Polkadots & 5 Ways to Love Yourself

In my opinion the first duty of a mom is to learn how to love herself unconditionally. Her quirks, her flaws, her own way of being.  When we love our imperfect selves we can then love our imperfect spouse and children without conditions. True love has no conditions, it is not given when the person performs but taken away when they aren’t “perfect”. This should apply to ourselves as well. We do not need to stop loving ourselves when the dishes and laundry are piled high, the scale doesn’t say what we want it to or we didn’t act the way we thought we should’ve. I was struggling with knowing how to begin loving myself and the question was asked of me, “How do you show love to others?”
I took my answers and began showing love to myself in these ways;

Speak Kindly – Words of affirmation is my love language. So when I’m speaking to a family member or friend I pay attention to my tone and choose my words very carefully. Need a word of encouragement just ask me! Hence this blog post...lol. But why is it that it’s so hard to apply this to myself? I can’t tell you how many times I’ve said to myself; “I’m a pushover, I’m messy, I’m a bad mom”. I’ve been replacing these negative phrases with positive ones and trying to be kind to myself by the words I say in my head. Instead I replace them with phrases like this, “It’s okay to assert yourself”, “I approve of myself and feel great about myself”, “I’m not a perfect mom but I’m exactly the kind of mom my children need”.  

Spend Quality Time – Whether it’s taking yourself to the nail shop to get your nails done, treating yourself to a nice dinner at a fancy restaurant or taking a long time in the bath, quality time with yourself is important. It says that you value time with you and you enjoy time with you.

Buy a Gift – Lately I’ve been buying myself flowers. From time to time while shopping at Trader Joe’s I stop at the flower section and get myself a nice bouquet of flowers. I say, this is for you, you are special and I love you. It works!

Write Love Letters – Write down all the things that you love about yourself in a journal and glance at it from time to time. If you truly don’t know what you like about yourself you can ask others.     

Protect Yourself – I would fiercely protect a family member or friend. I was in biology lab in college one day when another girl said something not so nice to my friend. It really hurt her. She expressed it to me and when class was over I pulled the girl aside and defended my friend! Somehow it is not instinctual to do this for myself. I’m working on it thought! I try to remember to set boundaries around myself and if someone acts or says something hurtful I protect myself by saying how I feel, if the behavior doesn’t change I just distance myself.

Romans 8:39 38 “For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

In my opinion the first duty of a mom is to learn how to love herself unconditionally. Her quirks, her flaws, her own way of being.  When we love our imperfect selves we can then love our imperfect spouse and children without conditions. True love has no conditions, it is not given when the person performs but taken away when they aren’t “perfect”. This should apply to ourselves as well. We do not need to stop loving ourselves when the dishes and laundry are piled high, the scale doesn’t say what we want it to or we didn’t act the way we thought we should’ve. I was struggling with knowing how to begin loving myself and the question was asked of me, “How do you show love to others?” I took my answers and began showing love to myself in these ways;

Speak Kindly – Words of affirmation is my love language. So when I’m speaking to a family member or friend I pay attention to my tone and choose my words very carefully. Need a word of encouragement just ask me! Hence this blog post...lol. But why is it that it’s so hard to apply this to myself? I can’t tell you how many times I’ve said to myself; “I’m a pushover, I’m messy, I’m a bad mom”. I’ve been replacing these negative phrases with positive ones and trying to be kind to myself by the words I say in my head. Instead I replace them with phrases like this, “It’s okay to assert yourself”, “I approve of myself and feel great about myself”, “I’m not a perfect mom but I’m exactly the kind of mom my children need”.  

Spend Quality Time – Whether it’s taking yourself to the nail shop to get your nails done, treating yourself to a nice dinner at a fancy restaurant or taking a long time in the bath, quality time with yourself is important. It says that you value time with you and you enjoy time with you.

Buy a Gift – Lately I’ve been buying myself flowers. From time to time while shopping at Trader Joe’s I stop at the flower section and get myself a nice bouquet of flowers. I say, this is for you, you are special and I love you. It works!

Write Love Letters – Write down all the things that you love about yourself in a journal and glance at it from time to time. If you truly don’t know what you like about yourself you can ask others.     

Protect Yourself – I would fiercely protect a family member or friend. I was in biology lab in college one day when another girl said something not so nice to my friend. It really hurt her. She expressed it to me and when class was over I pulled the girl aside and defended my friend! Somehow it is not instinctual to do this for myself. I’m working on it thought! I try to remember to set boundaries around myself and if someone acts or says something hurtful I protect myself by saying how I feel, if the behavior doesn’t change I just distance myself.

Romans 8:39 38 “For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”