Turn self criticism into self love
5 Daily practices to transform your inner dialogue.
Self love, it’s a life long journey that all of us have to go through. Sometimes loving ourselves feels so alien when really, it should come as natural to us breathing, sleeping and laughing. But why is it so hard?
I’m not sure why, but we love to be our biggest haters sometimes, always disregarding our own needs to help others, feeling the need to justify everything we do, neglect ourselves and forget to take care of the things important to us, and not to mention - all the negative self talk!
Well I think it’s about time we stop and start to treat ourselves like we would a loved one. BECAUSE WE ARE A LOVED ONE. Seriously, the only home, the only person, the only love you are promised in this lifetime is your own… So start taking it more seriously.
Here are 5 easy practices you can implement into your everyday that will help shift your negative self perception into a more positive one:
1) Mirror Time
This one might feel silly, but I want you to actually spend time looking at yourself in the mirror everyday. And not in a critical way, in a loving way. We’ve been told that to like the way we look is “vain”, but this is rubbish. Appreciating the way we look doesn’t come from the ego, it comes from a place of love. I bet most of the time you look in the mirror its to check you look “okay” before heading out… Well try and change that, start actually LOOKING at yourself, no judgements, just observing. Find things you love about yourself everyday, maybe it’s how your hair looks, the way your jumper sits on you or the way your new makeup you tried looks today. The point is, you need to start seeing and appreciating your beauty, don’t be embarrassed by this, it SHOULD be encouraged to like the way you look and be confident in your own skin.
2) Watch how you speak about others
You might be thinking - how does this affect my relationship with myself? But it has everything to do with it. You see, when you constantly talk badly about others and judge them harshly, you are sending signals to your brain that it’s normal to talk about people like that. Your brain shifts, your thought patterns become more judgemental not just to others but to yourself as well. If you paint the outside world to be negative, it will sour your internal world (i.e the relationship you have with yourself). Being judgemental is a downright no no anyways, but if you need any more reason to stop gossiping, take this as your sign. Every time your talk about others in a bad way, you are telling your subconscious brain that people talk about YOU like that.
3) Make promises to yourself - and stick to them!
One of the reasons we have a negative image of ourselves is simply because we don’t respect ourselves the way we do others. If your boss told you to stay at work late and finish a project by 7PM, you would do it with no questions asked. If you tell yourself, I am going to start walking to work everyday instead of driving there - chances are you will make excuses so you can continue driving to work instead. This is because it’s harder to keep promises to ourselves as we know there is no one to keep us accountable, we can be lazy, we can be unmotivated and we can stay in this negative cycle because whose going to tell us we can’t? But if we change that, start holding ourselves accountable, start showing up for ourselves how we would a loved one or colleague, our self image changes. I want you to start doing the things you keep saying you’ll do. Join that run club, read 10 pages of a book, whatever the promise is you keep making to yourself - keep it!
4) allow yourself time to feel
This blog page is about self love, but a big part of that is self acceptance. Stop brushing your thoughts and feeling aside and allow yourself to be in this current state of emotion. When we bottle our emotions, they get bigger and affect us more. Self love is unconditional, you have to love all parts of yourself. Have a cry, get angry, be present with your thoughts and feelings. It will teach you a lot and in turn change your perspective you have about yourself.
5) Give back to your physical body any way you can
Giving back to your body is giving back to your mind. Once I started viewing movement as a privilege and I started exercising in ways that made me FEEL good rather than look good, my self image changed. Sometimes you just need a change of scenery, get out and move your body! For me, it’s yoga, when I connect with my body on the mat and notice the feelings of each pose, I feel so much love for myself. Linking to building that self respect- staying active and looking after your physical body will build a better self image (mentally). Start taking your physical health more seriously, not for any other reason than you HAVE to. Your body is yours for life, look after it and it will look after you!
Hope this post helps🩷!
