Admit it.
If you’re single on Valentine’s day, it totally sucks. You dread the day when cute couples will invade your social media feeds with pictures of their gifts and romantic declarations of love.
But you’re forgetting one thing.
Valentine’s day is not about being in a relationship.
It’s about love.
And you don’t need to be in a relationship to celebrate love. It’s the perfect opportunity for you to love others, in general, but most importantly, to love yourself.
Self-love gives you permission to have compassion for yourself in spite of your mistakes and imperfections. Self-love says it’s OK to recognize the wonderful gifts, qualities, and skills that you bring to the table that make you the best friend, employee, and partner in a relationship. Self-love is self-acceptance.
Why hog all the attention for yourself?
Being in a healthy relationship with someone else starts with the relationship that you have with yourself. Seriously, you can’t demand the love and respect that you deserve from others if you aren’t equipped to get it from yourself. You teach other people how to treat you by how you treat yourself.
For instance, if you’re someone who:
Is afraid to ask for what you want
Is always trying to prove yourself to people who continuously reject you
Or
Is willing to settle for being with someone you know isn’t good to you or for you,
You are the victim of your own mistreatment and consequently will attract others who duplicate the same treatment.
But the more you love yourself, the more you’ll be prepared to love your boo when he finally shows up once and for all. Plus, loving yourself makes you more confident and confidence is seriously attractive.
If you’re single this Valentine ’s Day resist the urge to be depressed, feel sorry for yourself, and hate on everybody else who’s flaunting their goodies on Facebook.
Rather than pretending it’s just another dreadful day, use it to celebrate the self-love that you deserve.
How to get started?
There are a ton of things you can do to show appreciation for number 1. But if you’re used to accommodating everyone else but you, you may not know how. But here’s three things you can do:
- Practice affirming yourself. Remind yourself how beautiful and worthy you are. Even if no one else can see it, you should be able to see it because after all, you spend everyday with you.
- So, what is it that makes you so beautiful? Write it in a Valentine’s day card and mail it to yourself. List the amazing qualities that you have to offer, your character qualities, your talents, your accomplishments. Use them to remind you of your worth. If you can’t see them, don’t expect anyone else to see them.
- Send yourself flowers. Yup you read that right. What’s wrong with publicly showering yourself with love? You deserve it. If your co-workers want to know who they’re from, tell them, they’re from “someone who loves me.”
Being single on Valentine’s day is not the end of the world. Make it the beginning of a relationship with yourself that promotes the self-love, compassion, and acceptance that we all crave. It’s an amazing opportunity to focus on what you need and want in life, love, and relationships. There’s no better place to get it than in a relationship with yourself.
