How to Find Self-Love in Three Steps

It can be hard to know how to find self-love in adulthood (Learn To Like Yourself). You might not remember the last time you heard someone say, "Good job." You might miss receiving gold stars. You might feel inadequate after a coworker gets the promotion that you wanted. But there are ways to find self-love within yourself that do not include competition or recent appraisal from others. Read on to learn some positive steps that can remind you how to find self-love.

When you are an adult, you are expected to work hard without approval. You are not handed a syllabus or homework assignment to help you figure out what you need to do to land a job, afford a house, or repair a shaky relationship. Without verbal or physical guides, you might feel helpless (Challenges of Living with Anxiety). So no wonder it is hard for you to love yourself. However, you can use the following steps as guides to learn how to find self-love.

How to Find Self-Love After You've Lost Self-Esteem

Step 1 to Find Self-Love: Show Resilience

Resilience is the most important skill to possess. If you do not yet have it, you can still develop it. First, admit to yourself that you do not feel loved. Let that sink in and then tell yourself that you want to love yourself and your life. Take some time and write down what might help you feel the love that you need to keep going. This list will be a guide to help you become proactive in achieving your other goals.

Showing resilience is like studying really hard for a class that everyone else is too scared to take. Despite the thought of failure, you jump right in and do not quit. You face challenges and might even cry in the process, but in the end, you succeed because you had the will to do it and a plan of which you followed through.

Even if you do not actually meet your goals, you get a gold star for putting your best foot forward and demonstrating resilience. I believe in the cliche, "There are always second chances."

Once you have resilience, it will be easier to reach your goals while loving yourself in the process.

Step 2 to Find Self-Love: Look at Your Blessings

Not all of us are fortunate enough to have had great relationships, prestigious careers, or the ability to afford a nice house. But all of us have had something or someone wonderful in our lives.

When you hear the word blessings, think about a nice person. What did this person do for you? How much did he or she impact your life? Did you feel blessed by this person recently? If not, think about the last time someone else made you feel blessed.

When you think about people who love you, you start to remember how you are loved. Eventually, you might start to love yourself.

Step 3 to Find Self-Love: Give Yourself Positive Affirmations

If you are like me, you might have taken positive affirmations a little too far and turned them into something conceited like, "I am by far the best one for the job." or "I'm the smartest one here."

These affirmations could very well be lies as coping mechanisms for low self-esteem. To me, they are not healthy. But it would be beneficial to think about affirmations while acknowledging the value of others.

You can acknowledge your parents by saying an affirmation like "My parents have always told me that they loved me. So I am loved. I have a purpose."

You can acknowledge a teacher by saying "My teacher gave me a gold star. I must have been a good student. Maybe I will be a good employee now."

When you acknowledge your blessings, it shows that they have impacted your character. This is probably one of the most effective ways to feel loved.

You might think these steps are silly and that they will not work for you. That is fine. I encourage you to think of your own. Please share your ideas on how to find self-love in the comments.

Photo courtesy of Lindsay Allen.

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