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Having fun and doing what you love is a blessing and it definitely boosts your self love quotient, but self love is much deeper than this.
By Chevanon via Pexels
A few years back, while strolling through the city of Vienna, me and my husband stopped at a street side café. The light drizzle outside made the café glow with warmth.
The earthy rain kissed smell mixed with the smell of fresh burgers and coffee; it promised a beautiful evening. And a beautiful evening it was, as we sat there poring over the map and figuring out the next destination to cover while in the beautiful city.
That evening as I sat watching the raindrops trickling down lazily on the French windows of the café, and I sipped my coffee. I felt like I really had aced the game of self love. Here I am sitting in a beautiful city, lounging around, just watching the rain fall and exploring the world; this is what investing in myself must feel like.
Fast forward to today, I realized how wrong I was. As I learnt over the years, self love has got nothing to do with just having fun. Yes, having fun and doing what you love on a constant basis is a blessing and it definitely boosts your self love quotient, but self love is much deeper than just this.
In today’s world, commercials are filled with messages of prioritising yourself albeit with a catch. ‘Go have that sinful pastry’, ‘Blow your savings in mindless activities’, or just, ‘Give yourself a break from cooking and order pizzas in because it’s the weekend.’ And people do fall for these traps, without even thinking for once. Self love is not about indulgence, it’s about self care.
Here is what in my opinion self care is all about.
We have the ability to shut out the world if we do not like what it says to us. But have you ever been able to quiet that voice inside your head that scares you? The voice that makes you sad and tells how unworthy you are?
A person might be in paradise but just one single whisper from that voice can snatch away paradise from you. Self love is about teaching the voice to be nice to you and not bring you down every time it opens its mouth.
Destructive thoughts are damaging and if it runs your life you are obviously not going to enjoy the ride. Learn to be conscious of your thoughts and if you love yourself, do not believe anything it says.
Thoughts are just thoughts, and thoughts become actions only when you give your energy to it. Reclaim your power. If negative thoughts are incessant, replace them with what you would rather want in your life.
Walking away from a situation that does not serve us, from people who do not respect us or from a job that does not ignite a spark within us is not an easy thing to do. But, if you love yourself, you must walk away. To save yourself.
There are people who promised they would call but never did; it’s not that they are busy, they understand that you are not a priority. There are situations that will make your life seem like hell. If you love yourself, do not stay there. If you cannot do that, at least plan something else. Do not abandon yourself.
It is easy to love another person, but it is hard to love oneself. We all go that extra mile for the ones we care about. But what happens when we have to go that extra mile for ourselves? When it comes to coaxing ourselves to go that extra mile don’t we procrastinate? Maybe we need to sleep more, laugh more, just meet up with friends or maybe work hard to reach a goal. Do you put that effort in for yourself or do you just leave it for another day? What are you teaching yourself by doing this? That you are not important enough for yourself. That you do not matter.
To conclude, self love is not about over indulgence. It is about prioritising your well being, happiness and most importantly peace of mind at all costs. It’s about not abandoning yourself and protecting yourself from the effects of negative self-talk. Be careful what you understand by self love. If it does not empower you, it is not the real deal.
Image Source- By Chevanon via Pexels
A Social Media Content Writer by profession. A writer by heart. A genuine foodie. Simple by nature. Love to read, create paintings and cook. Have impossible dreams. At the moment, engaged in making those dreams read more...
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UP Boards Topper Prachi Nigam was trolled on social media for her facial hair; our obsession with appearance is harsh on young minds.
Prachi Nigam’s photo has been doing the rounds on social media for the right reasons. Well, scratch that- I wish the above statement were true. This 15-year-old girl should ideally be revelling in her spectacular achievement of scoring a whopping 98.05% and topping her tenth-grade boards. But oddly enough, along with her marks, it’s something else that garners more attention – her facial hair.
While the trolls are driving themselves giddy by mocking this girl who hasn’t even completed her school yet, the ones who are taking her side are going one step ahead – they are sharing her photoshopped pictures, sans the facial hair, looking nothing less than a celebrity with captions saying – “Prachi Nigam, ten years later”.
Doctors have already diagnosed her with PCOD in their comments, based on photographic evidence. While we have names for people shamed for their weight – body shaming, for their skin colour- racism, for their age- age shaming, for being a female- sexism, this category of shaming where one faces criticism for their appearance has no name. With that, it also has zero shame attached to it.
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