to offer you, my beautiful friend, and the irony is that it's only when we eventually come to believe this that we finally find that's exactly what we end up with!

Much love to you!

Love,

Jane

What about you? Do you have any additional ideas on how we can all give ourselves the gift of loving ourselves? Share them with us in the comments.

It's Time To Celebrate YOU!

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Loving yourself and recognizing all of the wonderful, valuable, and lovable qualities that make you the beautiful person that you are is the first step to having the kind of love in your life that you've been longing for. A beautiful woman is celebrating herself by giving herself a bouquet of flowers.You're pretty great, no matter what you think about yourself. How do I know? Because everyone is pretty great. We all have our own unique qualities that make us special, interesting, valuable and lovable. It's time to start celebrating those unique qualities that make you you. It's in the noticing and celebrating of our own special qualities that we let the light of ourselves shine out for the rest of the world to see. If we don't see it ourselves, how can we expect anyone else to?

So it's time to celebrate this beautiful woman that we all know as YOU! The weekend is here and there's no time like the present, so let's make this weekend into an impromptu celebration of everything that you bring to the table. Let's get started…

Love yourself

Write down three things that you love about yourself – they can be three things that you do really well (think knitting, organizing closets, putting together beautiful flower arrangements) or personality traits (kindness, generosity, patience). Don't sell yourself short – we all have things that we're good at, the problem is that remembering these things isn't one of them. Sometimes the things that we're good at come so naturally to us that we don't even realize what a gift they are. So if you're having trouble thinking of three – don't despair. Just start with one for now, and pay attention to yourself over the course of the day and think of two more. You'll be amazed at how many things you notice that you're great at!

Pamper yourself

Focus on making yourself happy this weekend. A few ideas:

Immerse yourself. Sure, it might be a cliché, but it's a good one - Draw yourself a nice hot bubble bath complete with some relaxing, rejuvenating aromatic bath salts, candles, soft music (or simply quiet if you prefer), and enjoy a long, hot soak. We are all intimately connected to water, and the feeling of water against our skin is simply renewing. Think of how it feels on your beautiful skin (yes, you have beautiful skin!)

Grab a cup of coffee, a friend, your dog, or just your own inner thoughts, and take an early morning stroll around the park and simply breathe in all of the nature.

Curl up on the couch with your most comforting comforter and read that book you haven't gotten to, watch a movie or catch up on your favorite shows.

The point is to do something you enjoy for yourself, and not because someone else wants you to. This is your time.

Go buy yourself something pretty

It doesn't need to be expensive, it just needs to be something that makes you feel special, feel good. Some pretty new cotton panties, a new pair of simple earrings or some new lipstick or eyeliner are all easy ways to bring beauty into your life.

An inexpensive bouquet of local flowers each week from the grocery store in a vase by your bedside table can brighten up your mood on a daily basis and doesn't cost much.

Put your best self forward

Wear your favorite knock-their-socks-off outfit just to go for a walk or to the grocery store. You can't help but strut your stuff with that air of confidence when you're wearing your hottest outfit, complete with all the accessories. Stop saving it for that special occasion and get some use out of it now!

Another way to feel your best is to wear your favorite lingerie under your everyday clothes even when you're doing mundane everyday things like running your errands. You'll be amazed at how much more confident you feel!

Make a dream list

Make a list of all of the things you've always dreamed of doing, both grand and simple. Wanted to walk on the Great Wall of China? Put it on the list. Wanted to go take a sailing lesson? Put it on there. Wanted to check out the famous theater downtown? Write it down. Then organize your list from most outlandish down to the simplest.

Now go down the list starting at the top, pick the first one that you can reasonably do now, and then go do it this weekend. You'll feel great when you scratch it off the list, and then you can plan another one for next weekend!

Connect with a friend

Call up one of your gal pals and let her know that you're ready for a celebration – just because! You can go out and celebrate each other – make a deal that you will prepare to tell her all of the wonderful things that you love about her in exchange for her telling you all of the things that she loves about you. You'll both feel great afterwards!

Loving yourself and recognizing all of the wonderful, valuable, and lovable qualities that make you the beautiful person that you are is the first step to having the kind of love in your life that you've been longing for. And the best part is, it's completely under your control!

So don't wait another second to start your weekend celebration of the beautiful, radiant, confident woman known as YOU!

It's Time to Be Selfish

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It's time to be selfish - Road sign pointing in different directions to "I want", "You want" "We want", and "They want".I know; we've all been brought up to be very good little girls. And we've become very well-behaved women. We learned well that we were to put others needs before our own, and not be selfish. And we've done just that, haven't we.

We're oh so good at meeting everyone's needs except our own. We know all too well how to take care of other people, especially the men in our lives that we've made so many excuses for over the years. We can cater to everyone else with an amazing sensitivity to what they need, and we know how to make them feel good about themselves.

But in the process there's someone whose needs we've overlooked over and over and over again; yes, I'm talking about you.  And the role you play all too well. At the expense of yourself and your own needs.Continue Reading

Why Won't He Commit? 7 Things You Can Do to Move Things Along

561 Comments

A beautiful woman on a pier with her boyfriend in the background, upset because he won't commit.
What do I do to make him want what I want?

There’s a very common scenario that seems to happen to all of us at one time or another, and sometimes over and over again.

We end up in a relationship with a guy that has tons of potential, IF he would just commit!

And the dilemma is always - how long to wait it out to see if he truly IS going to come around?  Or are we just wasting our time? Or, what if you've finally had enough, and decide to move on right before he was about to come around?

This is one of the most commonly asked questions because we are such a hopeful group.  The bottom line is that what we’re really asking is how do we know if he’ll ever commit?

When I was doing some soul searching on this subject, I realized that this was my own number one reason for being single as long as I was. I wasted so much time and energy - especially time – waiting. Waiting for a guy to come around. Waiting and waiting for him to commit.Continue Reading

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About Jane Garapick

Hi, I'm Jane Garapick. I'm here to provide inspiration, support and empowerment on the journey to true love. I know what it’s like to have a broken heart, a broken dream, and a broken you. And I know for a fact, that your dreams can still come true! Read more...
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